With the 2016 presidential election less than two years away, it’s worth taking a look at the travel schedules of the respective contenders.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., traveled to four Middle Eastern countries, including Israel, earlier this month, creating a stir that despite her frequent denials, she may be considering a run in 2016.
The U.S. and Israel have been close allies since since Israel’s founding, and leaders of the two countries often have close relationships. Former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush visited Israel numerous times and frequently hosted Israeli officials at the White House.
“We are proud of the strong bond we have forged with Israel, based on our shared values and ideals,” Clinton said in a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Israel’s 50th birthday.
President Obama first visited Israel as a candidate in July 2008 – but did not go again until March 2013. He not visited since.
A majority of Americans (51 percent) expressed support of Israel amid the country’s conflict with Hamas, a July Pew Research survey found. Among conservative Republicans, 77 percent sympathized more with Israel in the conflict with Palestine.
One potential candidate, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, may be seeking to draw a staunch distinction on Israel between himself and libertarian-leaning Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.
“It’s no accident that Cruz is sponsoring bill after bill, making speech after speech, about Israel and mentioning Israeli citizens and Israeli causes—all with Rand right there in the chamber,” one Cruz adviser anonymously told the National Journal in September.
Cruz has visited Israel as recently as May as part of a four-country swing. Paul has not visited Israel since 2013, and has been criticized as wanting to wean Israel off foreign aid money from the U.S.
Other potential Republican candidates have also made visits to Israel.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has already been to Israel three times in 2014. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who last traveled to Israel in 2012, accused Obama of dropping “the ball” on Middle East politics during an April speech in Iowa. Texas Gov. Rick Perry visited Israel in October 2013, which prematurely sparked speculation that he was gearing up for another run in 2016. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio — who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — last visited Israel in early 2013.
One outlier is former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the leader of the RealClearPolitics average of polls for 2016 Republican candidates, who last visited Israel on a private family trip in 2007.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton — who holds a formidable early lead in the RealClearPolitics average of polls for Democratic candidates — has not been to Israel since visiting twice in 2012 as Secretary of State. Clinton defended Israel’s campaign against Hamas earlier this year, saying Israel was “absolutely right in saying that they can’t just sit there and let rockets rain down.”
Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who would likely run as a Democrat if he were to run in 2016, has remained rather quiet about Israel, and has not visited this year.
Vice President Joe Biden, a former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, last visited Israel in January 2014. “We will never ever abandon Israel out of our own self-interests,” Biden said in November.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who is on the shortlist as a challenger to Clinton, traveled to Israel in August. “Any New Yorker who doesn’t understand that Israel’s fight is our fight is living not in the state of New York but in the state of denial,” he said in September.
Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley spent eight days in Israel, Jordan and the Palestine territories in early 2013, billing the trip as an economic development mission. “I hope our country can be a broker for peace and help bring about a resolution,” O’Malley said in an interview with Fusion’s Jorge Ramos this year.
Multiple potential candidates have said they’re planning on deciding early in the new year whether to run for the White House, so we may soon see more candidates taking trips abroad.
