Politicians Aren’t Heroes

Seth Moulton is not a progressive; he will tell you that himself. He’s a New Democrat Coalition member, he rather prominently picked a fight by opposing trans participation in youth sports right after the 2024 elections, and he’s generally a down-the-line, center-left Democrat.

Yet the moment he jumped into a U.S. Senate primary against progressive Ed Markey, he essentially kicked off his campaign with the announcement that he would be returning all donations from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), and would refuse any further contributions from them. “AIPAC has aligned itself too closely with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s government,” Moulton wrote in a statement.

This is far from an isolated incident. Mallory McMorrow, running for Senate in Michigan, has called Israel’s war in Gaza a genocide, and after appearing to solicit support from AIPAC in a leaked message, said she would not accept any. Likely 2028 candidate Pete Buttigieg flipped to support limiting arms sales to Israel, joining multiple former recipients of AIPAC cash. People like House Armed Services Committee ranking Democrat Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) and New Democrat caucus leader Brad Schneider (D-IL) and Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), who are as squarely inside the pro-Israel foreign-policy establishment as anyone, are criticizing the Netanyahu government and favoring the use of U.S. leverage. The annual AIPAC-funded trip to Israel for freshman Democrats had low attendance.

This is all happening because of the recoiled horror at Israel’s genocidal actions in Gaza, but also because a protest movement made this a priority and influenced public opinion. Polling shows Americans opposing military aid to Israel and siding with the Palestinians; the numbers among Democrats are a whopping 54-13 in favor of Palestine. This is at all levels of the party, including older voters.

In other words, unfolding events moved the center of gravity and forced all factions of the political leadership of the party to its side. But it didn’t happen in a vacuum. For all the discomfort over college students protesting on campuses, it played a major role in pushing attention and changing minds.

The issue led the politicians, not the other way around. College kids and activists don’t have a super PAC, and in 2024 their few champions in Congress actually lost ground amid an onslaught of AIPAC cash. But none of that mattered when public sentiment changed: Those in power got out in front of the parade and pretended to be leading it.

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