AIPAC spends around $30m in Stevens’s primary, then reportedly $9m for Rogers

Scheduled church unity event preceded Stevens’s criticism of El-Sayed

AIPAC and its affiliated groups spent around $30 million earlier this year trying to secure Haley Stevens’s victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary, The Guardian reported. It was the group’s largest-ever investment in a single race, and the report described the effort as an attempt “to stop El-Sayed by any means necessary.” After Stevens lost to Abdul El-Sayed, AIPAC reportedly spent $9 million supporting Republican Mike Rogers, whom Stevens backed Sunday. Rogers was apparently skeptical of the group’s support, and the report separately attributed the apparent reason for Stevens’s reversal to El-Sayed’s refusal to share her position on Israel.

Stevens had been scheduled to appear alongside El-Sayed and veteran Rep. Jim Clyburn at a predominantly Black Detroit church on Sunday, an attempt to demonstrate Democratic unity before election day. Instead, she released a lengthy statement attacking El-Sayed over alleged antisemitism and his associations. She was then told she was no longer welcome at campaign events, which she took personally.

The report included a Jose Juarez/AP photograph of Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers and Rep. Haley Stevens attending a service at Perfecting Church in Detroit on Sunday. A Jeff Kowalsky/AFP/Getty Images photograph showed El-Sayed and Maryland Sen. Angela Alsobrooks listening as South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn spoke to the media outside Northend Church of God in Detroit on Sunday. A Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP photograph showed El-Sayed speaking to the media during a campaign rally at Eastern Michigan University on Monday. A Kristen Norman/AP photograph showed Stevens and El-Sayed on a television screen during a debate on 7 July 2026 in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

The Guardian’s analysis, by Joseph Gedeon in Detroit, Michigan, called the reversal “extraordinary” and described the road from Democratic Senate candidate to campaigning alongside Rogers — a Republican she had once called a rubber stamp for Donald Trump — as “remarkably short.” Stevens had previously warned that Rogers would enable Trump’s agenda. The analysis focused on Israel. Its deck said: “The issue runs through almost every twist and turn and has come to define the congresswoman’s political persona.” Gedeon wrote: “Stevens’s extraordinary reversal is about more than a personal feud or a bruised political ego. It is the culmination of a fight over Israel that has come to define the congresswoman’s political persona, seemingly eclipsing her commitment to the Democratic party and its opposition to Donald Trump.”

The analysis said Israel “continues to dog the wider Democratic party, especially when it comes to candidates who accept money from Aipac.” It described AIPAC as the biggest pro-Israel lobby in the country and one of the biggest spenders in U.S. elections. Other Democratic candidates sought distance from the AIPAC brand as U.S. voters grew increasingly skeptical of the U.S.-Israel relationship, while Stevens “seems to have doubled down,” The Guardian reported.

Stevens continued the fight over Israel after losing the primary. Just days before the election, she demanded that El-Sayed distance himself from an outside group’s advertisement that blamed rising grocery costs on American support for Israel. The advertisement was not produced by his campaign, and El-Sayed explicitly rejected its contents. The Guardian concluded: “That was apparently not enough.”

The Guardian said the follow-up CNN interview with Anderson Cooper “only deepened the questions about her decision” and that Stevens “struggled to offer a clear explanation” when Cooper repeatedly asked what had changed between her assurances to fellow Democrats the previous evening and her endorsement the following morning. She said, “This is just a weight off my shoulders,” and repeatedly returned to El-Sayed’s supposed anger and “lack of kindness.” Cooper pointed out that the criticisms had been known for some time, including when Stevens had agreed to campaign with El-Sayed.

The Guardian reported that, despite all the intra-party divisions over Israel, “the response from Democrats has been unified: across the spectrum, they are horrified.” It described Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer as “no progressive firebrand” and said he called Stevens’s move “a despicable betrayal.” Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell, a close friend of Stevens, said: “She seriously hurt herself.” Michigan Democratic Party chair Curtis Hertel declared that Stevens was no longer a member of the party and “would not be in the future.”

The Guardian also reported that many had expressed concern about the influence of Stevens’s fiancé, Jason Turkish, a pro-Israel lawyer who long donated to Democrats before backing Rogers himself and other Republican candidates, including Maine Sen. Susan Collins. The analysis said Stevens’s support for Rogers was “tying herself evermore deeply to Israel.” Over the weekend, Drop Site News reported a number of ties between Rogers’s campaign and the Israeli government.

The Guardian said Israel had never been the focus of El-Sayed’s campaign. For a year, he told Michigan voters the same three things: money out of politics, money in his pocket, and Medicare for All. On the trail, he stirred controversy by saying U.S. military aid to Israel was better used for domestic priorities and by campaigning with progressive influencer Hasan Piker, whom the report described as often incendiary. El-Sayed continued to focus his message on the cost-of-living crisis as Stevens made news in recent days.

Stevens had tweeted “Medicare for all. NOW.” in 2018 but now opposes the proposed system of universal healthcare. She had also consistently accepted corporate political action committee money, which The Guardian said left her “no natural ally” on El-Sayed’s signature issues. The analysis continued: “But she is a Democrat who, by her own account, impeached Trump twice, and on almost everything else she sits far closer to El-Sayed than to Rogers, a Trump-endorsed Republican with a record of voting for abortion restrictions. She picked Rogers anyway.”

El-Sayed had repeatedly affirmed his commitment to Jewish safety. “My commitment to Jewish safety is the same as my commitment to the safety of my own daughters,” he has said. He had condemned antisemitism while arguing that the United States should stop providing military assistance to Israel.

A United Nations independent commission of inquiry concluded in September 2025 that Israel had committed genocide in Gaza. Around the same time, Democratic Sens. Chris Van Hollen and Jeff Merkley concluded after a fact-finding mission that Israel was pursuing a systematic campaign to destroy and ethnically cleanse Palestinians from Gaza. The senators accused the United States of complicity through its continued support for the Israeli government. A May New York Times/Siena poll found that 74% of Democratic voters opposed further military and economic support for Israel, a result The Guardian described as “far from a fringe position.”

The Guardian’s analysis said Stevens’s intervention, which had drawn criticism from top Democrats across the party, “threatens to undermine the effort to unite Democrats behind El-Sayed after a divisive primary.” It also “appears to have reinforced his argument that the party establishment has been too willing to make support for Israel a condition of political acceptance.”

Donald Trump celebrated Stevens’s endorsement of Rogers, calling her highly respected and suggesting she should join the Republican Party. El-Sayed’s response was shorter: “I actually don’t think about Haley Stevens.”