AIPAC Buys California: $5M to Stop One Name
AIPAC-linked Super PACs have spent more than five million dollars in California congressional advertising targeting Aisha Wahab, a progressive candidate whose name has become the clearest indicator yet of how organised pro-Israel money moves in American domestic politics, according to The Guardian.
AIPAC Buys California: $5M to Stop One Name
AIPAC-linked Super PACs have spent more than five million dollars in California congressional advertising targeting Aisha Wahab, a progressive candidate whose name has become the clearest indicator yet of how organised pro-Israel money moves in American domestic politics, according to The Guardian.
The spending — split between attack ads against Wahab and promotional material backing her opponent Melissa Hernandez — represents one of the largest single-candidate interventions the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's affiliated groups have mounted in a state-level race. California's congressional primaries have increasingly become a testing ground for outside spending, but the scale here is notable: five million dollars to defeat one candidate in a district most national observers would not have flagged as decisive.
Wahab's campaign has made the spending itself part of its argument, framing the ad barrage as evidence of exactly the kind of institutional pressure progressives say distorts representation in Washington. Hernandez's campaign has not publicly commented on the Super PAC support.
The intervention lands inside a broader national debate about the reach of AIPAC-aligned money following its successful campaigns against several progressive incumbents in 2022 and 2024. Critics argue the pattern amounts to a litmus test imposed on Democratic candidates from outside their constituencies. Supporters say it reflects legitimate voter education on foreign policy positions.
The California contest now heads toward its conclusion with outside spending, not local organising, shaping the final narrative.
