https://theintercept.com/2022/08/03/missouri-2022-primary-results/

Cori won by a whopping 69-27 margin.

REP. CORI BUSH sailed to a comfortable reelection Tuesday night, sending a message that St. Louis Democrats are happy with their nonconformist representative. Her victory marks a win for progressive incumbents in an election year that has seen them embattled by outside spending and little supported — if not outright opposed — by the party establishment.

“They don’t like the fact that we don’t accept any corporate money. They don’t like that I speak the way that I speak because I came from this community and I sound like my community. They don’t love the fact that, instead of being what they call dignified, I show up as a protestor, that I’ve been on the frontlines forever,” Bush told the crowd at her election-night speech. “But our work isn’t based on what they like. Our work is based on what folks need.”

A former nurse and activist, Bush gained prominence locally as the Black Lives Matter movement took to the streets in 2014, after Ferguson police shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown. Since her election to Congress in 2020, Bush has pursued a confrontational style of politics that has rallied activists but has often put her at odds with party leadership, becoming one of the only congressional Democrats willing to say “defund the police,” and bucking party leadership in a row over decoupling an infrastructure bill from a wider progressive agenda.

Bush riled St. Louis’s old guard two years ago by unseating longtime Rep. William Lacy Clay, the scion of a political family. This year, in her first primary challenge as an incumbent, that old guard came gunning for Bush in the form of state senator and minority caucus whip Steven Roberts Jr.

Roberts was fond of saying that St. Louis voters had “buyer’s remorse” over Bush, including in remarks to Fox News on Monday. St. Louis Democrats, who broke for Bush by a margin of more than 2-to-1, appeared to disagree.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/3/us-elections-rashida-tlaib-wins-primary-despite-pro-israel-spending

Rashida is leading her nearest rival 64-22.

US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib has all but secured re-election after comfortably fending off primary challengers and an advertising campaign by a pro-Israel group.

Tlaib won the Democratic Party’s nomination for a newly drawn congressional district in Michigan, the Associated Press projected early on Wednesday, defeating three other candidates who vied for the seat, including Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey.

With more than a third of the votes reported, Tlaib was leading with 64 percent; Winfrey, her nearest competitor, was at 20 percent.

The congresswoman, who was first elected to the US Congress in 2018, had to overcome a campaign from a pro-Israel group that was established earlier this year with the main aim of defeating her.

The new district, which includes parts of Detroit as well as the suburbs of Dearborn and Dearborn Heights – home to large Arab American communities – is a safe Democratic seat, meaning that Tlaib is likely to cruise to re-election in November.

Turnout was low in Dearborn on Tuesday, with most precincts hosting more campaign volunteers than voters throughout the day. But many in the Arab American community expressed their excitement at the prospect of being able to vote for Tlaib.

“To see representation, especially in the Arab, Muslim community, is a big deal,” Rashida Al-Asbahi, a Tlaib supporter, told Al Jazeera. “And she’s qualified. She never steps back. She’s fierce, and what she says is always strong. I applaud her for that.”

Yahya Al-Mawri, a Yemeni American voter, said he supports Tlaib because of her “honourable” stances in the US Congress, citing her recent push for justice for Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was fatally shot by Israeli forces in May.

Tlaib is the sole current member of Congress of Palestinian descent; she is also the only US federal lawmaker who supports a single state with equal rights in Israel-Palestine and one of a handful of legislators backing the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a lobbying group, has been spending millions of dollars to defeat progressives critical of Israel, but it did not interfere in the Tlaib race.

However, a new pro-Israel group called the Urban Empowerment Action (UEA) PAC (political action committee) spent nearly $700,000 backing Winfrey, according to Open Secrets, a website that tracks US election spending.

In its founding statement, first reported by Politico, UEA PAC pledged to spend $1m to help Winfrey win against Tlaib.

One of the group’s top donors has donated millions of dollars to Republican and pro-Israel campaigns and PACs over the years, Federal Election Commission (FEC) public records show.

“These folks are tainting our democracy and trying to come from the outside … into our communities to tell them how to think, how to feel and how to vote,” Tlaib told Al Jazeera while campaigning in Dearborn on Tuesday.

“Many of my residents understand that I put them first, and that the decisions I’ve made have always been centred around making sure that their quality of life is improved immediately. So all I do is outwork the hate and continue moving forward.”

Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud said Tlaib’s advocacy for the people she represents is “second to none”.

“Regardless of how you feel about Rashida’s political views, she does the best constituent advocacy amongst congressional members; it’s an example really, and so we’re excited to have hopefully that office and that advantage here in the city of Dearborn,” Hammoud told Al Jazeera last week.

On Tuesday, Tlaib said she will continue to focus on acquiring federal funding for community centres and fight for environmental justice to hold “corporate polluters” accountable in her likely third term.

Emily Kaplan, an organiser with Jewish Voice for Peace Action, a group that opposes the occupation in Palestine, said it was important that Tlaib won comfortably.

“It is good to know that we’re sending Rashida back [to Congress] with a mandate, so she can fight for all people from Detroit to Palestine, and we’re behind her 100 percent,” Kaplan told Al Jazeera.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/08/03/enormous-victory-kansas-voters-resoundingly-defeat-anti-abortion-amendment

Kansans voted by a decisive margin on Tuesday to reject a proposed amendment that would have removed the right to abortion from the state’s constitution and empowered the Republican legislature to advance a total ban.

With almost all precincts reporting, the count was 59% against the amendment and 41% in favor, a strong win over GOP lawmakers’ attempt to overturn a 2019 Kansas Supreme Court ruling that deemed abortion a protected right under the state constitution.

“Anti-choice lawmakers take note: The voters have spoken, and they will turn out at the ballot box to oppose efforts to restrict reproductive freedom.”

Turnout was far higher Tuesday than in other primary contests in recent years, defying Republican efforts to take advantage of typically lower voter participation in primaries. According to the Associated Press, turnout approached “what’s typical for a fall election for governor.”

“This is truly a historic day for Kansas and for America. Freedom has prevailed,” said Kansans for Constitutional Freedom, which helped lead the opposition to the amendment. “Thank you to everyone who took part in this movement.”

The no vote on the first abortion-related referendum since the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade came despite a last-minute flurry of disinformation by a Republican-backed organization that aimed to mislead Kansans into thinking a yes vote would “give women a choice.”

The defeated amendment would have added to the state constitution the following: “The constitution of the state of Kansas does not require government funding of abortion and does not create or secure a right to abortion.”

State Republicans made clear in the weeks leading up to the vote that, had the amendment been approved, they were prepared to move swiftly to prohibit abortion entirely.

“We’ll be able to make further laws, further refinement, with my goal of life starting at conception,” Republican state Sen. Mark Steffen said at a rally in support of the amendment last month.

Mini Timmaraju, the president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, said in a statement late Tuesday that “at a time when reproductive freedom is under unprecedented threat across the country, Kansans said loud and clear at the ballot box: ‘We’ve had enough.'”

“Reproductive freedom is a winning issue, now and in November,” Timmaraju added. “Anti-choice lawmakers take note: The voters have spoken, and they will turn out at the ballot box to oppose efforts to restrict reproductive freedom.”

While abortion is legal in Kansas, it is restricted both by the law and by a shortage of providers, creating a struggle for both Kansans and those looking to travel to the state for abortion care from Oklahoma and Missouri, neighboring states where the procedure has been outlawed.

Trust Women, an abortion clinic in Wichita, told the Washington Post that it has seen a 60% surge in out-of-state patients over the past year.

Nancy Northup, the president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, said Tuesday’s vote is “an enormous victory for people in Kansas.”

“Like the strong majority of people across the U.S., Kansans want to make their own decisions about abortion,” said Northup. “Later this year, California, Michigan, Nevada, and Vermont will vote on measures to protect abortion access, and Kentucky will vote on an anti-abortion measure. This is an important opportunity for voters in those states to directly defend their right to make personal decisions about their own lives, bodies, and futures.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/08/03/aipacs-millions-help-unseat-jewish-progressive-andy-levin-michigan

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s sizable investments in Michigan’s 11th Congressional District paid off Tuesday when Rep. Haley Stevens defeated fellow Democratic Rep. Andy Levin, a Jewish progressive who has criticized Israel’s illegal and brutal occupation of Palestinian territory.

Stevens and Levin were forced into a primary contest by Michigan’s redistricting process, which provided an opportunity for AIPAC’s super PAC and other special interest groups to pour millions into the race to oust Levin, who has been described as the most progressive Jewish member of the House.

“It is alarming that this race, like many other Democratic primaries this cycle, was heavily impacted by the aggressive outside spending of AIPAC.”

Stevens ultimately prevailed with 60% of the vote, a win that AIPAC celebrated as “major and consequential.”

AIPAC’s intervention in the contest through the United Democracy Project—a super PAC funded by Republican billionaires—drew outrage from progressives and liberal Jewish organizations such as J Street, which lamented Levin’s defeat in a statement late Tuesday.

“It is alarming that this race, like many other Democratic primaries this cycle, was heavily impacted by the aggressive outside spending of AIPAC and its super PAC, the United Democracy Project,” J Street said. “They spent nearly $5 million to target and defeat Levin, far more than was spent by any other group.”

J Street went on to highlight AIPAC’s endorsement and funding of “109 Republicans who voted to overturn the 2020 election on January 6th, promoters of the Big Lie like Jim Jordan, Scott Perry, and more—while attacking candidates like Andy Levin… as extremists.”

“Democratic Party leaders should make absolutely clear just how harmful and unwelcome AIPAC’s interventions in its primary contests are,” the group added. “Candidates in future primaries should disavow and decline the support of AIPAC and its super PAC—which have come as a surprise to at least some of them.”

Levin was just the latest progressive Democrat to lose a race in which AIPAC took a heavy interest. Last month, the United Democracy Project helped corporate attorney Glenn Ivey defeat former U.S. Rep. Donna Edwards in the Democratic primary for Maryland’s 4th Congressional District.

In a statement congratulating Stevens and conceding the race, Levin said he was “the target of a largely Republican-funded campaign set on defeating the movement I represent no matter where I ran.”

“I will continue to speak out against the corrosive influence of dark money on our democracy,” Levin added. “Onward.”

Michele Weindling, electoral director of the youth-led Sunrise Movement, said Tuesday that the Democratic leadership is to blame for allowing “millions to pour into MI-11 to silence our generation” at a moment when “Americans, and young people especially, are doubting our democracy.”

“Rep. Andy Levin was one of the few representatives who have actually stood up for young and working people, and Congress is in a worse place without him,” said Weindling. “We are grateful for his leadership and for the young people who poured so much into this race.”

At a rally ahead of Tuesday’s primary, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—who endorsed Levin—said that AIPAC’s efforts in Michigan’s 11th Congressional District had “nothing to do—in my view—with Israel.”

“It is simply trying to defeat candidates and members of Congress who stand for working families and are prepared to demand that the wealthy and large corporations pay their fair share of taxes,” argued the Vermont senator, who has called on the Democratic National Committee to institute a ban on super PAC money in the party’s primary races.

“There is something profoundly wrong in our political system when a handful of billionaires, through super PACs that spend millions of dollars, try to defeat progressive candidates for Congress,” Sanders said over the weekend. “That is not what democracy is about. That is what oligarchy is about.”

AIPAC spent almost $5 million dollars of Trump supporting billionaires money to take out the most progressive Jew in the House of Representatives for daring to criticize Israel.

Just a grotesque thing for Jews, the Democratic Party, and American democracy. https://t.co/TTFsL9vFrw

— Max Berger (@maxberger) August 3, 2022

This one is on the Dem voters of Missouri. Kunce had enough money to compete even though Busch Valentine self funded. I hope her voters enjoy their vapid choice getting crushed in November. At least I won’t have to worry about sending $ to a state which was always going to be a reach for Dems.

https://theintercept.com/2022/08/03/missouri-2022-primary-results/

IF BUSH’S PRIMARY was about securing the gains progressives have made in recent election cycles, Kunce’s campaign represented a progressive movement on offense. But his efforts fell short Tuesday night, as Busch Valentine claimed 43 percent of the vote to Kunce’s 38 with 90 percent of ballots counted.

A Marine veteran and former policy wonk at the American Economic Liberties Project, a D.C.-based anti-monopoly advocacy organization, Kunce centered his pitch on his ability to regain ground with disaffected working-class voters that the Missouri Democratic establishment is rapidly losing. By embracing calls for universal health care and swearing off corporate PAC money, he tried to recreate a populist progressive model that has fueled the surprisingly resilient careers of Midwestern senators like Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis.

His opponent was in many ways the perfect foil. An heir to Anheuser-Busch fortune, Busch Valentine ca under fire for her past participation in the “Veiled Prophet Ball,” a white supremacist ritual that had for years been protested by advocates for racial equality.

Throughout the race, Busch Valentine’s knowledge of the issues and commitment to Democratic priorities were called into question. She botched an interview with Missouri’s largest newspaper — which endorsed Kunce — and, in a widely shared video, stumbled when asked about her thoughts on the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United, which she had earlier campaigned on overturning.

Despite her wealth and connections, Busch Valentine raised less money than Kunce, who brought in just under $5 million to her almost $3.5 million — $3 million of which she gave to her own campaign.