Today is primary day in Pennsylvania. The most watched race is in the Pittsburgh area where Republican big money interests have been assaulting progressive Democrat Summer Lee, using AIPAC to launder immense amounts of money to disable a Democratic Party effective young superstar— as usual, a woman of color, the quintessential AIPAC target. The Republicans would like to replace her with GOP-lite Edgewood Borough Councilor Bhavini Patel. Biden beat Trump here by 20 points and the partisan lean of the district is D+15, so whomever wins today’s primary will be going to Congress. AOC was in Pittsburgh over the weekend, campaigning for Summer Lee.
As of April 3, Summer had spent $1,143,481 and Patel had spent $461,911. MAGA billionaire Jeffrey Yass, the big money keeping Truth Social afloat and Pennsylvania’s richest resident, spent over $610,000 supporting Patel through his so-called “Moderate PAC” (which seems to have spent another $200,000 since the April 3 reporting deadline). Mark Mellman, the AIPAC targeter and head of DMFI claims his pro-genocide lobby’s most important race is today’s against Summer Lee. He claims they are going to be able to knock off Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman and that AOC and Rashida are too strongly entrenched for them but that “The person in the middle is Summer Lee. I think it’s hard to know exactly how vulnerable she is at the moment.” Reporting for Decision Desk yesterday, Nick Field wrote that “Given this reality, national pundits will surely read these results as a partial referendum on how the Democratic base feels about the Israeli invasion of Gaza. Yet local Democrats appear far more concerned with the domestic implications.”
As of the April 3 FEC report AIPAC hadn't spent any money attacking Summer directly… nor against the other progressives they’re working on defeating. Instead they’ve been acting as money-launderer for wealthy conservative donors, encouraging max donations ($6,600) from their supporters, earmarked for their candidates, like Jamaal Bowman opponent George Latimer and Cori Bush opponent Wesley Bell, for Democratic Party pro-genocide scumbags like Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL), Jared Golden (ME), Jared Moskowitz (FL), Rob Menendez (NJ) and Josh Gottheimer (NJ) and for AIPAC Republican allies like Derrick Van Orden (WI), Mariannette Miller-Meeks (IA), Brian Fitzpatrick (PA), Lori Chavez-DeRemer (OR), Scott Fitzgerald (WI), Jake Ellzey (TX), Elise Stefanik (NY), John Barrasso (WY), Joe Wilson (SC), Mike Lawler (NY), Juan Ciscomani (AZ), Ken Calvert (CA), Guy Reschenthaler (PA), Glenn Grothman (WI), Tom Cole (OK), Mario Diaz-Balart (FL)… and dozens of others— amounting to millions of dollars propping up the pro-genocide position in Congress. AIPAC spent $4.3 million in March alone. You can give AIPAC the finger here.
Back to today’s primary races in Pennsylvania... there’s also one we’re following in PA-10 to take on Freedom Caucus neo-fascist Scott Perry. The progressive in the race is Shamaine Daniels but there are 5 other Democrats running, including big spender Michael O’Brien and Republican-disguised-as-a-Democrat Janelle Stelson (who has been endorsed by the corporate-backed New Dems, of course), a well-known former TV anchor who lives in another district.
UPDATE:
