Pro-Israel PAC Floods Assembly Races With Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars

Since its creation in February, the group has become a quiet but major force in those races. In four of them, Solidarity PAC-directed donations have comprised at least half of its endorsed candidates’ total fundraising hauls — not including funds from New York’s public matching program — between March and May, New York Focus’s analysis found. In two others, the donations made up nearly a third.

Instead of contributing to campaigns itself, Solidarity PAC directs donors to a slate of candidates who share its “deep-rooted American values” and “continued support for” Israel, according to its website. The strategy allows the group to skirt the legal contribution limit for its candidates’ races.

The largest contributions have mostly come from people in the hedge fund, venture capital, and real estate industries.

“Wall Street, real estate — they’re coming after our movement,” said Queens challenger Claire Valdez, whose opponent Johanna Carmona has received at least $42,000 in apparent Solidarity PAC-funneled donations — over 58 percent of her haul since the PAC started fundraising. “They’re coming after us, not just because we’ve been standing for a ceasefire and for an end to the genocide in Gaza, but because we’re winning,” Valdez said.

Solidarity PAC is the first known state-level version of a pro-Israel political action committee like those run by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and Democratic Majority for Israel, which have for years been a pivotal force against progressive candidates for federal office.

The committee is operated by officials from the New York Solidarity Network, a 501(c)(4) dark money nonprofit created in 2022 to “help pro-Israel voters make an informed decision about who they would support in a primary.” The nonprofit has published an online “Wall of Shame” of officials critical of Israel’s assault on Gaza, which the International Court of Justice is investigating as a possible genocide.

Neither Solidarity PAC nor officials with the New York Solidarity Network responded to requests for comment.

As Solidarity PAC has mobilized against candidates calling for a ceasefire, Israel has launched a deadly offensive — with US-supplied weapons — on displaced people’s camps in Gaza’s last remaining “safe zone.” Palestinian civilians have alleged torture in Israeli internment camps, and the Israel military has choked off aid to Gaza, leading to young children starving to death.

The group has solicited donations for nine candidates in contested primaries: incumbent assemblymembers Michael Benedetto, Didi Barrett, and Stefani Zinerman, as well as candidates Johanna Carmona, Gabi Madden, Anathea Simpkins, Jordan Wright, Micah Lasher, and Kalman Yeger.

By comparing state data on donations to Solidarity PAC and its endorsed slate of candidates, New York Focus identified dozens of apparent PAC-facilitated donation packages dated between March 11, when the group started fundraising, and May 20, the cutoff for the most recent state Board of Elections filings. The contributions totaled nearly $380,000, about a fifth of which went to the PAC. The rest went to the endorsed candidates as individual contributions.

Although the total pales in comparison to fundraising by national pro-Israel PACs, which can spend tens of millions on a single congressional race, the money has made up a considerable portion of state legislative campaigns’ fundraising. And in some races, candidates’ hauls from Solidarity PAC alone nearly match their competitors’ total fundraising.

Anathea Simpkins, who is running to unseat the DSA-backed Brooklyn incumbent Emily Gallagher, received at least $39,500 in Solidarity PAC-funneled donations in the last reporting cycle, New York Focus found. Those donations made up 68 percent of her campaign contributions after the PAC started fundraising and rivaled Gallagher’s entire haul during that same period.

“There is no comment from this campaign, because the issues that matter to voters and working class people are not being covered in this story,” Simpkins’s spokesperson told New York Focus. “Unless you want to write a story about that, just stop.”

DSA-endorsed challenger Eon Huntley raised about $47,500 from March 11 to May 20. His opponent, Brooklyn incumbent Stefani Zinerman, received nearly as much as that — about $41,000 — in Solidarity PAC donations during the same time period, comprising half of her fundraising.

“Unlike my opponent, I’m funded by working class New Yorkers who are concerned about rising rents, underfunded public schools, and a lack of affordable healthcare,” Huntley said.

“Our belief is that those who are donating to the assemblywoman’s campaign are donating because they believe she’s the best person to continue not only the legacy of Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights, which is the 56th Assembly District, but also to continue to protect the rights of working families,” said a Zinerman spokesperson.