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U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders warned Friday that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, plans to spend $233 million in this fall’s congressional midterm elections to defeat candidates who speak out against the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The Vermont independent, who caucuses with Democrats, made the claim in a post on X as criticism of U.S. military support for Israel becomes a sharper dividing line in Democratic politics ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms.
AIPAC “plans to spend $233 million to defeat candidates who dare to speak out against Netanyahu’s extremist government,” Sanders said.
“They spent $33 million to defeat Abdul El-Sayed in the Michigan primary. They lost. They are going to keep losing,” he added.
Sanders ended the post by saying: “NO MORE U.S. MILITARY AID FOR ISRAEL.”
Sayed, the Democratic candidate in Michigan’s Senate race, has strongly opposed unconditional U.S. military aid for Israel and criticized Netanyahu’s policies in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
AIPAC and affiliated groups spent close to $30 million backing El-Sayed’s primary opponent, Haley Stevens, in what the Associated Press described as the group’s largest investment ever in a single race.
Sayed won the Democratic primary despite the outside spending, turning the race into one of the clearest tests of the pro-Israel lobby’s influence inside the Democratic Party.
The spending came as Democratic candidates have taken increasingly different positions on Israel’s war in Gaza and Washington’s military support for Netanyahu’s government.
The debate is unfolding as U.S. voters prepare for congressional midterms on Nov. 3.
Polls show Democrats broadly favored to win the House of Representatives and possibly the Senate.
Public views of Israel have soured among many Democratic voters during the war in Gaza, and several candidates have taken a harder line against Netanyahu’s government and U.S. military aid.
The dispute has also prompted pro-Israel Democratic groups to push for a new framework on U.S.-Israel relations, with Democratic Majority for Israel releasing guidance for candidates as the party’s internal divisions deepen.
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