Latest news with #AIPAC
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Targeted by Trump, Republican Rep. Thomas Massie hauls in campaign cash
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., announced on Thursday that his campaign has hauled in $177,394 in recent days. "Will lobbyists for a FOREIGN country be able to buy a seat in Congress? That's the question in my re-election. 1,900 of you donated $177,394 this week to make sure I can hold this office to represent American interests, not foreign interests," the congressman noted in a Thursday post on his campaign X account. The flood of financial support for the fiscal hawk came after President Donald Trump repeatedly targeted the lawmaker on Truth Social. "The biggest impact of Trump getting involved on the other side of a race is usually diminished fund raising. In my case, we're seeing the opposite effect," Massie told Fox News Digital in a statement on Thursday. "Most of the people donating to me also support Trump, but they strongly believe Congressmen should be able to vote to represent their districts instead of being a rubber stamp for the President or beholden to foreign interest groups like AIPAC," he added, referring to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. Trump Campaign Unleashes Pac To Oust Gop Congressman Who Questioned Authority To Strike Iran Read On The Fox News App The pro-Israel group returned fire in a statement to Fox News Digital on Thursday. "Rep. Massie is so desperate to change the story from how he is an outspoken opponent of President Trump, that he is resorting to outrageously questioning the patriotism of millions of American citizens who are AIPAC members, including U.S. Veterans and more than 10,000 of his own constituents,' AIPAC's Marshall Wittmann asserted. "While the overwhelming majority of Americans support a strong U.S.-Israel relationship, Rep. Massie regularly votes with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders to undermine our partnership with Israel." Massie fired back, writing to Fox News Digital, "The AIPAC agenda includes endless foreign aid and US involvement in wars in the Middle-East, which contradicts the America first policies I support on behalf of Kentuckians. That's why they spent $400,000 against me last election cycle, and why they threaten to spend more this cycle." Massie, who was one of the two Republicans to vote against passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act in the House last month, labeled Trump's strikes against the Islamic Republic of Iran as "not Constitutional" in a post on X last week. Trump Pressures Congress To Pass 'Big, Beautiful Bill,' Insisting 'No One Goes On Vacation Until It's Done' The president excoriated Massie in a lengthy Truth Social post on Sunday, calling the congressman a "pathetic LOSER." "The good news is that we will have a wonderful American Patriot running against him in the Republican Primary, and I'll be out in Kentucky campaigning really hard," Trump declared. The president re-posted his anti-Massie tirade on Monday and commented, "GET THIS 'BUM' OUT OF OFFICE, ASAP!!!" Massie Reveals How Much Campaign Cash He's Hauled In Since Trump Targeted Him For Ouster: 'Fundraising Record' Then on Tuesday, the president once again targeted Massie, claiming in a Truth Social post that the congressman is "very bad for the Constitution." Massie pointed to Trump's 2022 statement endorsing him. "For those who want to know what @realDonaldTrump really thinks of me, this should clear things up…" the lawmaker wrote in a Tuesday post on article source: Targeted by Trump, Republican Rep. Thomas Massie hauls in campaign cash
Fox News
a day ago
- Politics
- Fox News
Targeted by Trump, Republican Rep. Thomas Massie hauls in campaign cash
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., announced on Thursday that his campaign has hauled in $177,394 in recent days. "Will lobbyists for a FOREIGN country be able to buy a seat in Congress? That's the question in my re-election. 1,900 of you donated $177,394 this week to make sure I can hold this office to represent American interests, not foreign interests," the congressman noted in a Thursday post on his campaign X account. The flood of financial support for the fiscal hawk came after President Donald Trump repeatedly targeted the lawmaker on Truth Social. "The biggest impact of Trump getting involved on the other side of a race is usually diminished fund raising. In my case, we're seeing the opposite effect," Massie told Fox News Digital in a statement on Thursday. "Most of the people donating to me also support Trump, but they strongly believe Congressmen should be able to vote to represent their districts instead of being a rubber stamp for the President or beholden to foreign interest groups like AIPAC," he added, referring to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The pro-Israel group returned fire in a statement to Fox News Digital on Thursday. "Rep. Massie is so desperate to change the story from how he is an outspoken opponent of President Trump, that he is resorting to outrageously questioning the patriotism of millions of American citizens who are AIPAC members, including U.S. Veterans and more than 10,000 of his own constituents,' AIPAC's Marshall Wittman asserted. "While the overwhelming majority of Americans support a strong U.S.-Israel relationship, Rep. Massie regularly votes with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders to undermine our partnership with Israel." Massie fired back, writing to Fox News Digital, "The AIPAC agenda includes endless foreign aid and US involvement in wars in the Middle-East, which contradicts the America first policies I support on behalf of Kentuckians. That's why they spent $400,000 against me last election cycle, and why they threaten to spend more this cycle." Massie, who was one of the two Republicans to vote against passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act in the House last month, labeled Trump's strikes against the Islamic Republic of Iran as "not Constitutional" in a post on X last week. The president excoriated Massie in a lengthy Truth Social post on Sunday, calling the congressman a "pathetic LOSER." "The good news is that we will have a wonderful American Patriot running against him in the Republican Primary, and I'll be out in Kentucky campaigning really hard," Trump declared. The president re-posted his anti-Massie tirade on Monday and commented, "GET THIS 'BUM' OUT OF OFFICE, ASAP!!!" Then on Tuesday, the president once again targeted Massie, claiming in a Truth Social post that the congressman is "very bad for the Constitution." Massie pointed to Trump's 2022 statement endorsing him. "For those who want to know what @realDonaldTrump really thinks of me, this should clear things up…" the lawmaker wrote in a Tuesday post on X.
New York Post
3 days ago
- Politics
- New York Post
Strange bedfellows: Antisemitism unites the radical left and the isolationist right
As President Donald Trump weighed and ultimately decided to strike the Iranian regime's nuclear sites Saturday, American anti-war voices were mobilizing — and their messages revealed a disturbing truth. The one thing uniting the radical left and far right in their anti-war stance is a shared willingness to blame the Jews. From radical-left activists claiming America lives 'under a Zionist regime' to far-right conspiracy theorists pushing tropes about Jewish foreign-policy manipulation, the extremes of American politics are perverting healthy democratic debate and corrupting legitimate policy disagreements about foreign intervention. While arguing America should not support its ally Israel, Tucker Carlson last week insinuated Sen. Ted Cruz is in the pocket of Jewish groups like AIPAC. Meanwhile, left-wing figures like Mehdi Hasan and Hasan Piker continue to make wild accusations and amplify narratives that demonize the world's only Jewish state. 'The one silver lining to all this is that everyone, left, right, and center, now knows that Israel controls US foreign policy, and that most politicians and conservative media personalities are foreign agents,' Holocaust revisionist Darryl Cooper, who has guested on Joe Rogan's podcast, wrote on X. 'US policy: America takes a back seat, Israel takes the wheel,' Nihad Awad of the Council on American-Islamic Relations posted. 'Netanyahu calls the shots. Trump pretends to be in charge.' And Hussam Ayloush, executive director of CAIR's Los Angeles chapter, wrote in a Facebook post that 'Congress and the White House' are 'Israeli-occupied territories.' No need to dive into the bowels of the online world to hear these theories; they were coming from major political influencers. Minutes after the White House announced the successful US strike, former Obama National Security Council official and popular podcaster Tommy Vietor posted that the 'weak' Trump 'got manipulated into doing Netanyahu's dirty work.' Some anti-war groups went so far as to post 'Death to America' in Farsi, removing their pacifist masks to reveal something far more malevolent. And when Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) appeared on MSNBC, host Ayman Mohyeldin pressed him to discuss Israel's responsibility for getting America involved in an 'unprovoked war . . . knowing, ultimately, that America was always going to come to Israel's defense.' The use of such accusatory language by a so-called journalist was shocking — an example of the barely concealed activism so prevalent in newsrooms today. You could hear it in the surprised response from Smith — who, while not supportive of Trump's action, felt the need to state the obvious: 'This isn't Israel's fault that Donald Trump decided to bomb [Iran] . . . He's the president of the United States, he doesn't have to do what Israel wants.' Smith then corrected Mohyeldin's framing, noting that 'Iran has definitely been provoking Israel' and pointing to the double standard the host had applied to Israel's right to self-defense. The exchange was remarkable for what it revealed: Even a Democratic Trump critic felt compelled to reject the antisemitic assumption underlying the question. It demonstrated just how deeply these conspiracy theories have penetrated mainstream media discourse. In response to Tehran's 'forever war,' which has been aggressive and unrelenting since 1979, Republican and Democratic presidents alike have made it a stated policy that Iran cannot obtain a nuclear weapon. Multiple commanders-in-chief have been clear that the United States would not preclude military force to prevent that from happening — and to his credit, Trump was the first president to take concrete action. Any country has a right to respond preemptively to an open danger. But critics consistently delegitimize the actions of the Jewish state — to the point where observers deny Israel even the ability to protect its citizens from an explicitly existential threat. Today, as Americans debate Trump's military action against Iran, the same dangerous patterns are emerging. Whether dressed up as 'anti-Zionism' or presented as high-minded foreign policy analysis in coded language, legitimate policy debates have become vehicles to spread antisemitism. Get opinions and commentary from our columnists Subscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter! Thanks for signing up! Enter your email address Please provide a valid email address. By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Never miss a story. Check out more newsletters As the Anti-Defamation League has documented, violent antisemitic incidents are now occurring at historically high levels. We see a direct correlation between anti-Israel rhetoric and global anti-Jewish incidents. Every person claiming to oppose war in the name of human dignity must reject antisemitism completely — whether intentional or not. This isn't about American foreign policy or even Jewish safety, though both matter enormously. What's at stake is whether we will allow conspiracy theories, and hatreds that have poisoned societies throughout the centuries, to poison ours. It should not be a difficult choice. Jonathan A. Greenblatt is CEO and national director of the Anti-Defamation League.
Express Tribune
3 days ago
- Politics
- Express Tribune
When facts are rumoured to be conspiracy theories
Listen to article Journalists and book authors have spent a considerable amount of time and writing to teach us all about how to do authentic research so as not to consider conspiracy theories as facts. Conspiracy theories are usually designed in such a way that they're not only entertaining for the human mind to quickly embrace it but also are quite unintelligent and helps lazy minds to settle an issue without much thinking to do about it. There's more entertainment in them than any rationality. However, understanding the reverse is perhaps equally, if not more, important. What if certain facts are wrongly understood to be conspiracy theories because they're too cheesy and too unrealistic. Before I delve into that, let me give you a bit of a context. I grew up in Pakistan watching Hollywood movies. There would be violent scenes of guns being used and serial killers killing innocent people without reason or remorse. I always thought movie makers had to spice things up for entertainment purposes and that in the real world things weren't this extreme. Then I came to America. After more than a decade of living here, I realised what they showed in the movies didn't even amount to 10% of the truth. The truth here is a lot more violent and a lot worse. When it comes to Israel and America, I always heard from almost all sources that usually spin out conspiracy theories that America was owned and controlled by the Jewish lobbies. I am sure you've seen the film The Arrivals. It was entertaining but quite conspiracy theories filled. Well, maybe not so much. Israel controls America from within is not a conspiracy theory. Almost every, if not every, politician comes to public office shining up his credentials that he or she will be a fierce and loyal defender of Israel. The United States gives billions to Israel, which uses a good amount of that money to donate to politicians and public officer holders through lobbying groups such as AIPAC. Then they're asked to make policies and laws that will be good for Israel but harmful for America most of the time. It's a vicious cycle. In 2017, there was a massive hurricane that hit Texas. It was called Hurricane Harvey. Businesses and personal properties were damaged. My business, car and other items were damaged completely. The state of Texas was providing relief help only to those who'd pledge not to boycott Israel. I mean think about it for a minute; I being an American citizen and an American business am required to show loyalty to a foreign country in order to get help from my own country. That fact alone is crazier than the most bizarre conspiracy theories that ever existed. Israel uses American money to control America. One might conclude that it's money. Not so fast. Because the Saudis have a lot more money than a mere few billions. No American politician sticks a Saudi flag outside their office with the text "I stand with Saudi Arabia". The Israelis have spent almost half a century, if not more, in creating this false narrative and convinced the American people of it that the Holy Bible commands that Israel must be protected, that American values align very neatly with Jewish teachings, that the interests of America and Israel are one and the same, that Israel is the victim, that they are the chosen people who are the rightful owners of that land because they were there 2000 years ago. None of it is true but these falsehoods are enough tools to scare any politician who might have funny ideas about the freedom of Palestine. AIPAC uses scare tactics to remind such politicians about the money and the zombified, if you will, electorate that stays high on the 'chosen ones' nonsense. Once this chokehold is understood, then every nonsense that America does starts making sense.
The Independent
3 days ago
- Politics
- The Independent
What Bernie Sanders told Joe Rogan about talk of another presidential run
Bernie Sanders, 83, appeared on the Joe Rogan Experience, addressing questions about a potential 2028 presidential run by joking about his age. Sanders said his top priority if elected would be campaign finance reform, advocating for publicly funded elections over billionaire contributions. He criticized the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) for obstructing policies that could aid people in Gaza and for influencing congressional elections. Sanders also discussed the "insanely low" $7 minimum wage and praised Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez 's work in challenging powerful figures. He expressed concern about the future of American democracy due to a corrupt campaign finance system and criticized Elon Musk 's significant financial contribution to Trump 's campaign.
