Jeffries & Hochul Know Zionism Is Going to Lose

What they don’t say about Dan Goldman speaks loudly.

Yesterday House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (who is from New York) and New York Governor Hochul both endorsed House incumbent Dan Goldman in NY-10. Goldman faces a tough incumbency challenge from progressive former city comptroller Brad Lander. Neither Hochul nor Jeffries mentioned Israel in their endorsement—a glaring omission that underlines just how embattled the Zionist Democratic caucus is following the victory of New York mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Israel is a long way away from New York. But Zionism is the area where Lander and Goldman—who are both Jewish—most conspicuously diverge. In the mayoral contest, Lander enthusiastically endorsed Mamdani, who has criticized Israel sharply for its genocide in Gaza. Mamdani, in turn, has endorsed Lander for Congress.

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A clear choice for NY-10

Landor like Mamdani, calls the genocide in Gaza a genocide. In a campaign video Lander said that the problems of the district could not be solved by “doing [pro-Israel lobbying group] AIPAC’s bidding.”

Goldman, in contrast, has received funding from AIPAC; he also refused to endorse Mamdani because of the mayor’s criticism of Israel. And in a recent New York Times interview, Goldman not only refused to call Israel’s genocide in Gaza a genocide, but even refused to admit that Israel had committed war crimes. Instead, he equivocated, saying that “I believe very strongly there must be an investigation.”

Goldman also voted in November 2023 to censure his colleague Rashid Tlaib, a Palestinian-American representative from Michigan, for “promoting false narratives” against the state of Israel. Tlaib’s crime was to argue that US aid to Israel was intensifying rather than reducing violence. That “false narrative” is much less controversial these days, and Goldman says he would not vote the same way now.

Goldman’s retreat on the censure vote is telling. There was a time, not that long ago, when support for Israel in a heavily Jewish New York district would have been de rigueur, and certainly wouldn’t have been seen as a political disadvantage.

But NY-10 is also very liberal, and it voted for Mamdani by a large margin in the mayoral election. A NYT/Siena poll during the mayoral race found that New Yorkers now sympathized with Palestinians over Israelis 44% to 26%. Israel’s brutal destruction of Gaza and ongoing restriction of desperately needed aid even after a ceasefire has catastrophically eroded support for the country among Democrats and the young, in New York and nationally.

But older, wealthier Democrats—which is to say elected representatives and donors—still lean Zionist. Rather than moving with their base, they have been attempting to hold the line, making only minimal compromises when absolutely forced. Hochul and Jeffries both endorsed Mamdani only reluctantly after much shilly-shallying, even though both of his major opponents—disgraced former mayor Eric Adams and disgraced former governor Andrew Cuomo— had close ties to Trump. Their quick rush to endorse Goldman over the popular and clearly qualified Lander shows their priorities with distressing clarity. Opposing Israeli actions is more concerning to them than handing the mayor’s chair to a Trump stooge.

Fighting for Zionism by not saying “Zionism”

NY-10 is in part a factional fight for the future of the Democratic party; along with Mamdani left-wing Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren endorsed Lander, as did Democratic-Socialist New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. But what’s surprising is that the centrists have declined to tout Goldman’s Zionism, even though Goldman’s Zionism is clearly a big reason they are endorsing him.

Instead, Hochul and Jeffries touted Goldman’s anti-Trump bonafides. Jeffries highlighted Goldman’s role as lead investigative counsel in the first impeachment effort against Trump, stating that Goldman’s “unique investigative ability will be critical to the work of the House Judiciary Committee in the next Congress.” Hochul took a similar tack, arguing that, “New Yorkers need experienced fighters in Washington who know how to stand up to abuse of power.”

It’s hard to take these statements very seriously, inasmuch as Lander is in fact an experienced and qualified politician. Lander has, moreover, been repeatedly arrested for accompanying defendants to ICE deportation hearings and protesting ICE actions. Given Jeffries’ repeated efforts to prevent impeachment proceedings against Trump in the House, one suspects that he supports Goldman not because he thinks Lander won’t fight Trump, but because he thinks Lander will fight Trump too hard.

Again, though, the bottom line is that Jeffries is a Zionist and doesn’t want the majority non-Zionist base of the Democratic party to have representation in Congress. In a district with an overwhelming Democratic majority, the centrists can’t claim that Lander would lose the seat for Democrats. And they also can no longer use anti Zionism as an effective smear; if it didn’t work against the Muslim-American Mamdani, it’s not going to work against Jewish-American Brad Lander. What they are left with is negative partisanship—the claim that Goldman would, somehow, someway, be a more effective voice against Trump.

The problem there is that Trump is himself a Zionist. Open hostility to Palestinians and Muslims in the name of Israeli security is the declared position of the Republican party. Goldman was voting with Republican representatives when he joined in with the racist and Islmophobic censure of Rashida Tlaib. He crossed the aisle to join Republicans and attack his Democratic colleague. If Goldman did that, why should voters trust him to oppose Trump?

NY-10 is going to be a tough race, and though I want Lander to win, I can’t promise he will. What I can say, though, is that his campaign, and Mamdani’s before it, have already shown just how precarious Zionist politics are for the Democratic old guard. Unquestioning support for Israel’s brutal policies of genocide and apartheid cuts against the Democratic base’s core belief in multi-racial democracy. It aligns Democrats like Goldman with the policies of the Trump regime. It is immoral and it is bad politics.

Jeffries, Hochul,and Goldman himself all realize this, which is why they are dancing around or qualifying or soft-selling Goldman’s Zionism. They recognize it as a weakness, not a strength, and they are attempting to figure out how to minimize it or win despite it. Perhaps that will work in this race, this year. But long term, it is unsustainable. We know that the Democratic party is going to become significantly less Zionist for the simple reason that, as Jeffries and Hochul tacitly acknowledge, it already has.