The “Block the Bombs” bill’s supporters are presenting it as a litmus test for the 2026 midterms.
The Block the Bombs to Israel Act would prohibit the Trump administration from providing Israel with specific U.S.-made weapons that the Israeli military has used in documented war crimes against Palestinians. As the 2026 midterm elections near, the bill’s backers are seeking to frame it as a litmus test for Democratic voters, who have long expressed support for such restrictions.
Rep. Valerie Foushee, D-N.C., who was first elected to the House in 2022 while riding more than $800,00 in campaign donations from AIPAC, signed on to the bill on August 6. The next day, she pledged her campaign would not take AIPAC money during the 2026 midterms, as first reported by Indy Week.
Other AIPAC recipients who are co-sponsoring the bill include Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, who received $46,000 from AIPAC in 2022, and Rep. Jonathan Jackson, D-Ill., who took $15,000 in 2022 and 2024, according to campaign finance data.
During a town hall meeting held at a high school gym in her district in El Paso on Saturday (August 23, Escobar acknowledged that she had taken AIPAC money “early on” but said she no longer accepts the lobbying group’s donations.
“I had AIPAC support early on in my elected life — I do not receive AIPAC support, it’s been years,” she said when an attendee drew applause, asking her about her ties to AIPAC and what she is doing to halt the genocide in Gaza. She pointed out that she was among the first co-sponsors of the Block the Bombs bill.
The bill’s lead sponsor, Democratic Rep. Delia Ramirez of Illinois, praised her colleagues for supporting the bill and expressed hope that their stances signaled a loosening of AIPAC’s powerful grip on the Democratic Party in Congress.
“I think it’s incredibly courageous and I think so much of the leadership of folks like Val and Veronica to say, ‘Look, you may have given money to my campaign, but I am taking a stance that is correct, and the stance as a leader and representative I must take, and the stance my constituents call on me to take,” said Ramirez, who was elected in 2022 and has not taken AIPAC funding.
The shift is likely to be politically expedient for many Democrats: A poll from January showed that a third of voters who cast ballots for Joe Biden in 2020 but not for Kamala Harris in 2024 said “ending Israel’s violence in Gaza” was the main issue deciding their vote.
The Block the Bombs bill had 12 co-sponsors when it was rolled out in June, including the band of progressives known as the Squad and some prominent Jewish lawmakers, like Rep. Sara Jacobs, D-Calif., and Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill. It has since swelled to 37, with four representatives signing on on Friday, including ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and Rep. Robin Kelly, D-Ill., who is running for Senate to fill outgoing Democratic Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin’s seat.
Most of the recent momentum behind the bill coincided with Congress’s summer recess, when lawmakers leave D.C. and return to their home districts. It’s at home where lawmakers have felt the most pressure from their constituents around Israel’s war in Gaza, said Beth Miller, political director of Jewish Voice for Peace Action, one of the groups backing Block the Bombs. She pointed to a pair of votes Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., forced on two resolutions to block some weapons transfers to Israel. Both failed — blocking military aid to Israel is still far from a mainstream position in D.C. — but, with margins of 27-70 and 24-73, still drew record-high Democratic support.
“When senators went home, if they voted the wrong way, they were getting angry outreach from their constituents about ‘Why would you have tried to continue sending bombs to Israel?’” Miller said.
She also noted the frosty reception Rep. Wesley Bell received last week at a St. Louis, Missouri, town hall, where Bell’s constituents grilled him over his support for Israel and his relationship with AIPAC. St. Louis Magazine reported that protesters yelled, “Wesley Bell loves killing children,” and “Wesley Bell loves bombs and rockets.” The town hall ended with security guards and police officers forcing attendees out of the building, and video of the incident showed a security guard grabbing an attendee by their hair and other officers tackling people to the ground.
Bell was elected to the House last year, when he unseated incumbent Israel critic Rep. Cori Bush in an election heavily influenced by AIPAC. The group poured $8 million into Bell’s campaign, on top of contributions from the Democratic Majority for Israel PAC.
In late July, as images of starving Palestinian children in Gaza circulated in the mainstream news, Bell made a statement uncharacteristically critical statement of Israel. “I’ve always supported Israel’s right to exist and defend itself,” he wrote on social media. “But supporting this government’s actions—allowing children to starve and firing on civilians seeking food—is something I can’t stand by. This isn’t self-defense. It must stop.”
Yet at his town hall, Bell defended AIPAC, dismissing criticism against them as “propaganda.” He likened the conservative pro-Israel lobby to interest groups focused on reproductive rights or clean energy and said that “everyone should be able to participate” in the electoral process.
Bell did not respond to The Intercept’s request for comment.
Block the Bombs has also faced some criticism from voters who stand for Palestinian human rights and liberation. During a town hall in San Diego, Jacobs’s constituents pressed her on why the bill only focuses on cutting off offensive weapons, which leaves out so-called “defensive” systems like the Iron Dome. Jacobs, for her part, said she still supports the transfer of weapons that arm Israel’s missile defense systems.
[IAK NOTE: As Annelle Sheline points out, by boosting Israel’s ability to “defend” itself, Israel is effectively encouraged to act more aggressively knowing it is protected, thanks to the United States, from costly retaliation. Sheline publicly resigned from the US State Department in March 2024, declaring that she was “Unable to serve an administration that enables such atrocities.”]
Asked to respond to the criticism, Ramirez said she had aimed to craft language that would hold Israel accountable for its atrocities but also appeal to a broader base within the party. She and her bill’s coalition of backers, including Iman Abid-Thompson of the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights, said the bill is only one tool for achieving their ultimate goal: an end to all U.S. military support and complicity with Israel’s apartheid and genocide of Palestinians.
“The pro-Israel lobbying institution is being dismantled a bit at a time — it’s not as powerful as it once was,” said Abid-Thompson. “I think that’s clear, especially in the fact that those who have taken these pro-Israel dollars are actually taking on pro-Palestinian stances that they haven’t taken on before. And I think that’s because people are afraid.”
At least four other representatives — Oregon Democrats Maxine Dexter and Suzanne Bonamici, both AIPAC recipients, as well as Gabe Vasquez of New Mexico and John Garamendi of California — have made statements in support of blocking arms to Israel in recent weeks, but have yet to sign on to the Block the Bombs bill.
Ramirez said her office is also trying to court the support of the pro-Israel lobbying group J Street, which was founded in 2008 as a more progressive counterweight to AIPAC. J Street has received considerable criticism, including from its own staffers, over its support for pro-war resolutions in Congress that left out consideration for Palestinian human rights. Even so, the Jewish-led lobby group, which advocates for a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine, threw its weight behind Sanders’s recent resolutions blocking some weapons to Israel.
J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami said that when moderate groups like his join with constituents and progressive coalitions, it can provide cover for politicians to vote in favor of limiting arms to Israel despite getting support from AIPAC.
“You can see a whole host of members of the House who did in fact get significant support from AIPAC in the last two elections who are beginning to take much more principled positions now,” Ben-Ami said.
Ben-Ami declined to comment on why the organization hasn’t signed on to Ramirez’s bill, despite its similarities to Sanders’s joint resolutions.
Lauren Maunus, the political director for IfNotNow, another group backing the bill and encouraging lawmakers to reject AIPAC money, said blocking arms sales is becoming an animating issue as the Democratic Party attempts to shore up support from its disillusioned base.
“In the 2024 cycle, it was first, do you support a ceasefire, then an arms embargo, and now we actually have a legislative vehicle that’s stronger than just the notion of an arms embargo,” Maunus said. “Block the Bombs is very evidently becoming the litmus test for the 2026 midterm.”
AIPAC, of course, will also get involved in the midterms, and it remains to be seen where the Trump-aligned and billionaire-backed lobby will spend its resources in 2026.
The obvious targets include members of the Squad like Reps. Ilhan Omar and Summer Lee, both longtime advocates for Palestinians and co-sponsors of Block the Bombs. AIPAC appears to be testing the waters in its respective districts for possibly running its own candidates.
Because of AIPAC’s massive spending capabilities, Maunus said, some Democratic lawmakers may agree with their base on the issue of Gaza but remain fearful of “punching first” at AIPAC.
“What it takes to beat their money, or what it takes to beat any right-wing-billionaire-backed money, is a massive turnout,” Maunus said. “And to win massive turnout, you actually need to like fight for things and not just be running a middle-of-the-ground, tepid, scared campaign.”
Jonah Valdez is a reporter for The Intercept covering politics, U.S. foreign policy, Israel and Palestine, human rights issues, and protest movements for social justice.
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