‘Squad’ Member Trailing By HUGE Margin With One Day Till Election

With just over 24 hours to go before the polls close, another “Squad” member is badly underwater in the latest polling and sits in serious jeopardy of losing her Democratic primary.

The 2024 election cycle has been unkind to members of the informal far-left group of Democratic lawmakers who prioritize showmanship and rhetoric over service and results. In June, New York Congressman Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) lost his primary to a pro-Israel Westchester native after voters grew tired of his pro-Palestinian grandstanding and photo ops with progressive Jewish leaders who, it turns out, never liked him very much. The story may repeat itself this week in Missouri’s 1st District this week where Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) is badly trailing progressive prosecutor Wesley Bell.

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The Jewish Insider, which has closely chronicled the rise and fall of anti-Israel Squad members in Congress, reported on a poll by the political arm of the Democratic Majority for Israel, DMFI PAC, showing Bell leading Bush 48%-42%, well outside the margin of error and putting Bush on track to lose her reelection on Tuesday. If the result holds, she would not fare as poorly as Bowman who lost by a wide margin of 58.4% to 41.6%. The Bell campaign is taking the results in stride while taking nothing for granted.

“Wesley is finishing the last few days of this primary campaign the way he’s been running the whole time: talking with people, hearing their concerns and sharing his vision for better representation for this district,” Anjan Mukherjee, a spokesperson for the Bell campaign, said in a statement to Jewish Insider on Thursday. “That’s how he was elected as a city councilman and county prosecutor, and it’s why he will be the next member of Congress from MO-01.”

Washington, DC, USA – December 1, 2021: Rep. Cori Bush, speaking at the abortion rights rally at the Supreme Court, Jackson Women’s Health v. Dobbs

A large coalition of progressive activists, from labor unions to Black Lives Matter chapters, have endorsed Bell over Bush, who has been one of the least productive lawmakers in the 118th Congress. She may have escaped criticism of that, however, were it not for a series of politically sensitive scandals that tainted her image as an outsider. She struggled to describe the tax code after announcing her reelection campaign, and in January the Justice Department quietly launched an investigation into her hiring of a bodyguard with no credentials who was paid more than $100,000 over two years. The guard, Nathaniel Davis, has a history of making virulent antisemitic statements. Bush and Cortney Merritts, another bodyguard, tied the knot in a private ceremony in February 2023. Earlier this month the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, her hometown paper, endorsed Bell.

Some of the House Democratic leadership has not yet turned their back on Bush. On Friday House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-MA) campaigned with the Missouri Democrat on Friday, though Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) has kept his powder dry in the feud.

Jewish advocates in the district are hopeful they can repeat the success felt by Rep. Bowman’s defeat earlier this summer. Benjamin Singer, CEO of the Jewish community organization St. Louis Votes, said he has anticipated “record turnout among Jewish St. Louisans, in part due to our grassroots organizing, door-knocking, phone banking and work with synagogues and other community institutions.”

“People are incredibly worried and upset by the skyrocketing antisemitism across our country,” he said, noting that his group is not telling voters who to support. “The Jewish people are simply fighting for our right to survive.” State Rep. Stacey Newman, who is leading outreach efforts for the Bell campaign, said antisemitic protests have broken out sporadically in front of the campaign’s headquarters, further emboldening his supporters to feel good about Election Day and work into the evening. “I’ve never worked on a race where I had to think about mine and my staff’s safety every day or had to check in with a security advisor frequently,” Newman said. But, she added, “it only seems to motivate volunteers to keep showing up.”

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