ArcaMax

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — If Russia or China had purchased an electoral victory in America, the reaction would be instant moral panic, emergency hearings and televised outrage. So why is another foreign policy-obsessed donor ecosystem celebrating a victory in plain view, while the same normally excitable lawmakers turn the volume all the way down?

Rep. Thomas Massie, the Republican Kentucky congressman arguably best known for defending “America First” principles, has spent much of his time since President Donald Trump’s 2024 re- election attempting to keep the president aligned with his own campaign promises. He was rewarded with a Trump-prescribed face-off against a GOP primary challenger: Ed Gallrein.

You might be asking, “Who’s that?” The answer: a former Navy SEAL. Also, the beneficiary of more than $9 million in campaign booster juice from the Israeli lobby, as reported by Politico, describing it as the most expensive primary in American history. Plus another $7 million from Trump megadonors. Come on down, Israeli-American Miriam Adelson and claim your Presidential Medal of Freedom. Oops, looks like Trump already gave it to you. Was that before or after he also mused aloud in front of you and Israel’s parliament, “I actually

asked her once, I said, ‘So, Miriam, I know you love Israel. What do you love more, the United States or Israel?’ She refused to answer. That might mean Israel, I

must say.”

Senator Bernie Sanders (D-VT) drew a direct line from the anti-Massie “oligarch”-style campaign funding to his defiance of Trump on issues like American bombing Gaza (and now Iran) for Israel, and his pleading greater public transparency on the shady influence and subversion operations of disgraced Israeli-linked financier, Jeffrey Epstein.

It doesn’t much help Israel’s own cause that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee overtly declared its pride in having helped “pro-Israel candidates” replace Massie and another “outspoken detractor” in Georgia, Marjorie Taylor-Greene (who resigned last year) with what they call “pro-Israel voices.”

Massie even joked in conceding the race, that he was late addressing his supporters since it took a while to find Gallrein in Tel Aviv.

The Massie-Gallrein matchup was promoted as a litmus test for GOP voter loyalty to Trump. The hope was that voters would stop thinking for themselves and select the Trump-approved answer. The truth is, we’ll never really know what exactly that 14 percent gap between these two candidates represents. Because how does one quantify the difference that $16 million from a lobby focused on the interests of a foreign country makes, especially when it arrives wrapped in legally compliant paperwork and with all the confidence of something that you’re not supposed to question too closely?

What is plainly evident is that the resulting advertising buy increased the name recognition of an unknown newcomer while reinforcing the idea that Massie is just generally out of step. Israel isn’t a top voting issue for the GOP in the state, or anywhere else in America, which is probably why it requires so much proactive effort to stay emotionally present in voters’ minds. But millions spent on badmouthing one guy while elevating the other is likely enough to persuade at least some low-information voters how to think. Or is it? I guess we’ll never know.

And that’s the whole problem with the kind of systemic corruption that operates entirely within perfectly legal loopholes. The same ones that lawmakers refuse to close. Perhaps because they hope to keep benefiting from them while never experiencing the misfortune of being on the receiving end, like Massie was.

Just imagine if Russia or China were doing this. They’ve already had congressional subcommittees looking into them despite having meddled much less in American affairs. You wouldn’t know it from the rhetoric, though.

“The Chinese Communist Party is engaged in a sustained campaign to infiltrate our institutions,” said Trump’s secretary of State and former senator, Marco Rubio (R-FL). Yet when it comes to Israel, he’s said that it’s “important for the United States to reaffirm that Israel is a major strategic partner.” One that funnels millions into American elections without it being treated as anything more than an awkward dinner topic that gets quickly changed, apparently.

“The United States has a vital national interest in and unbreakable commitment to, ensuring the existence, survival, and security of the State of Israel,” Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has said.

Yet, he also says that China and its allies, particularly Russia, are “all dirtbags” and a threat to the free world.

It raises a simple question: are foreign threats defined by their actual behavior, or by whether they have a lobbying office within Uber distance of Capitol Hill? Graham and his establishment ilk seem to have an incredibly sensitive radar for any hint of foreign influence — except when it comes to one particular nation that sends their finely tuned instincts offline.

These political campaigns make it fairly clear why no one wants to touch the issue. Before anything can even be debated in legislative form, it gets buried under a coordinated electoral spending blitz that then proudly advertises its own effectiveness. Just a few days before his Israel-sponsored political requiem, Massie had announced his introduction in the House of the “Americans Insist on Political Agent Clarity Act" to Require All Foreign Lobbyists to Register Under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), a wink and a nod to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee lobby (AIPAC), now responsible for his demise.

Even worse is that they’re riding shotgun with the actual president of the United States, who has benefited from the same donor ecosystem and has sold out “America First” proponents like Massie and Trump’s own grassroots base, who would much prefer that he focus on domestic issues like jobs and inflation instead of acting as the world’s most expensive subcontractor on the other side of the planet.

If Israel is sensitive about opposition to it gaining momentum, they could hardly have handled it in a more counterproductive way. And there’s little point in hand-wringing over American democracy if it continues to be auctioned off to the highest-bidding foreign passport holders.