Aipac had originally created two political action committees in December 2021 to participate directly in elections rather than remaining strictly an advocacy organization. In the past, the group influenced races indirectly by publishing congressional report cards that outside committees used to allocate campaign contributions. The decision to abandon that hands-off approach yielded uneven outcomes and defied former foreign policy director Steve Rosen's warning that lobbies thrive in the dark and wither under public scrutiny.
Key points
Direct campaign involvement marked a strategic departure that yielded mixed political res…: Direct campaign involvement marked a strategic departure that yielded mixed political results for the organization.
Stepping directly into candidate fundraising challenged internal warnings that political…: Stepping directly into candidate fundraising challenged internal warnings that political lobbies thrive best away from public scrutiny.
The closure reflects shifting strategies after decades of operating strictly as an indire…: The closure reflects shifting strategies after decades of operating strictly as an indirect advocacy organization.
Sources checked by our analysis pipeline: 1
"A lobby is like a night flower: it thrives in the dark and dies in the sun.” So said Steve Rosen, former foreign policy director of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) in a memo to a fellow staffer. Rosen would later be fired amid a major scandal involving espionage in passing classified US information to Israel.
Rosen was correct about the danger to a lobbying organisation that publicity poses. But in December 2021, Aipac decided to test that theory by creating two political action committees (Pacs) that enabled it to take part directly in political campaigns.
The results were mixed, and Aipac recently announced that it was closing one of the Pacs it had set up.
Aipac had been an advocacy organisation, promoting Israel’s interests, but it did not fund campaigns directly, nor did it endorse or fund political candidates.
In many ways, that made it more effective. It could do things like issue a congressional report card which rated every member of Congress’s support of Israel. Then other groups that were actual Pacs could use those reports…
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