Haaretz | Op-ed: Why American Jews Will Once Again Favor Democrats This Fall

Read the full op-ed on Haaretz

Each election cycle, there’s speculation about whether Jews will make a political exodus from the Democratic Party. Every two years, this hypothesis is tested and proven false, as Jewish voters remain overwhelmingly supportive of Democrats.

According to a study conducted last year by the Jewish Voters Resource Center (JVRC), an average of 71.6 percent of Jewish voters have supported Democrats in each consecutive election since 2010. This trend is likely to continue in the 2026 midterms, but it’s also not something Democrats can take for granted.

This year, speculation of a Jewish exodus is growing given the ascent of Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and far-left candidates. What’s missing from these conversations, however, is that declining pro-Israel sentiment isn’t unique to Democrats; it’s a generational issue felt on both sides of the aisle. Additionally, for far too long there has been a false narrative that Trump was “good” for Israel, which some American Jews and many Israelis believed until now. In recent months, support for Trump in Israel has plummeted, just as it has significantly dropped in the United States. As of May, Donald Trump’s approval rating stood at 28 percent among American Jews.

With Trump figuratively on the ballot in 2026, the GOP is unlikely to get a boost from Jewish voters, a majority of whom view Trump’s policies as anathema to their values and core beliefs. With “the future of democracy” registering as the number one issue for Jewish voters since the 2022 midterms, Trump and Republicans’ ongoing election denialism, voter suppression, and election subversion efforts are unlikely to increase Jewish support for the GOP.

While Americans’ trust in both parties is waning, we still have a two-party system, forcing a binary choice at the ballot box. In May, 67% of Jewish voters said they’ll vote for Democrats in the midterms. It’s expected this number will increase by a few points as we approach November, just as it did in 2024.

At the same time, this isn’t a typical election for American Jews, and their ongoing support isn’t something Democrats can take for granted. This election is distinctly challenging for Jewish voters given the rise of antisemitic incidents, some motivated by anti-Israel sentiment, a handful of them deadly. Cynical exploitation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for political purposes is unacceptable, whether it comes from the right or the left, and it’s the primary reason the rise of DSA is dangerous from the perspective of most American Jews.

On U.S. policy toward Israel, there has been a larger divide among Democrats in 2026 than ever before, and yet it’s not so black or white. We saw this with the recent vote on the Massie amendment, which split the House Democratic Caucus on military aid to Israel. While the organization I lead, the Jewish Democratic Council of America, opposed this amendment, many of the Democrats who voted in favor of it also support Israel’s security and future as a Jewish and democratic state.

In some cases, Democratic votes for the Massie amendment – which had no chance of passing the House – were intended to register their disagreement with the policies of the current Israeli government. Criticizing this particular government, while supporting Israel generally, is consistent with the position of most Jewish Americans. Seventy percent of Jewish voters have an emotional attachment to Israel, while 67% have an unfavorable view of Prime Minister Netanyahu. Jewish Americans are holding these two nuanced truths at once, as are many Democratic elected officials and candidates.

Yet, American Jews remain concerned about the rise of the far left. This week, Michigan and Missouri will hold critical Democratic primaries, which have pitted far-left candidates Abdul El-Sayed and Cori Bush against mainstream candidates Reps. Haley Stevens (D-MI) and Wesley Bell (D-MO).

Regardless of who wins those contentious primaries, the fact remains that the path to Democrats winning back control of Congress does not lie with the far-left wing of the party. Such candidates may turn some blue seats even bluer, but no DSA candidate is going to flip a House or Senate seat from red to blue. This is why organizations like ours are focused on electing mainstream Democrats who share our values and are positioned to pick up critical House and Senate seats.

Let’s put it in perspective. So far, four DSA candidates – Melat Kiros (CO), Claire Valdez (NY), Chris Rabb (PA), and Darializa Chevalier (NY) – have won Democratic primaries. If you include far-left candidates who do not identify as DSA, the total is between 10 and 15, or approximately 2% of Democrats running for Congress in the general election.

Compare these numbers to the nearly unanimous alignment with Trump’s extremism, attacks on democracy and bigotry among Republican candidates, and it becomes crystal clear which party is uniformly out of step with the vast majority of Jewish voters in the United States.

The far left does not define the Democratic Party – they are problematic outliers, not the majority of lawmakers and candidates – while the extreme right has taken over the Republican Party and now occupies the White House. Predictions of a historic realignment of Jewish voters in 2026 ignore the fact that most Jews are voting their values, and for the vast majority of Jewish Americans, that means once again voting for Democrats and against Donald Trump.

Halie Soifer is CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, and previously served as national security adviser to then-Senator Kamala Harris, senior policy adviser in the Obama administration and foreign policy adviser to Senator Chris Coons. On Substack: @HalieSoifer