The influx of nearly $9 million in pro-Israel funding into Missouri’s 1st Congressional primary race has led to the defeat of incumbent Congresswoman Cori Bush. Her criticism of the Israeli government and the country’s response to Hamas’ terrorist attack, drew United Democracy Project into the race.
The super PAC, tied to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, inundated the airwaves with advertisements attacking Bush and boosting the eventual winner St. Louis County Prosecutor Wesley Bell. Bush was the second member of The Squad, a group of progressives in Congress, awho lost their primary after a race in which the super PAC invested heavily. The first was New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman.
Mike Brown Beginning
Bush and Bell both rose to prominence ten years ago following the death of Michael Brown.
Bush, 48, was a protest leader. She was outspoken and critical of how police and the courts treated Black people. Her activism prompted an unsuccessful run against longtime incumbent 1st District Democrat William Lacy Clay in 2018, before she defeated him in 2020. Bush became the first Black woman to represent Missouri and the first organizer from the Black Lives Matter movement in Congress.
Bell, 49, began hosting conversations about community policing after Brown’s death. The lawyer, who previously served as a municipal prosecutor and judge, ran successfully for a seat on the Ferguson City Council before defeating seven-term incumbent St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Bob McCulloch in the August 2018 Democratic primary.
As prosecutor, Bell reopened an examination into Brown’s death. He announced in July 2020 that while the investigation didn’t exonerate Wilson, there wasn’t enough evidence to charge him.
“My heart breaks” for Brown’s parents, Bell said at the time. “I know this is not the result they were looking for and that their pain will continue forever.”
The Race
In October, Bush called the Israeli retaliation an “ethnic cleansing campaign.” Soon after the Hamas attack on Israel, Bush wrote on social media that Israel’s “collective punishment against Palestinians for Hamas’s actions is a war crime.”
Her comments prompted backlash, even among some supporters in her district. Bell, who had been planning a Senate run against incumbent Republican Josh Hawley, instead opted to challenge Bush. He told The Associated Press that Bush’s comments about Israel were “wrong and offensive.”
While Bush’s criticism of Israel drew millions of dollars into the race, the candidates launched other attacks against each other. Bell argued that Bush has not been an effective congresswoman, pointing to her votes against the bipartisan infrastructure package and the child tax credit.
Bush, meanwhile, focused her closing argument against Bell about the failure to bring charges against the police officer who killed 18-year-old Michael Brown in 2014, featuring Brown’s father in her final ad of the race.
Brown’s father, Michael Brown Sr., was featured in an ad for Bush.
“He used my family for power,” Brown says of Bell in the ad. “And now he’s trying to sell out St. Louis.”
“I’ll be a progressive member of Congress, but I’m also going to be a practical member of Congress,” Bell told NBC News over the weekend. “I recognize that we can’t get anything done without majorities, and so that means we need to work with our fellow Democrats up there, and we also when we can reach across the aisle and work with folks to get things done for this region and for this country.”
Bush indicated she may not be disappearing from political life.
“One thing I don’t do is go away,” Bush told NBC News over the weekend, noting that she made unsuccessful runs for Congress before. “I’m in the community, and I’m trying to have change for the community. And so I won’t stop just because of a title change.”
