Even though there's lots more to do before the polls close Tuesday night, the overall message from the electorate is clear even before the results are in. Discontent with the economy and with Washington runs deep, and the environment for President Obama and incumbents at all levels of government is rough.
But when it comes to Israel, we know that the right-wing of the Jewish and pro-Israel communities is already getting set to blame any possible incumbent defeats on their pro-Israel, pro-peace positions, on J Street's support for them, or on the President's efforts to achieve a two-state solution.
We get it. They have to make this argument. After all, they just spent millions of dollars trying to turn Israel into a partisan wedge issue in the campaign with ads attacking pro-Israel, pro-peace candidates for holding sensible views on the Middle East.
But some early polling numbers from one closely watched race in Chicago show that the right wing's partisan and neoconservative attacks aren't working.
The poll was conducted last week of 400 Jewish voters in the 9th Congressional district of Illinois, where challenger Joel Pollak has waged what The New York Times called an "Israel-centric" campaign against pro-Israel, pro-peace champion Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky.
He's falsely accused her of being anti-Israel and made a campaign issue of her association with J Street in a failed attempt to make the race a national referendum on President Obama's Middle East policy.
But as the poll shows, not only does Congresswoman Schakowsky look like she's in good shape for Tuesday among Jewish voters, Pollak's attacks have actually caused some voters to be more likely to vote for Schakowsky. (On our website, you can read a memo put together by pollster Jim Gerstein analyzing the results, scroll through a Powerpoint presentation of the findings, and view the complete crosstabs.)
Some key findings from the poll in Illinois' 9th Congressional District:
-- Schakowsky is on track to win 70 or more percent of the Jewish vote on Tuesday – winning the support of nearly all those who voted for her in 2008, a strong showing in a year when the tides are running strongly against Democratic incumbents nationally.
-- An overwhelming 74 percent of Jewish voters in the District either did not hear about the criticism of Schakowsky's positions on Israel or said that the criticism made no difference in their vote.
-- Among those who were aware of the criticism, 36% said it made them more likely to vote for Schakowsky, and only 21% said the attacks made them more likely to vote for Pollak.
-- Jewish voters in the Illinois 9th are deciding how to vote primarily based on economic issues, as is true for the American electorate as a whole. Only 14% of Jews in the district consider Israel one of their top two priorities in deciding how to vote, ranking far behind the economy (53%), healthcare (24%) and education (21%).
-- 60% of Jews in the Illinois 9th support the President's policies on Israel and the Middle East. This support is divided between those who say they agree with the policy and like the way he is executing it (32%) and those who say they agree with the policy but do not like the way he is executing it (27%). Only 29% say they disagree with Obama's policies on the Arab-Israeli conflict.
These data provide critical evidence for understanding the larger politics of our issue -- especially as the President and his team contemplate their next steps on the push for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Cycle after cycle, the right-wing predicts severe consequences for political candidates who refuse to stake out hard-right positions on Israel. And for years they've had the political field to themselves to make the case.
No longer.
J Street's working to fix the broken politics on this issue so that American policy makers have the political space to help achieve peace and security in the Middle East.
In the past two years, 160,000 Americans have helped J Street and its legally independent political action committee, JStreetPAC, build the capacity to defend pro-Israel, pro-peace candidates. The PAC endorsed 61 candidates – up from 41 in the last cycle – and raised over $1.5 million for those candidates, more than any pro-Israel PAC in history.
Lots more information to come very soon. Please join us.