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April 1996, pg. 18 PAC Watch
Downward Spiral in Pro-Israel PAC Contributions Continues
by Richard H. CurtissOne of the characteristics of the network of pro-Israel political action committees established by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), Israel's principal Washington, DC lobby, is its ability to provide candidates for federal office with "early money." While many individual contributors to congressional campaigns wait until interest in elections mounts during an election year, the deceptively named pro-Israel PACs signal their choices early, usually with $500, $1,000 or $5,000 contributions made up to a year before the primary elections. Then, if their favorite faces a tough primary or general election challenge, they provide very large amounts of money later in the two-year election cycle. Given their propensity for providing "early money," it is puzzling that donations to candidates by the 55 pro-Israel PACs so far active in the 1996 election cycle dropped precipitately during 1995 compared to previous election cycles. This continues a downward spiral that first manifested itself in the 1994 campaign, when both collections and disbursements by pro-Israel PACs were about half of the totals for the three previous cycles in 1988, 1990 and 1992. In 1995 pro-Israel PACs collected $1,838,638 and had contributed only $541,400 of this to individual campaigns by Dec. 31. By contrast, in the 1993-1994 election cycle 61 active pro-Israel PACs collected $6,084,639 and donated $2,529,573 of this to congressional candidates. Of the much-reduced 1995 funding, a total of $26,000 went to members of Congress for presidential campaigns. This included $11,000 to Sen. Bob Dole (R-KS), $10,000 to Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN) and $5,000 to Sen. Phil Gramm (R-TX). Not included in the 1995 total above is an additional $5,000 from pro-Israel PACs to Gov. Pete Wilson of California for his presidential campaign. There are two likely explanations for the continuing decline in pro-Israel PAC contributions. Since the signing of the Oslo accord on Sept. 13, 1993, treasurers of pro-Israel PACs have complained that contributions have dropped. Earlier in the same year many of the pro-Israel PACs also were criticized by their own members for donating to candidates only a very small percentage of the funds they raised, as demonstrated again by the $3,555,066 gap between PAC receipts and PAC contributions in the 1994 cycle. Members complained that money was wasted on inflated salaries for PAC officials, and on services contracted from their friends or relatives that could have been carried out by volunteers. The PAC officials responded that the difference was spent largely on raising more funds. In the 1996 cycle, an additional factor is at work. It is the rising tide of public criticism of all PACs and special interests, and the fear by AIPAC officials that serious campaign finance reforms could loosen AIPAC's iron control of congressional votes on aid to Israel and on weapons sales to Arab countries. These fears have motivated PAC directors to resort to various strategies to hide the extent of pro-Israel funding actually reaching members of Congress. For many years AIPAC directors boasted that for every dollar their PACs gave candidates, their members provided another dollar in direct campaign contributions. They now have taken measures to formalize this flow of direct contributions through the practice called "bundling." One pro-Israel PAC has instructed its members to divide their monthly check contributions to the PAC. One half of each individual's contribution is made directly to the PAC, and the other is made in signed $25 checks which the PAC can then endorse to specific candidates and deliver in a "bundle." The candidate knows why he or she is receiving the checks. However, because the checks are individually signed and are below the $250 threshold for recording the names of the donors, there is no way for anyone monitoring candidate filings with the Federal Election Commission to know that the donations have been delivered by pro-Israel PACs. Given the rising unpopularity of foreign aid in general and aid to Israel in particular, this concealment is vitally important to members of Congress from states where few of the voters are Jewish. In such states the majority of voters would be turned off if they realized how dependent their elected representatives have become on pro-Israel money for re-election. Normally, pro-Israel PACs contribute far more to Democratic candidates than to Republicans. Donations in 1995 were almost evenly balanced, however, reflecting the higher number of Republicans in both the Senate and the House, and the fact that, like most special interest PACs, pro-Israel PACs generally favor incumbents. Of 117 candidates who received pro-Israel PAC donations in 1995, 59 were Democrats and 58 Republicans. Most special interests have only one or, at most, a half dozen PACs, each of which can give up to $5,000 to a candidate in a single election. The proliferation of pro-Israel PACs, nearly all of which have an identical agenda and seem to be coordinated, illegally, by AIPAC, gives them a unique advantage. If a candidate who can be counted on to deliver aid to Israel is in trouble, the multiple PACs can put tremendous amounts of money into that candidate's campaign on very short notice. The tables that follow show this already was happening during the runup to the primary elections. If an endangered candidate wins a contested primary and then also faces heavy competition in the general election, each of the PACs again can put $5,000 into his/her campaign, for a total of $10,000 per candidate in a single election cycle. Such concentrated donations go especially to incumbents who are on committees that are of special interest to Israel, such as the Armed Services, Budget, Foreign Relations, Intelligence, International Relations, Commerce, Ways and Means and National Security committees and the Appropriation committees and their defense, foreign operations and national security subcommittees. In general, House Republicans, particularly the so-called "freshman class," have tended to be stronger critics of foreign aid than are most Democrats. At the leadership level, however, this is not necessarily true. Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia is one of the most pro-Israel members of the House and he made sure that 1996 aid to Israel and Egypt remained unscathed at a time of budget cuts elsewhere by changing the name of the bill to "The Foreign Aid Reduction Act." Although the total of foreign aid world-wide was indeed reduced in 1996, neither of its two biggest components, aid to Israel and to Egypt, suffered reductions. Gingrich is one of the largest House recipients of pro-Israel PAC donations in the current cycle. Ironically, in the House, AIPAC is concerned that if control of the House shifts from the Republicans back to the Democrats in 1996, the chairmanship of the International Relations Committee will shift away from strongly pro-Israel Republican Rep. Benjamin Gilman of New York to more even-handed Democratic Rep. Lee Hamilton of Indiana. Pro-Israel PACs already have contributed heavily to Hamilton in case that happens, as the tables on pages 19 and 20 show. In the Senate, however, AIPAC would breathe a sign of relief if
unpredictable Republican Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse
Helms, who is for aid to Israel and Egypt but against all other
foreign aid, were replaced by Democratic Senators Joseph Biden of
Delaware, Paul Sarbanes of Maryland, or Christopher Dodd of Connecticut,
all of whom are strong supporters of foreign aid to Israel.
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