Days before she faces off against an AIPAC-backed challenger in a costly and contentious Democratic primary, Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri has doubled down on her threat to put her job at risk.
Standing outside an early voting site at Ferguson's public library, on the same street where he led protests for racial justice in 2014, Bush refused to call Hamas a terrorist organization.
“In Ferguson, we were called terrorists,” she said of herself and other black activists who took to the streets after a white police officer killed an unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown. “Did they hurt people? Of course. Did the Israeli military hurt people? Of course.”
Most voters in this segregated blue city in a deep red state aren't talking about Israel's war against Hamas — where abortion is illegal, crime is high and downtown is dominated by boarded-up storefronts — and they have more pressing concerns. “It's not necessarily a priority for my district,” she said, acknowledging her pro-Palestinian views.
But it was her vocal voice in advocating these views that enabled Bush's more mainstream opponent, Wesley Bell, to intensify the race, drawing AIPAC-aligned super PACs and other pro-Israel groups into the race, which spent more than $8 million on ads attacking Bush and praising Bell, making it one of the most expensive House primary races in history.
And that stance has left Bush, 48, a former nurse who was elected in 2020 amid widespread national protests against racism, facing a life-or-death challenge as the latest member of Congress' ultra-liberal “battle force.”
“This is a battle for the soul of the Democratic Party,” said Osama Andrabi, spokesman for the grassroots group Justice Democrats. He said it was also a testament to the power of the progressive movement that “the forces of the right” have to “drag our democracy through the mud to even have a chance at challenging Cori Bush.”
On Tuesday, Mr. Bush faces Mr. Bell, a Black county attorney who pitches himself as progressive but pragmatic and whose campaign is funded almost entirely by the pro-Israel lobby. His lawsuit against Mr. Bush has little to do with Israel. He argues that Mr. Bush is incompetent, prioritizes his reputation as a “squad” in Congress over the results of local elections and has shown poor judgment, including voting against President Biden's $1 trillion infrastructure bill.
“This is a good bill, hands down,” Bell said in an interview, noting that the bill would bring hundreds of millions of dollars to the district for jobs, roads, bridges and clean water. “She cast a protest vote against the district's interests.”
Still, Mr. Bush's stance on the Israel-Gaza war shaped the campaign, and he has not apologized for it, even as Republicans tried to divide Democrats with message voting aimed at portraying critics of Israel's tactics as extreme.
Bush was one of two Democrats to vote in January against a resolution that would have banned members of Hamas and those who took part in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel from entering the United States.
Bush, who was given a celebrity-like welcome at the Ferguson breakfast, said her vote was an act of defiance against efforts to intimidate her and other lawmakers who have expressed pro-Palestinian views.
“You can't buy or intimidate lawmakers,” she said. “That's why we're out there getting the votes.”
“We only act when we are attacked. Today it's me, tomorrow it's Rashida Tlaib,” she added. Tlaib is a Democratic congresswoman from Michigan and the only Palestinian-American member of the US Congress. “We've known that since the beginning.”
Bush said he knew so little about Hamas that he was reluctant to classify it as a terrorist organization.
“Do they qualify as a terrorist organization to me? Yes. But do I know that? I definitely don't,” Bush said. “I have no contact with them. All I know is that we were considered terrorists, we were considered Black Identity Extremists, and we wanted peace. I'm not trying to compare us, but I've learned to be careful about labeling things when you don't know them.”
Bush's spokesman later tried to walk back the statement. “The congressman knows that Hamas is a terrorist organization,” spokesman Marina Chafa said. The problem, she added, is that the term “has consistently been used by far-right forces to justify violence, and in this case the collective punishment of Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip.”
AIPAC spokesman Marshall Whitman called Bush a member of Congress “aligned with anti-Israel extremists” and noted that he was one of only 10 senators to vote against a resolution expressing and pledging U.S. support and solidarity with Israel and condemning Hamas' actions just days after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking hundreds hostage.
“Democratic voters are sending a message that supporting Israel in its fight against Iran's terrorist proxies is entirely consistent with progressive values,” Whitman added.
Democratic pollster and Israel Democratic Majority Leader Mark Melman said Bush has long been a target of attack for his stance on Israel, but that his vote against popular Democratic policies made him even more vulnerable in this election.
“We're taking advantage of that,” he said. And even if the war between Israel and Hamas isn't a central concern in St. Louis, progressives like Bush “have chosen to make this issue their central issue,” Mellman said.
“That's the choice they made,” he said. “It's who they are.”
So is breaking with the party when they believe progressive priorities are at risk: In 2021, Mr. Bush was one of six Democrats to vote against one of Mr. Biden's signature policies, an infrastructure bill, because many elements liberals wanted, like universal family leave and free community college, were cut from the bill to garner the Republican support needed to pass it.
Bush said her opposition was an effort to “seize the leverage” to get the president's economic agenda across the pond. But she paid a high price: Labor leaders across Missouri criticized her vote, and now, while some unions continue to support her, more than a half-dozen have backed Bell.
The budding progressive star never expected things to get so difficult.
Ms. Bush arrived in Washington four years ago after defeating Rep. Lacy Clay, a career politician who had served 10 terms in Congress. She was part of a wave of progressive victories over establishment figures such as Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York who elevated black voices during a summer of protests against police brutality.
Bush, who at times in her life was homeless and lived in her car, has become a unique voice in Congress, drawing on her own experiences to make a compelling case that poverty is very costly.
In 2021, Bush grabbed a sleeping bag and folding chairs and began a 24-hour sit-in on the steps of the Capitol to protest the expiration of the federal eviction ban. Her pressure campaign worked, and the White House reversed course and announced a new 60-day suspension of the eviction ban. Bush has garnered support from progressives across the country, including Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.
In her fight for reproductive rights, Bush shared her harrowing story of being raped and having an abortion at age 17. She gained national fame after landing a book deal and appearing in a glossy magazine feature.
But the political landscape has shifted since then, largely due to the spotlight on Israel's war with Hamas. The “Squad,” a group of liberal lawmakers of color that Ocasio-Cortez made famous, is now known for openly voicing pro-Palestinian views and is alienated by mainstream Democrats. In June, fellow progressive Bowman lost to a mainstream candidate who also had record support from pro-Israel groups, including AIPAC.
At a wine-and-oysters fundraiser for Bell at a Soulard-area bar Thursday evening, wealthy supporters argued that the race was instead about ousting a congresswoman who wasn't representing the district effectively.
“You're in favor of terrorism, but you can't be in favor of your own president?,” said Steven Engelhardt, a former Clay adviser and Bell supporter. “That's her record, not my opinion. It's incompetence.”
John Rogers, an attorney who introduced Bell at the event, told the crowd: “All she does is yell and complain, get bills passed and she isolates herself from her party. It's time to change that.”
Bell said Bush “has not worked with the Democratic caucus, has not worked with the Congressional Black Caucus, has not worked across party lines, and our district is suffering as a result.”
Bush refused to debate him.
“I'm not going to defend any Republican,” she said. “If he wasn't diverting Republican funds to Democratic districts, the conversation would be happening.”
On Friday morning, Bush received some support from House leadership when he joined Rep. Katherine Clark, the No. 2 Democrat from Massachusetts, at a roundtable discussion on abortion rights at her campaign office in St. Louis.
“She's a leading voice on a lot of issues, but especially on this one,” Clark said. “She's a champion.” Sunrise organizers have been canvassing for her.
“I'm excited right now because of the lack of sleep and a lot of talking,” Bush said Friday morning. Bush said she believes the outcome will be different than Bowman, who won the last election by a narrower margin than her.
“They've seen me put my body on the line not only for the Black community, but for families separated at the border, for the Muslim ban, for abortion rights,” she said of her voters.
Bush said Democrats should be wary of allowing AIPAC to have too much influence over whether members of their own party can survive in Congress.
“It's not just progressives who are at risk,” she said. “Other Democrats need to pay attention to what they're really trying to do, and not think that they're not going to lean on moderates and get people that they can pull further to the right.”
