The political ad playing on TVs in the Hudson Valley looks like a genuine attack by a progressive group outraged by the tactics used by the Trump administration in its mass deportation campaign.
“Immigrant families separated, human rights violated, dissenters brutalized,” a narrator intones, putting that critique of U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement in quick strokes before turning to the commercial’s true target: Democratic House candidate Cait Conley.
“Cait Conley pocketed over 300 grand from firms supporting the apparatus weaponized by ICE,” declares the ad from Progressive Champions PAC, which has reported spending $1.5 million so far on anti-Conley ads. “True activists fought ICE’s atrocities. But Conley kept collecting.”
The outrage may be less than sincere. The hit on a top Democratic contender in New York’s 17th Congressional District appears to be the latest disguised effort by Republicans to influence Democratic voters in districts that will be pivotal in November’s midterm elections. Suspected GOP super PACs have recently intervened in at least five other races to either damage or pump up certain candidates.
“All signs point to it being linked to Republicans, who have meddled in a number of competitive Democratic primaries this cycle,” Erin Covey, a House race analyst for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, told the USA TODAY Network in an interview.
Conley and her campaign have denounced the attack while touting it as a sign she’s the opponent Republicans fear most in the race. She’s one of five Democrats running in a June 23 primary to take on Rep. Mike Lawler, a second-term Republican from Rockland County, with early voting already under way since June 13.
No one is rushing to take credit for the ad. The only traces of Progressive Champions PAC are a bare-bones web site and an email address it listed when it opened a federal funding account on May 11. Queries from the USA TODAY Network to that address and the Congressional Leadership Fund — a House Republican super PAC thought to be doing the meddling, according to a Popular Information report — went unanswered on Monday, June 15.
Why is the ad trying to tie a Democrat to ICE roundups?
The ICE-themed attack on Conley stems from her consulting for two tech companies since leaving the Biden administration, where she held national security posts after a 16-year Army career. One of those firms makes gear for detecting drones and other aerial threats; the other provides artificial intelligence to analyze deep troves of data. Both hold U.S. military contracts.
Beth Davidson, another top contender in the 17th District primary, has tied Conley’s work to the immigration crackdown, noting that both firms have collaborated with another federal contractor —Palantir — that works with the Department of Homeland Security. Progressive Champions Inc. is now making that same charge in its ad.
Conley adamantly disputes the claim, saying her work pertains solely to public safety and has nothing to do with immigration enforcement.
What Dems, GOP say about ads attacking Conley?
The House Democrats’ campaign arm went after the GOP for its latest apparent intervention in a Democratic race. “Desperate D.C. Republicans are so terrified Mike Lawler will lose in November that they’re resorting to meddling in yet another Democratic primary,” said Riya Vashi, a spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
A spokesperson for the House Republicans’ counterpart declined to comment on the Progressive Champions PAC ad, but charged that Conley and her primary rivals have been “racing to the left” and are setting themselves up for defeat in the general election.
“Whoever emerges as the nominee will be broke, bruised, and no match for Mike Lawler, who’s been hard at work delivering for the Hudson Valley,” said Maureen Toole, spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.
What other Dem primaries had GOP-linked ads?
Both parties have used similar tactics in past primaries to kneecap a feared opponent or promote a weaker one. Covey pointed to a 2022 example when Democrats supported Republican John Gibbs in Michigan’s 3rd District primary. He won the race with that Democratic support and went on to lose the general election.
This cycle has a lot of apparent subterfuge on the Republican side.
Two other newly created super PACs linked to Republicans — Lead Left PAC and Real Change PAC — have disclosed spending a total of $4.3 million on ads, mailers and texts in Democratic primaries in five states, according to Federal Election Commission records. All five races are in swing districts Republicans are eager to hold or hope to take from Democrats in this year’s midterm elections.
In New Jersey, for example, Real Change spent $660,000 to torpedo Rebecca Bennett in the Democratic primary for Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr.’s seat, but to no avail. Bennett, who like Conley is a veteran, cruised to a wide victory on June 2.
Lead Left shelled out $1 million in Texas to try to nominate a dream opponent for Republicans: a sex therapist disavowed by her own party for antisemitism after she pledged to turn an immigration detention facility into a “prison for American Zionists.” That candidate, Maureen Galindo, wound up losing a Democratic primary runoff to Johnny Garcia on May 26.
Lead Left also had no luck in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley, where it spent $1.7 million to try to sink Bob Brooks in the primary to take on freshman GOP Rep. Ryan Mackenzie. Brooks won the four-way Democratic contest on May 19 by 20 percentage points over his nearest rival.
The sheer number of competitive Democratic primaries this year seems to have brought out more covert intervention by Republicans than in past elections, Covey said. She also noted the huge resources Republicans have, including a $300 million war chest amassed by President Donald Trump’s MAGA Inc. to spend on the midterms.
“They have more money to do this sort of thing,” she said.
Progressive Champions, created the same day as Real Change, lists a Staples store in Colorado as its address and uses the same Alabama bank as Real Change. Its $1.5 million in ad spending went entirely to a new company (“Direct Media Services”) that was incorporated on June 2, listing a Wyoming storefront address that has been used to conceal shady activity in the past.
Chris McKenna covers government and politics for The Journal News and USA TODAY Network. Reach him at CMcKenna@usatodayco.com.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: NY-17 House race is latest Dem primary hit by attack ads linked to GOP
Reporting by Chris McKenna, New York State Team / Rockland/Westchester Journal News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Chris McKenna, New York State Team | USA TODAY Network
