Former Vice President Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party suffered losses in the 2024 presidential race in part because of the party’s approach to Israel’s war in Gaza, according to internal research cited by Axios.
The report, based on confidential Democratic Party reviews, suggests that U.S. policy toward Israel under then-President Joe Biden alienated key segments of young and progressive voters, contributing to Harris’s defeat by Donald Trump.
According to Axios, Democratic officials conducted more than 300 interviews across all 50 states as part of a post-election analysis aimed at understanding the party’s losses.
Despite the scope of the review, Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin said in December that the party would not release the full findings.
“We’ve completed a comprehensive review of what happened in 2024,” Martin said at the time. “Here’s our North Star: Does this help us win?”
As part of the review, DNC officials met with activists from the Institute for Middle East Understanding Policy Project, which advocates for Palestinian rights and has criticized U.S. support for Israel.
Representatives from the group told Democratic leaders that Biden’s backing of Israel had eroded support among younger voters and progressives.
“The DNC shared with us that their own data found that the policy was a ‘net-negative’ in the 2024 election,” said IMEU spokesperson Hamid Bendaas, according to Axios.
The organization later accused the DNC of withholding its report because of its findings on Israel — a claim denied by DNC spokesperson Kendall Witmer.
Despite the internal conclusions, Harris adopted a more critical tone on Gaza in the final months of the campaign.
While she stopped short of labeling Israel’s actions as “genocide,” she publicly acknowledged protesters’ concerns during a campaign stop in Milwaukee in October 2024, saying, “What he’s talking about, it’s real.”
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3 Responses
The Democrat Party has increasingly moved to, both, anti-Israelism and anti-semitism. They are seperate issues but the party can now be classified as, effectively and in reality, supporting both anti-Israelism and anti-semitism.
Always blame Israel! Israel is always at fault! When Obama claimed things were Bush’s fault, if he stated it was Israel’s fault, everyone would have bought his story hook, lime and sinker! Maybe she lost because she was a awful, terrible choice! Could that have possibly been the reason? She was worse than bad. Even worse than the alternative!
Two thoughts come to mind, and both highlight how misguided many Democratic voters have become. First, set aside the word salads, the border visit that somehow happened before it didn’t, and the flip‑flops on a long list of issues — yet Israel was supposedly the breaking point for Democrats who withdrew their support. That logic doesn’t hold up. Second, even if we assume the article is correct, who exactly did these voters turn to? Trump? Of course not. So either they stayed home or they cast a protest vote for a third‑party candidate. And Trump a bigger supporter of Israel won.