Allies of Mike Rogers, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Michigan—not to be confused with the Alabama congressman with the same name—have asked AIPAC not to run advertising on his behalf, Axios reported Aug. 22. Rogers met AIPAC Board Chair Michael Tuchin in Los Angeles last week; the next day, according to the report, the group shelved a video ad it had already produced attacking his Democratic opponent, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed.
Axios’s sources are unnamed, AIPAC did not respond to requests for comment, and Rogers said on the record, “I welcome any and all support from the pro-Israel community and I’m proud to have their involvement.” But reports are that direct talks between Rogers’s team and AIPAC have gone cold, and that Republican donors are now trying to broker a reconciliation.
On Aug. 6 this news service reported Rogers opening his general-election campaign with the declaration: “I spent years hunting terrorists and bringing Osama bin Laden to justice. Never in a million years did I think that I would be running against someone who believes America deserved 9/11"—while the Senate Republican Conference posted that “an alliance of communists and Islamists is taking control of the Democrat party.” His campaign is now asking the pro-Israel lobby to keep its name off the airwaves.
