Following the Money: How We Trace $2.4 Billion in Israel-Lobby Spending

Every dollar in American politics tells a story. At GoodVote, our job is to trace those stories — from donor to PAC to candidate — and make them transparent. Today we're publishing the most detailed breakdown of our Israel-lobby attribution methodology: how we arrived at $2.4 billion in pro-Israel spending across all FEC cycles, and why we're confident in that number.

We're also sharing what we got wrong, what we fixed, and what we deliberately chose not to count.

The challenge

Campaign finance data is messy by design. A donor writes a check to Senate Leadership Fund. SLF bundles that money with thousands of other checks and spends it supporting candidates across 30 races. Some of those candidates are pro-Israel. Some aren't. How much of that donor's money is "Israel money"?

There's no perfect answer. But there are defensible ones — and indefensible ones. This post explains our methodology and the evidence behind each tier.

The tier system

We attribute pro-Israel spending through four tiers, each with a different evidence standard.

Tier 1: Public statements — $851 million

35 donors who publicly stated that Israel is their top political priority.

The most famous example: Sheldon Adelson told an audience "I'm a one-issue person. That issue is Israel." He and Miriam Adelson gave $593.5 million in political donations across all cycles. Under Tier 1, 100% of that giving is attributed as pro-Israel — because they told us it was.

Other Tier 1 donors include Haim Saban ("I'm a one-issue guy, and my issue is Israel"), Paul Singer (RJC board), Bernard Marcus (RJC leadership, Israel on Campus Coalition funder), and Jan Koum (WhatsApp founder whose $5M+ to AIPAC's super PAC was effectively his entire political giving).

Why it's defensible: These donors said it themselves. We're taking them at their word.

Tier 2a: Direct giving to Israel PACs — $292 million

~27,000 donors who gave directly to explicitly pro-Israel PACs: AIPAC's United Democracy Project, Democratic Majority for Israel, Republican Jewish Coalition Victory Fund, JStreetPAC, NORPAC, Pro-Israel America, and others on our curated list.

This is concrete, traceable money. A check to AIPAC is a check to AIPAC — there's no interpretation needed.

Why it's defensible: FEC Schedule A receipts. The donor chose to give to an Israel-branded PAC.

Tier 2b: Israel-PAC donors' full portfolio — $596 million

This is where it gets interesting.

9,361 donors who gave to pro-Israel PACs also gave to generalist PACs like Senate Leadership Fund, Congressional Leadership Fund, and party committees. We attribute 100% of their other giving as pro-Israel.

That's a big claim. Here's why we make it.

The falsification test

Instead of trying to prove these donors are Israel-motivated across their full portfolio, we tried to disprove it. We searched for counter-examples:

Test 1: Double-loyalty donors. How many of the 18,004 pro-Israel-PAC donors also gave to anti-Israel PACs (Jewish Voice for Peace, Reject AIPAC, Citizens Against AIPAC Corruption)?

Result: 1 donor out of 18,004. That one donor gave $9,030 to pro-Israel PACs and $275 to anti-Israel PACs.

Test 2: Topic-saturated donors. How many had >80% of their other giving concentrated in non-Israel topics (insurance, defense, fossil fuel PACs)?

Result: 51 donors, $0.7 million total. These are insurance industry employees who happened to write a $250 check to NORPAC. Not serious counter-evidence.

Test 3: Where the money actually goes. For the remaining 98.6% of donors, their other money goes to generalist party infrastructure — SLF, CLF, SMP, HMP, party committees. Not to competing causes.

Counter-examples are less than 1% of the pool. The theory holds.

An important distinction: Jewish ≠ pro-Israel

J Street, Bend The Arc Jewish Action, and other liberal Zionist organizations are classified as pro-Israel lobby (dovish). They advocate for Israel policy — they disagree with AIPAC on how to support Israel, not whether to support it. Only explicitly anti-lobby groups (Jewish Voice for Peace Action, Reject AIPAC PAC) are classified as opposing the Israel lobby.

What doesn't qualify

Donors must have given to high-confidence Israel PACs (attribution weight ≥ 0.5 in our committee curation). Donors whose only Israel-adjacent giving is to generalist PACs like SLF — even though SLF is tagged in our system at low weight — do not enter the Tier 2b pool. This prevents absurd results like Elon Musk appearing as a top Israel donor.

Additionally, donors must have Israel-share ≥ 2% of their total giving. Below that threshold, the Israel signal is noise.

Tier 3: Generalist PAC pro-rata — $803 million

This is the most complex and most scrutinized tier. When Senate Leadership Fund raises $1.2 billion and spends $45.5 million supporting pro-Israel candidates, every SLF donor gets a pro-rata share of that $45.5 million attributed as pro-Israel.

But not all generalist PAC spending on pro-Israel candidates is equally credible as "Israel money." We apply a two-factor confidence weight:

Factor 1: Race type

• Presidential races → weight 0 (excluded). Harris, Biden, and Trump are all pro-Israel. But a PAC spending $90 million to elect Biden isn't doing it for Israel policy — it's doing it for the Democratic party. Presidential candidates are pro-Israel by bipartisan consensus, not because the lobby put them there.

• Congressional races with Israel-PAC IE → weight 1.0. When AIPAC spent $2.1 million supporting John Fetterman in Pennsylvania, and SLF also spent $34 million in the same race — those PACs were aligned on this candidate. The Israel lobby showed its hand.

• Congressional races without Israel-PAC IE → weight 0.5. The candidate has a pro-Israel voting record, but the Israel lobby didn't specifically target this race. Half credit.

Factor 2: Who funds the PAC?

This is the key insight. We trace funding backwards from the generalist PAC to its donors and check: what fraction of this PAC's money comes from known Israel-lobby donors?

PAC	Total Receipts	From Israel-Lobby Donors	%
Senate Leadership Fund	$1,188M	$286M	24.1%
Congressional Leadership Fund	$859M	$183M	21.3%
Future45	$35M	$21.8M	62.1%
American Unity PAC	$11.5M	$7.7M	66.7%

Sheldon Adelson alone funded 15.4% of SLF ($182.5M) and 17.2% of CLF ($147.5M). Add Singer ($43.5M to SLF), Marcus ($15.75M to SLF), and Stephens ($20.6M to SLF), and Israel-lobby donors account for nearly a quarter of these PACs' entire war chests.

When 24% of your funding comes from donors who also gave to AIPAC and DMFI, and then your PAC spends $103 million supporting pro-Israel candidates — that's not coincidence.

We weight PACs by their Israel-donor funding share:

• ≥10% from Israel-lobby donors → full confidence (1.0×)
• 5–10% → 0.75×
• 2–5% → 0.5×
• <2% → 0.25×

The combined weight (race type × donor influence) means that SLF's spending on a congressional race where AIPAC also spent gets full credit (1.0 × 1.0), while DCCC's spending on a presidential race gets near-zero credit (0 × 0.25).

The bipartisan story

Israel-lobby money flows to both parties' infrastructure:

GOP	From Israel Donors	Dem	From Israel Donors
Senate Leadership Fund	$286M	Priorities USA Action	$9.4M
Congressional Leadership Fund	$183M	DCCC	$8.9M
NRSC	$12.9M	DSCC	$7.7M

The GOP side is heavier (dominated by Adelson, Singer, and Marcus), but the Democratic side has Saban ($6.1M to SMP), Sacks, and others. The lobby works both sides — candidates like Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell receive generalist PAC support from Israel-aligned donors regardless of party.

What we chose not to count

Christian Zionist money

Christians United for Israel claims 10 million members. But only 2 FEC-registered Christian Zionist PACs exist (both already in our list). The real Christian Zionist political money flows through 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) structures — outside FEC jurisdiction entirely. This is a known limitation of any FEC-based methodology.

Non-FEC advocacy

Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, gave just $2,900 to Israel PACs against $14.6 million in other political giving. His Israel advocacy runs through the WJC, AJC, and Israel Bonds — channels that don't appear in FEC data. Our methodology will always miss advocacy money that doesn't flow through FEC.

The final numbers

Tier	What it captures	Donors	Pro-Israel
Tier 1	Public statements	35	$851M
Tier 2a	Direct to Israel PACs	~27K	$292M
Tier 2b	Israel-PAC donors' other giving	9,361	$596M
Tier 3	Generalist PAC pro-rata (confidence-weighted)	5.3M	$803M
	Total pro-Israel		$2.4B

Every dollar in this total has a traceable path and a defensible evidence standard. We publish our methodology, our data, and our mistakes — because transparency about transparency is the whole point.

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GoodVote is a non-profit campaign finance transparency platform. Our data comes from FEC filings. Our methodology is open for scrutiny. If you find an error, tell us.