Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a member of the “Squad,” would decisively defeat Sen. Chuck Schumer in a primary. This is largely because the Democratic leader is losing support from both his party and Jewish voters, according to a surprising new poll.
The poll, conducted by Hongan Strategy Group for the Jewish Voters Action Network, reveals that the socialist AOC is ahead of five-term incumbent Schumer, securing 54% of likely Democratic voters in New York City to Schumer’s 33%.
AOC, aged 35 and currently serving as a House Representative, also surpasses Schumer among Jewish Democrats with 45% to 33%, as 17% of voters remain undecided, according to the survey results.
“This is a massive wake-up call for Schumer,” said Maury Litwack, co-founder of Jewish Voters Action Network. “He’s not only bleeding support in the Democratic Party overall but also in the Jewish community.”
The numbers are troublesome for Schumer, who is Jewish and has relied on Jewish voters as a key area of support in his 50-year political career. The 74-year-old Senate minority leader isn’t up for reelection until 2028.
Litwack said the poll results are likely more of a reflection of dissatisfaction with Schumer than support for AOC, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America — a group that supports the controversial boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel.
Ocasio-Cortez herself has called Israel’s retaliatory bombing of the Gaza strip “genocide” after Hamas terrorists invaded Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
But Litwack was critical of Schumer’s actions in the wake of those attacks and subsequent antisemitic protests in the United States.
“The leading Jewish elected official in the nation did not step up in a moment of rising antisemitism — and the poll reflects that,” Litwack said.
He said Schumer failed to pass the Antisemitism Awareness Act last year while Democrats controlled the Senate and White House and he served as Senate majority leader. The legislation would empower the US Education Department to use the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism when investigating potential violations of civil rights law.
Litwack also noted that Schumer was accused of advising Columbia University to ignore accusations of antisemitism, which was referenced in a bombshell House investigative report on campus protests. Schumer vehemently denied the claim.
Meanwhile, Schumer attacked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the Senate floor months into the war in Gaza, saying new elections should be held.
The senator wrote a book about antisemitism but his actions did not match his words in combatting it, Litwack said.
Schumer also came under a firestorm of criticism from liberal party activists — already smarting over Donald Trump’s second election to the White House — by voting in March to pass a six-month government funding bill. Some called on him to step down as the Senate Democratic leader, preferring someone else to be more confrontational with Trump.
The New York senior senator defended the vote, claiming a partial shutdown would have wrought “devastation like we’ve never seen.”
The phone text poll of 1,136 Democrats, conducted from May 15-18, has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.89 percentage points.
A spokesperson for Schumer didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
