Denise Powell
D · U.S. House, NE-2 · Tier 2
Tier 2, “Mainstream pro-Israel”
At a January 2026 primary forum she said she was “a big believer that the U.S. needs to be doing more to support the Palestinian people in this moment” and that a State Department funding bill pairing $3.3 billion for Israel with a block on UNRWA funding, which she said she hadn’t reviewed, “doesn’t feel like something I’d be super comfortable voting on”; a follow-up statement then stressed that she has “always unequivocally supported Israel’s right to exist and its right to defend itself” and “I fully support providing aid to Israel,” alongside humanitarian aid and two states. In May 2026 she told the Nebraska Examiner “It has been heartbreaking to watch innocent lives destroyed because of this conflict,” sidestepped whether she would keep funding offensive and defensive military aid, and, the Examiner reported, said in a local interview that she hasn’t “accepted any money from AIPAC, J Street, DMFI, any organization in this space.” Two super PACs funded in part by AIPAC’s United Democracy Project, Bold America and EDW Action Fund, spent about $618,000 supporting her in 2026; she does not control that spending. A former corporate communications director and co-founder of the Women Who Run Nebraska PAC, she won the May 2026 primary for the open NE-2 seat (Don Bacon retiring).
A 2, not 1/2. Her written position — full support for aid to Israel and its right to defend itself, with humanitarian aid and two states alongside — is the standard pro-Israel line, but in her own words, without a self-defense caveat, she has said the U.S. must do more for the Palestinian people and grieved the “innocent lives destroyed,” and she balked at a bill that cut off UNRWA. That is concern for Palestinian civilians. It is not 2/3: beyond saying Netanyahu’s government “has gone way too far” and that the U.S. should be “holding him accountable for this stuff,” she offers no specific criticism of the war’s conduct, her follow-up statement re-centered aid to Israel, and she would not say whether she would limit military aid. The counter-case is 1/2: read on the follow-up statement, her position pairs aid to Israel with humanitarian aid in a single breath.
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elect26 places 2026 midterm candidates on a six-tier spectrum, from 1 (most pro-Israel) to 6 (most critical of Israel).