The Republicans Are Fighting AIPAC in NY-3

The setup: AIPAC’s Democrat

NY-3 covers Nassau County’s North Shore and part of northeast Queens — the seat George Santos held before his expulsion. Rep. Tom Suozzi, a former Nassau County executive and co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, won it back in a February 2024 special election and beat Republican Mike LiPetri that November with 51.8% of the vote. LiPetri, a former state assemblyman endorsed by President Trump, is back for the rematch.

Suozzi is also one of AIPAC’s incumbents. FEC filings via FundVoter document $498,824 in AIPAC-linked money to Suozzi across the 2024–2026 window — AIPAC’s own PAC plus individual contributions routed through AIPAC’s network, the methodology spelled out on our pro-Israel PACs page and his race page. His own committee has raised $2,315,702 this cycle, with $883,162 on hand at September 30.

On October 9, the Cook Political Report moved the race a step toward the Democrats — from Lean D to Likely D — with House editor Erin Covey writing that the heavy Republican ad campaign “has yet to move the needle” (Washington Examiner).

The attack: a super PAC with no donors

The Republican air war in NY-3 is run almost entirely by one committee: No Going Back PAC (C00960435, treasurer Charles Gantt). FEC filings through October 20 show:

FEC independent expenditure data, 2026 cycle, bulk files through October 20, 2026 plus 24-hour notices filed October 19; amendment-deduplicated and candidate-matched by FEC ID. Smaller spenders (under $50K combined) omitted. Ad-buy reporting puts No Going Back’s full NY-3 effort at about $8 million including a $5.7 million TV buy and roughly $2 million in mail; local reporting expects about $19 million to pour into the race overall (Courier New York, New York Post).

Now look at the PAC itself. No Going Back registered on September 1, 2026, and by October 14 had reported $159.6 million in outside spending nationwide — instantly one of the biggest super PACs in America. Yet its FEC file shows no donors, no receipts, and no cash on hand this cycle (Legis1). The money’s origin is known only from reporting: Reuters reported September 27 that the group is fully funded by MAGA Inc., President Trump’s main super PAC, and the New York Times described it as backed by MAGA Inc. The two committees share a treasurer.

Its NY-3 ads attack Suozzi over congressional stock trading — “Tom Suozzi serves himself,” one spot says. The Suozzi campaign answers that he “has not purchased a single stock since he returned to Congress in January of 2025.” What matters for this page is the structure: the single biggest spender in the race is a seven-week-old committee whose funding appears nowhere in its own FEC file. If the MAGA Inc. money shows up anywhere, it will be in MAGA Inc.’s reports — a different committee, on a different schedule.

The defense has a shadow of its own

Suozzi’s outside help is smaller — and most of it is clean. Article One PAC spent $338,408 against LiPetri as a normal, disclosing super PAC. The American Democracy Project, a Democratic super PAC run by veteran compliance operator Victoria Perrone, added support for Suozzi in an October 19 filing and disclosed its donors in its quarterly report ($638.5K raised, including $300K from another committee). That is how the system is supposed to work.

Then there is the Center for Democratic Priorities. On October 19 it filed the first FEC report of its existence: $110,310 in direct mail supporting Suozzi, through the mail firm Mission Control. Before that filing, the group’s entire public record was this:

• It appeared from nowhere in May 2026 and placed an estimated $5.7 million in TV ads backing Haley Stevens in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary — Stevens being the candidate AIPAC’s network favored against Abdul El-Sayed (AdImpact estimate, via InfluenceWatch).
• It bought the ads through Waterfront Strategies — the same media buyer used by AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project.
• The only human name attached to it anywhere is a board officer, “John Jones,” on TV-station paperwork — the same name as the treasurer of Blue Wave Action, a 2024 group funded by UDP. Same person has not been established, and we do not claim it.
• It has never disclosed a donor and, as of June 2026 reporting, had filed no FEC registration or IRS 527 paperwork. El-Sayed publicly alleged AIPAC funded it. AIPAC denied it. No outlet has documented a money link.

Now the same vehicle is mailing for the second AIPAC-aligned Democrat of its short life. Both of its known beneficiaries are candidates AIPAC’s network supports; both times, the money arrived with no AIPAC label and no donor trail — in a cycle when, as our dark-side reporting documents, the label itself has become a liability. That pattern is circumstantial, and this page labels it as such. But a pattern with no innocent documentation is exactly what a donor-watch exists for: the Center for Democratic Priorities sits on ours, with no donor report scheduled — because as a 527, it may never have to file one.

The cavalry that didn’t come

The most telling absence in the filings is the Democrats’ own big gun. When Suozzi won the February 2024 special election, the House Majority PAC spent $5.9 million backing him. In the 2026 filings through October 20, House Majority PAC has spent nothing in NY-3.

That lines up with Cook’s October 9 move: the party committees read this race as one their incumbent is likely to hold, Trump’s $8 million notwithstanding, and sent their money to tighter seats. It also means the defense of an AIPAC-backed incumbent against the president’s machine is being left to a disclosed mid-size PAC, a small disclosed super PAC — and one untraceable 527.

What this race actually shows

First: AIPAC is not a Republican organization, and NY-3 is the proof case. Across the November ballot, our hub documents AIPAC-linked money on 190 Republican nominees ($33.2 million) and 138 Democratic nominees ($46.3 million). The network’s allegiance is to a position — support for Israel — not a party. It backs pro-Israel incumbents where it finds them, which is how its money ends up defending a New York Democrat against the Republican president’s own super PAC, in the same cycle it spent millions trying to shape Democratic primaries in Michigan and Republican ones in Kentucky. Party is the terrain. The position is the point.

Second: in this race, disclosure itself has collapsed on both sides. More than $7.3 million in independent expenditures has been filed in NY-3. The two most unusual spenders — a $6.6 million super PAC with an empty FEC wallet and a $110K 527 with no donors anywhere in any public record — account for most of the attack and the most mysterious slice of the defense. Voters in Nassau and Queens can see every ad. For the biggest one, they cannot see a single donor.

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