U.S. Rep. Summer Lee and her Democratic challenger, Bhavini Patel, met for a blistering debate on WPXI-TV Thursday night. And while the event lasted just 30 minutes, it summed up the entire campaign for the 12th Congressional District, with rapid-fire attacks concerning the war in Gaza, the candidates' loyalty to President Joe Biden, and dueling accusations about each other’s supporters.
Patel was on the attack from the outset, lashing out at Lee less than 30 seconds into an opening statement in which, after reprising her own immigrant background, she accused Lee of being allied with groups “who are calling for Pennsylvanians to write in ‘uncommitted’ rather than supporting President Joe Biden in the primary and the general election. This undermines our democracy and hurts President Biden.”
Lee sought to turn the tables on Patel, at one point accusing her of seeking out the support of Republicans including Pennsylvania hedge fund manager Jeffrey Yass, who has risen to become one of the most prominent donors to Republicans in the country. He also has been a longtime funder of school vouchers and other conservative causes.
“She is now backed by Jeffrey Yass, who is the richest man in Pennsylvania, who has spent all of his money eroding public education,” Lee charged. “He has eroded abortion rights, and right now he is on the shortlist to be treasurer secretary for Donald Trump. Her entire campaign is backed by Republicans, yet she says I’m not a good enough Democrat.”
Each candidate’s attacks arguably had some basis in fact, though both overstated their cases.
Organizers of Pennsylvania’s “uncommitted” movement are calling for Democrats to write in the word on their primary ballots rather than vote for Biden — an effort to pressure the administration to rein in Israel’s attacks on Gaza. In a news conference this week, however, organizers said the movement as a whole is focused solely on the primary, not on the general election, though individual member groups could pursue their own strategy this fall.
Some media accounts have linked a Lee staffer to an anonymous social media account that has backed the uncommitted effort, and has previously told WESA that she knew nothing about the effort. Lee herself is broadly backed by a broad swath of Democratic officials and interests including labor, and in Thursday’s debate, she offered a version of an argument she has previously made to WESA: that beating Donald Trump in November requires an energized base — one that feels its concerns are being heard.
“There is a new coalition that we have in our country, and it is black people and progressives and young people, Muslims and Palestinians and Jewish people. We need each and every one of them,” she said. “So to just throw any part of our coalition out is to say that we don't want President Biden to win.”
Conversely, Lee’s efforts to link Patel to Yass arguably overstated the connection between them. There is no record of Yass contributing directly to Patel’s campaign, though in the past and during this cycle he has been a donor to an outside-spending group that is backing her in TV spots. But that group, Moderate PAC, has also said its donors include residents within the 12th District, and WESA has heard anecdotal accounts of such gifts.
A full accounting of the group’s donors in 2024 is not yet available. In any case, Patel has drawn the backing of unions and Democratic local officials. And while her campaign once trumpeted the ad for joining a battle between her “principled Democratic brand and Lee’s fringe agenda,” she would not have control over or even knowledge of its donor list. On Thursday night, Patel said, “I denounce extremism on both sides. … I denounce Donald Trump. I denounce Jeffrey Yass.”
A debate about Israel was similarly charged, with WPXI moderator Lisa Sylvester asking Lee to respond to a letter written by local Jewish religious leaders accusing her of using “antisemitic rhetoric” at times and allying herself with others who have done the same.
“I'm not able to respond to that because I don't know what they are considering antisemitic rhetoric,” said Lee.
The letter also faulted Lee for a number of symbolic votes against bills expressing support for Israel and for planning to attend a Philadelphia fundraiser for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The group is the nation’s most visible Muslim civil-rights advocacy group, but its executive director and speakers at the fundraiser had made antisemitic and homophobic statements in the past.
“She was going to be sharing a stage with homophobes and known antisemites,” Patel said of Lee. And she noted that Lee withdrew only after the fundraiser was criticized by Gov. Josh Shapiro and others.
Lee “actually had to be peeled away from being able to share the stage with those individuals,” Patel said.
She noted criticism that Lee had not participated in some Jewish community events and had not agreed to participate in a political gathering next week. Lee repeated earlier assertions that she speaks with Jewish and other groups inside the district, and she accused Patel of using loaded rhetoric as well.
“My opponent has already mentioned the rising tide of Islamophobia, but yet she just called out the largest, Muslim organization in the country, which I did not attend," Lee said.
Patel herself hedged when asked whether she thought Israel should receive more military aid from the United States — a question that has become more pointed as concern has grown about Israel’s tactics in Gaza.
“I think military aid is directly tied to our own national security,” she said. “It’s critical that we look at the bigger picture of what’s playing out there”
On many domestic issues — including some that divide the country as a whole — there appeared to be few marked differences between the two candidates. Both said they favor more stringent controls on firearm ownership, and they pledged to support the cause of labor and favor investments in affordable housing.
Both celebrated a state-level investment in “whole home repair,” which provides aid for lower-income families for home renovations. (Lee noted that she supported that initiative alongside her ally, former state Rep. and current Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato, but she and Patel both said they would back it at the federal level.)
The debate was the first time the two have shared the stage in public since a contentious forum this past winter, and because the field has shrunk since then, it was the first time they faced each other one-on-one. There are no other debates scheduled. The primary is scheduled for April 23.
