ROYAL OAK, Mich. — The top issues driving Democratic voters right now include rising prices, abortion rights, gun violence and threats to democracy. But the top spender in Democratic primaries is singularly focused on Israel — and fights over the issue are rending the party in district after district.

The latest one is a deep-blue slice of suburban Detroit, where the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as AIPAC, is showering Michigan’s 11th District with ads boosting Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.). Spending through the group’s super PAC has topped $22 million across nine safe-seat Democratic primaries so far, paying for slashing negative ads against a number of largely progressive candidates.

But in a redistricting year twist, Stevens — a former Obama administration official who flipped a GOP-held swing seat in 2018 — is running in her primary against fellowRep. Andy Levin, who authored legislation to make a two-state solution official U.S. policy and has criticized the “creeping annexation” of Palestinian territory, after Michigan lost a congressional seat. Levin is from one of the most prominent Jewish families in American politics, the son of former Rep. Sander Levin and nephew of the late Sen. Carl Levin.

It’s a lineage, Levin said in an interview with POLITICO, that “definitely [is] extra threatening to” AIPAC as the group tries to shape the future of the Democratic Party in Washington — and as some Democratic voters’ sympathies on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict shift. The super PAC’s spending has outstripped all other groups in Democratic primaries so far this year, per OpenSecrets, and has helped six AIPAC-preferred candidates to victory in deep-blue seats, compared to just one loss, with more primaries to come. “We’re looking hard at a number of upcoming primary races, including in New York,” said Patrick Dorton, a spokesperson for AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project.

Rep. Haley Stevens speaks during an event on the Build Back Better Act at the Capitol on Sept. 28, 2021 in Washington, D.C.

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Now, the Levin-Stevens primary is on track to become one of the group’s most expensive investments of 2022 — and, by far, the most personal one.

“This race is important to them because Andy is so prominent, so outspoken and is from a very distinguished Jewish political family,” said David Hecker, president of Michigan’s American Federation of Teachers union and a Levin supporter, who also noted that he is Jewish and supportive of a “safe and secure Israel” as well as Palestinian human rights, “just like Andy.”

“AIPAC would want every Jewish individual to fall in line with their way of thinking,” Hecker continued. “But Andy’s a man of tremendous integrity and he has his firm beliefs, and he’s not going to waver on those firm beliefs to stop an onslaught of money for his opponent.”

David Victor, who served as AIPAC’s president from 2008 to 2010 and lives in the district, echoed the assessment of Levin’s positioning and prominence — but said that’s exactly why he thinks Levin needs to be out of Congress.

“If you’re a member of the Democratic caucus and you’re not particularly engaged on the [Israel] issue, and you’re getting pressure from the left to be more critical but you want to be considered pro-Israel, you can be forgiven for following Andy Levin’s path,” Victor said. He noted Levin’s defense of Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who he called “Israel’s most vociferous critics.”

Victor also called Levin’s legislation for a two-state solution “highly problematic legislation.” Democratic Majority for Israel, another super PAC that’s frequently aligned with AIPAC spending in primaries, said the legislation “[stirred] up anti-Israel hostility.”

“That’s why we consider him so problematic,” Victor added.

Levin, for his part, called AIPAC’s involvement “a politics of domination,” wherein AIPAC uses “vast amounts of money to control or to prevent open space to have rational dialogue about Israel and Palestine.”

“The idea that people with vast resources, who want to influence politics can come in and not even talk about the reason that they’re doing it, and for a million dollars a week, run unaccountable, dark money in to try to change the outcome of a vote of a Democratic primary, it’s a real threat to our democracy,” Levin added.

Stage hands prepare the stage for the 2015 AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington, Monday, March 2, 2015.