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Ed Markey

Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey uses Zionist "both sides" talking points to normalize Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their homeland, and consistently supports the interests of US weapons developers in US Congress.

'Both-Sides'-ing Israeli Ethnic Cleansing

In spite of branding himself as a bold progressive during his 2020 primary campaign against Joe Kennedy, Ed Markey has parroted Zionist "both sides" talking points, contributing to the erasure of the power imbalances that exist between Israel's program of ethnic cleansing and the Palestinians fighting to remain on and return to their land. Following one such statement from Markey in the midst of Israel's May 2021 military onslaught against Palestinians in Gaza, hundreds of Markey's former staff, fellows, volunteers, donors, supporters, and endorsing organizations composed and signed onto an open letter expressing their rejection of Markey, as they put it, "follow[ing] in the footsteps of Mitt Romney and Donald Trump by saying it’s a 'both sides' issue, which ignores the current and historical power imbalance between Israel and Palestine," and demanding Markey take meaningful action to support Palestinians.

Support for US Weapons Developers

Neither does Ed Markey's progressive self-branding extend to authentic opposition to the US military and the weapons manufacturers who supply and profit from it. In 2017, Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey along with his colleague MA Senator Elizabeth Warren successfully fought for additional funding in Congress’s FY 2017 defense appropriations bill for a “battlefield communications” project worth hundreds of millions USD at General Dynamics’ site in Taunton, MA. General Dynamics spent $277 million from 1998-2021 lobbying US federal officials, likely including Warren and Markey, for more war, more destruction, and of course, more weapons purchases from companies like GD. More recently, Markey has joined the chorus of Democrats advocating for the "greening" of the US Military. Ignoring worldwide calls for the reduction of US military emissions by downsizing the US military itself, this new liberal imperialist political line holds that the US government should decrease its military's reliance on fossil fuels in order to ensure continued US dominance and hegemony worldwide in decades to come.

Markey's support for the US military and US weapons developers can be partially explained by where the Senator receives his campaign funding. Politico reported that in 2013 Ed Markey's largest campaign contributor was DLA Piper, a "politically connected law and lobbying firm whose clients include Raytheon, the Massachusetts-based defense contractor." Markey has also received campaign funding from weapons manufacturer L3Harris.

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