Base bails as Booker betrayed them! Netanyahu photo and shutdown vote ignite left-wing primary threat

Senator Cory Booker, a Wall Street darling long embraced by the progressive left, is facing a furious revolt from his one-time supporters, who accuse him of sacrificing principle for political expediency and bundles of AIPAC cash.

The growing backlash, fueled by his recent vote to fund Trump's government after promising a fight and a controversial photo-op with a wanted war criminal, is rapidly solidifying into a likely primary challenge from progressive stalwart Lisa McCormick.

The disillusionment was crystallized this week by a powerful voice from Booker's past: Miyoko Schinner, the celebrated vegan chef and entrepreneur.

Schinner, who once hosted a fundraiser for Booker, publicly denounced him on social media after he appeared in a grinning photo with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a bipartisan group of senators.

"I once hosted a fundraiser for him at my house. Cory was a vegan, a staunch advocate for animals, and I was a big fan," Schinner wrote. "But he can’t seem to give up AIPAC money and proudly stood alongside Netanyahu last week... You care about animals, but you don’t care about starving children, an entire population being annihilated? Or are you too cowardly to stand up against the powerful? I guess in the end you’re just another politician."

Schinner’s condemnation taps into a deep well of anger among grassroots Democrats who see Booker as the epitome of a corrupt, spineless establishment led by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

At the time, Booker quelled the outrage with a marathon Senate floor speech—a performance critics derided as political theater that served no practical purpose but to distract from his own complicity in Schumer's betrayal.

Now, Booker stands accused of an identical betrayal.

After weeks of public promises that he would "not give away [his] vote to Trump to fund the government for nothing," Booker on Friday provided a key vote to avert a government shutdown without securing any major concessions for Democrats.

“This is who Cory Booker is: all sermon, no spine,” said Lisa McCormick, who is expected to mount a serious primary challenge against the incumbent senator. “He gives a stirring speech about justice, then takes a photo with a leader accused of genocide. He draws a red line in the sand, then immediately crosses it when the lobbyists call. New Jersey deserves a senator who fights for human rights and economic justice, not one who auctions his vote to the highest bidder.”

The criticism of Booker’s alignment with Netanyahu is severe.

The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for the Israeli leader for alleged war crimes, and his government is openly planning to forcibly confine Gaza’s Palestinian population. Activists were swift to condemn the senators' meeting.

"Shame on you, Cory Booker!" wrote Medea Benjamin of CODEPINK. "Standing with oppressors and war criminals sends a clear message: that he does not care about the struggle for justice."

"The way these people make me resent them with every fiber of my being because they are hypocrites in the literal definition," posted another critic, Neveen, who called Booker a "ghoulish clown" for taking "blood money."

The contrast with McCormick’s platform could not be starker.

While Booker has raised nearly $100 million during his career, much of it from billionaires, pro-Israel donors, and corporate PACs, McCormick is championing an agenda of radical economic justice. Her proposals include a $50 million cap on personal wealth, a 90% tax on extreme income, and the elimination of big money in politics.

“Since Cory Booker went to the Senate, women lost abortion rights, the middle class shrank, and $37 trillion was stolen from workers,” said McCormick. “He’s been on the wrong side of America’s class war. It’s time for a senator who will fight for the people, not the powerful.”

For supporters who once saw Booker as a different kind of politician, the feeling is one of profound betrayal.

The senator who speaks passionately about civil rights at home, they argue, has proven unwilling to defend those same rights for Palestinians when it conflicts with the demands of his donors.

Booker supported Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. McCormick backed Senator Bernie Sanders, and she called on Biden to step aside long before his disastrous debate with Donald Trump.

As the 2026 election cycle approaches, the stage is set for a bitter Democratic civil war in New Jersey, pitting the well-funded establishment incumbent against a progressive insurgency that believes he has become everything he once claimed to oppose.