🎬 Bought and Paid For: How Adelita Grijalva Became AIPAC's Genocide Spokesperson
How Adelita Grijalva went from AIPAC-funded Israel trip to starring in their Latino outreach videos
😽 Keepin’ It Simple Summary for Younger Readers
👧🏾✊🏾👦🏾
🏃♀️🏛️ Adelita Grijalva is running for Congress and took a ✈️ free trip to 🇮🇱 Israel paid for by a powerful 💼 lobbying group called AIPAC. She made a 📹 video for them where she 😢 cried about 🇮🇱 Israeli children and said supporting 🇮🇱 was a "Latino value."
But Adelita won't talk about the fact that over 80,000 🇵🇸 Palestinian people, including 17,000 🧒 children, have been killed by weapons made right in her own city of Tucson by a company called Raytheon.
It's like if someone gave you 💵 money to make a 🎥 commercial saying bullies were good people, while the bully was using 🪨 rocks from your own backyard to hurt other kids, and you just stayed quiet about it because you wanted the 💰 money.
🗝️ Takeaways
🎬 Adelita Grijalva starred in an AIPAC promotional video after they funded her trip to Israel, making her a literal spokesperson for the genocide lobby
💣 She represents the district where Raytheon manufactures weapons killing Palestinian children, yet refuses to condemn arms sales to Israel
🔇 Her silence on Gaza genocide contrasts sharply with her emotional performance crying for Israeli children in AIPAC propaganda
💸 AIPAC's $53 million political machine systematically buys politicians and eliminates voices that might question unconditional support for Israel
🏭 The military-industrial complex in her own district creates a financial incentive to stay quiet about genocide
AIPAC's Congressional Asset: How Adelita Grijalva Became a Genocide Spokesperson
Órale, readers. We need to talk about something that landed in my inbox recently—a video from the Tucson Hispanic Chamber that made me spit out my café de olla faster than you can say "¿Qué chingados?"
It's an AIPAC promotional piece featuring various Latino voices, including Adelita Grijalva, who describes herself as an “Arizona educator” working with at-risk Hispanic youth in Tucson.
Now, here in the frontera, we know all about people trying to manufacture connections where convenient ones don't exist—but this particular story hits different.
The Video That Made My Abuela Roll Over in Her Grave
This promotional piece features multiple Latino speakers sharing their "AIPAC Latino stories"—those magical aha moments when supporting a Middle Eastern ethnostate suddenly became personal.
Grijalva is featured in the video, describing visiting Israel, standing in a bomb shelter with a mother and daughter, crying tears of solidarity, and having what can only be described as a political awakening wrapped in humanitarian packaging.
But it gets worse. In the video, Grijalva declares: "For us, supporting Israel is not just a Jewish value. It is the Latino value. It is an American value."
¿En serio? Supporting a genocidal apartheid state is now a "Latino value"?
Órale, the audacity is breathtaking. Here's what's actually a Latino value: solidaridad with the oppressed, standing with los de abajo, fighting against colonization and displacement.
You know what else is a Latino value? Not manufacturing weapons to kill children.
According to the video, "Tears streamed down my face. No child should have to live in danger like this, I thought... At that second, I realized that this mother and the entire community had created a safe and caring environment for its children in spite of the dangers."
The pinche irony is suffocating.
While expressing concern for Israeli children in bomb shelters, there's complete silence about the Palestinian children being bombed to death by the very weapons manufactured in their backyard. While praising Israeli "resilience," there's no mention of Palestinian steadfastness (sumud) in the face of 76 years of ethnic cleansing.
The video continues, "As we stood, looking out over Jerusalem, she grabbed onto me with tears flowing down her face... Promise me, she said, promise me that for all that you will do in your life, you will continually help to protect Israel."
Protect Israel? From what—accountability for war crimes?
From facing consequences for genocide? While Palestinian grandmothers are being buried under the rubble of their homes, we're supposed to shed tears for the emotional manipulation of Israeli propaganda tours?
But here's where it gets interesante: Right now, in Arizona's 7th Congressional District, Adelita Grijalva is running in a special election to fill the seat left vacant by her father's death. The late Congressman Raúl Grijalva, a towering figure in progressive politics who served our borderland communities for over two decades, was known for his principled stances on indigenous rights, environmental protection, and—sí—his criticism of Israeli policies.
The Ironía Is Thick as Molasses in the Desert Sun
According to Jewish Insider, Adelita Grijalva "has struggled to clearly articulate her approach to Israel and the broader Middle East." During a recent Zoom call with Progressive Democrats of America, she expressed frustration that "there were some things that my dad could get away with that a lot of these organizations that come in and try to influence races... he predated them."
¿Predated them? Her father literally voted against funding Israel's Iron Dome in 2021—one of only eight Democrats with the cojones to do so. He voted against condemning the BDS movement. He understood that our struggles here in the borderlands—against militarization, against environmental destruction, against the displacement of indigenous peoples—have uncomfortable parallels with what's happening in Palestine.
But here's where the silence becomes absolutely chingón hypocritical: Adelita Grijalva lives in the city that is literally home to the weapons killing Palestinian children. Raytheon's Tucson operation didn't just help create Israel's Iron Dome—it's Arizona's largest defense contractor, employing over 15,000 people and generating billions in revenue from weapons that end up in Gaza.
And yet, as over 80,000 Palestinians have been killed in what multiple international organizations now recognize as genocide, Grijalva can't find her voice to speak clearly about arms sales to Israel.
Qué conveniente, ¿no?
The Genocide Connection: From Nuestra Casa to Gaza
Let's talk numbers that matter, raza.
As of July 2025, over 80,000 Palestinians have been killed in what Amnesty International, UN experts, and multiple international legal bodies have concluded is genocide. The Lancet estimates that 70% of those killed in residential buildings were women and children. Over 90% of educational buildings have been destroyed. One out of every 44 people in Gaza has been killed.
But here's the pinche connection that makes Adelita Grijalva's silence even more damning: She lives in the city where the weapons killing those children are made.
Raytheon's Tucson operation is Arizona's largest defense contractor, employing over 15,000 people and securing billions of dollars in contracts. They didn't just help create Israel's Iron Dome—they've supplied Israel with at least 1,200 Paveway bombs, thousands of missiles, and the technology integrated into Israeli fighter jets and warships that are systematically destroying Gaza.
Every day, Raytheon workers in Tucson manufacture weapons that, within weeks, could be dropped on Palestinian schools, hospitals, and refugee camps. The company has made $52 billion in Department of Defense contracts since 2008, and much of that deadly technology flows directly to Israel through the $3.8 billion annual military aid package.
Meanwhile, Adelita Grijalva—who represents the very district where these weapons of mass destruction are manufactured—can't bring herself to take a clear position on arms sales to Israel. When asked directly about U.S. military aid during her Zoom call with progressive organizations, she dodged the question entirely, calling the war in Gaza an "atrocity" while refusing to name who's committing it or how to stop it.
Let's talk about what AIPAC does, because understanding this machine is crucial to understanding our current political moment. According to The Intercept, AIPAC's educational arm has spent millions ferrying members of Congress to Israel—upward of $10,000 per person for carefully curated eight-day trips that present a very specific narrative.
Like the trip Adelita Grijalva took to Israel.
These aren't educational exchanges; they're propaganda tours with mariachi music. In 2019 alone, AIEF sponsored trips for 64 Democrats and 65 Republicans, spending over $10 million in the past decade to ensure members of Congress see Israel through rose-colored glasses while wearing complimentary t-shirts.
And now they're coming for our communities with a targeted Latino outreach campaign that would make even the most cynical political consultants blush.
The Numbers Don't Lie: AIPAC's Financial Firepower
Here's what we're really talking about, mi gente. AIPAC's political action committee distributed more than $53 million to pro-Israel candidates in 2024 alone. They proudly boast that 98% of their endorsed candidates won their races. When they say they're the largest pro-Israel PAC in America, they're not jugando.
But it gets worse. Through their United Democracy Project super PAC, they've spent millions targeting progressive Democrats, particularly women of color who might dare to question unconditional military aid to Israel. They spent $2.3 million trying to defeat Summer Lee in Pennsylvania. They're not just buying politicians—they're systematically removing anyone who might prioritize human rights over geopolitical allegiances.
Our Struggle, Their Narrative
What makes this particularly pinche insulting is the attempt to equate Latino immigrant experiences with Israeli settler colonialism while ignoring the ongoing genocide. The video features speakers drawing parallels between Latino struggles for dignity and Israel's "defensive" wars, with one declaring that "we must not stand in the way of another people who, like us, are motivated by making a better life for themselves and those around them."
¿Making a better life? By ethnically cleansing Palestinians from their ancestral lands? By turning Gaza into the world's largest open-air prison? By systematically destroying every university, hospital, and school in Gaza?
Another speaker talks about creating "safe and caring environments" while standing in a bomb shelter—as if Palestinians aren't also trying to create safe environments for their children while dodging U.S.-made bombs dropped by Israeli forces. The video notes: "This is something I could relate to. This is something I could bring home with me."
What they brought home was complicity in genocide, wrapped in the language of solidarity.
¿En serio? We're supposed to identify with a nuclear-armed state that receives $3.8 billion annually in U.S. military aid because they faced missiles from the open-air prison they've created in Gaza? While over 17,000 Palestinian children have been murdered, we're being told to sympathize with the occupiers because they had to run to bomb shelters built with our tax dollars?
Here in the borderlands, we know something about walls, about militarization, about being told that our security requires making other people less secure. We know what it means when politicians use fear to justify the unjustifiable. And we especially know what it means when the weapons being used against otros pueblos are manufactured right here in our own backyard.
The over 100 protesters who blocked Raytheon's Tucson facility in October 2023 understood this connection. They carried signs reading "From Palestine to O'Odham Land: Resist Colonialism," recognizing that the same forces displacing Palestinians are the inheritors of those who displaced our Tohono O'odham and Pascua Yaqui neighbors.
The Progressive Moment vs. The Machine
According to reporting, Adelita Grijalva's primary opponent, Daniel Hernandez Jr., is running as a "pro-Israel progressive.” Meanwhile, Grijalva appears at rallies with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders but won't clearly state her position on arms sales to Israel.
This is the squeeze play, raza. This is how the machine works. Progressive credentials get you the endorsements and the energy, but when it comes to foreign policy, suddenly everyone gets very quiet about international law and human rights.
What This Means for Nuestra Comunidad
The CD7 special election scheduled for July 15 isn't just about who replaces Raúl Grijalva—it's about whether progressive politics in America can survive contact with pro-Israel political money. It's about whether our movements for justice here at home can be separated from justice everywhere.
When AIPAC comes knocking with their carefully crafted Latino outreach videos, they're not just buying politicians—they're buying silence. They're ensuring that the next generation of Latino leaders will think twice before connecting the dots between border militarization and Palestinian displacement, between ICE raids and IDF operations, between our struggles and theirs.
Pero There's Hope in the Desert
Mira, we've been here before. Our communities have always known how to resist attempts to divide us, to co-opt our narratives, to use our struggles to justify someone else's oppression. The same organizing spirit that built the Chicano movement, that fought for bilingual education, that continues to resist militarization of our borderlands—that spirit isn't going anywhere.
Raúl Grijalva understood this. He voted his conscience even when it was politically inconvenient. He understood that justice isn't a zero-sum game, that supporting Palestinian rights doesn't diminish Latino struggles—it recognizes that all our liberation is connected.
The question now is whether his daughter and the other candidates in this race will carry that torch or let it be extinguished by the soft money and carefully managed narratives of organizations that see our communities as votes to be bought rather than movements to be respected.
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What do you think, raza? Drop your thoughts in the comments below and share two questions this article raised for you about money in politics and Latino representation.
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The oppression of the Palestinians didn’t start on October 7th, but in 1948. Adelita didn’t have to vote for a resolution that she didn’t support. Hernandez is worse. But there are two other good candidates to vote for: Foxx and Malvido, who are both better on this issue, but Malvido at least raised it (twice) during their first debate. Thanks to Three Sonorans for this coverage!
Now watch the Tucson Highspanic chamber take this video down.