But What Can You Do? tracks where 2026 candidates stand on U.S. weapons and funding for the government of Israel. How we check

Victor Mellor

Republican · U.S. House, Rhode Island District 2
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How this mark works

We track key votes on sending U.S. weapons and money to the government of Israel. A check means every tracked vote they cast came down against sending more, on the side of peace and de-escalation. A question mark means a mixed record: they sided with sending up to half of the time. An X means they voted to send more weapons and money in over half of their tracked votes, even as the way those weapons and dollars were being used became more and more obvious. At exactly half, money this election cycle from a lobbying group we track, or an endorsement from a group that backs sending weapons, makes it an X. Only votes actually cast are counted. Where a candidate has no recorded votes on these bills, the mark comes instead from a reviewed reading of their public record (money from the lobbying groups we track, endorsements, and their own words since January 26, 2024). There an X also covers fully backing the conduct of the war by the government of Israel without significant reservations, and a question mark also covers speaking about Israel without saying clearly where they stand on U.S. weapons and funding. A dash means No Position Found: we found nothing in their own words about Israel, Gaza or the war.

See a dash? Ask the candidate where they stand, then send us their answer and we'll review it and update the mark. Or volunteer to help review candidates.

No recorded votes on the bills we track. We found nothing in their own words about Israel, Gaza or the war.

Nothing located as of September 2026 has Mellor taking a position on U.S. weapons or money for the government of Israel, or on U.S. aid to Palestinians. His campaign platform does not reach these questions, and neither does the candidate survey he answered twice in August.

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Deep Dive

Victor Mellor, who campaigns as Vic, is the Republican nominee in Rhode Island's 2nd District. He is a Marine Corps veteran who grew up in Woonsocket, spent about thirty years in Florida building a concrete forms business, and says he moved back to Rhode Island in 2025. He has not held office before. He won the Republican primary on September 9, 2026 against Stephen Skoly and faces Seth Magaziner, the sitting representative, on November 3, 2026.

This is an empty record on these questions rather than a thin one. His campaign site puts his platform under one heading, What Matters, and the twelve subjects listed there are all domestic: affordability, jobs, inflation, housing, medical freedom, the Second Amendment, parental rights, free speech, community and small business outreach, government dysfunction and election integrity. Every issue page and every news post on the site was read, and none of them mentions Israel, Gaza, Palestinians or foreign aid. He answered Ballotpedia's candidate survey twice in August 2026, at length on both occasions, and neither submission reaches the subject either; the nearest is a line about creating Rhode Island jobs through commerce with organizations foreign and domestic. An empty record carries no implication either way.

He has spoken about foreign policy, on a different question. His campaign published a statement of his from March 2026 about attacks on American forces in the region, arguing that the United States has the right and the responsibility to defend its personnel and deter further attacks; it is about the government of Iran throughout and names no other country. Asked about the same war by a Providence television station in August 2026 he said he supported it, and he was not asked about Israel, Gaza or aid. The one item on his site whose title names Israel is a campaign post about a 2022 article that an Israeli newspaper carried about an event venue he owned in Florida, and it is about that venue rather than about anything the United States sends.

His campaign's accounts on X, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube were not read here, and one voter guide would not open; the addresses are all on his research page so that anyone who can reach them may look. You are better placed to change this than we are. Ask Mellor directly, or at a candidate forum, and send us the reply: it goes on this page in his own words, which is worth more than anything we could write about him.

The money

Checked the five lobbying groups we track; no direct 2026 support found

2026 support from the five lobbying groups we track
Nothing recorded (as of 2026-09-27) from the five lobbying groups we track; earlier cycles and earmarked donations not yet tracked.
Support-only OpenFEC data. Opposition independent expenditures are excluded.

Research log

The notes behind this card: what we looked at, what we found, and where each item came from.

Every page named below was opened and read on 2026-09-19 unless the entry says otherwise. Every substantive page of his campaign site was read, one at a time: all twelve issue pages, the about page, the endorsements page, the team page, the photo gallery, the contact page, the GAHA page and every news post. So were his Ballotpedia page and both of the candidate-survey submissions it carries, a long television profile interview, an opinion column about his candidacy, and the newspaper article his campaign names in its own headline. Bands: Position (2024-01-26 onward), Reaction window (2023-10-07 to 2024-01-25), Earlier record (before 2023-10-07), Undated. He has never held federal office, so none of the congressional votes this site tracks are his, and no funding from the committees this site tracks is recorded on this record.

U.S. military aid and weapons to the government of Israel

  • Nothing located, at any date. No statement by him about arms transfers, weapons shipments, Foreign Military Financing, the memorandum of understanding, security assistance, a dollar figure, a condition on aid, or any bill or amendment on those subjects appears on his campaign site, in either of his Ballotpedia survey submissions, in the television profile, in the news coverage of his primary, or in anything else of his read for this card.
  • [Position, 2026-03; the post is undated on its face] The closest thing of his on any foreign question is the statement his campaign published about Operation Epic Fury and the strikes on American forces that followed, which his campaign says Coalition News carried in March 2026. His words on the page: “For decades, the Iranian regime has engaged in sustained hostility toward the United States and our allies, from the 1979 hostage crisis to the 1983 bombing that killed 241 U.S. Marines, and through the support of proxy forces responsible for attacks on American service members across the region. Aggression without consequence encourages further instability. Recent strikes against U.S. forces underscore the seriousness of this threat. The United States has both the right and the responsibility to defend its personnel and deter further attacks.” The page then gives two further spans, separated on it by the words “Vic said”: “This is not about seeking broader conflict,” and “It is about restoring deterrence and ensuring that American service members are protected.” The statement is about American forces and the government of Iran. It names no other country, no ally by name, and no aid of any kind. The page links out to the Coalition News article, which was not opened here.
  • [Position, 2026-08-25] In a profile interview with NBC 10 News the reporter asked him about the war with Iran and he answered, “I support the war, wholeheartedly, yes.” That is the whole of the foreign policy in the piece. He is not asked about Israel, Gaza, Palestinians, weapons or aid, and he raises none of them.

U.S. aid to Palestinians

  • Nothing located, at any date. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, humanitarian funding for Gaza and the aid pipeline appear nowhere on his campaign site, in his Ballotpedia answers, or in any report about him that was read.

Characterization of the conflict

  • Nothing located, at any date. He has not been found using the words genocide, apartheid, self-defense or terrorism about the war in Gaza, and nothing was found from him on Palestinian statehood, a two-state framework, hostages or territorial boundaries. The words Israel, Gaza, Palestinian and Hamas occur nowhere on his campaign site except in the title and text of the single post described below.

Related rhetoric and lobbying

  • Nothing located, at any date. Nothing of his names the American Israel Public Affairs Committee or any other advocacy organization on this subject, and no money connected to any of them is recorded on this record. His endorsements page carries firearms and veterans endorsements, and his August 6 survey submission names Veterans for America First and the Rhode Island Fraternal Order of Police.
  • [Position, 2022-10-18 on its face; the page was last modified 2026-05-29] The one post on his site whose title names Israel, headed “Times of Israel Takes Notice of Vic Mellor and General Flynn”. It is his campaign’s own writing about an October 18, 2022 article, “Former White House adviser goes grassroots to spread Christian nationalism”, and it says the article “attempts to portray Vic Mellor and Michael Flynn as dangerous and extreme” and that “such attacks on grassroots organizing only reinforce the importance of what Vic Mellor is doing”. The article itself is an Associated Press and Frontline report by Michelle R. Smith that the Israeli newspaper republished, and its subject is a ten-acre event venue called The Hollow in Venice, Florida, and the retired general who used it as a base. It names the venue’s owner as “Victor Mellor Sr.” Nothing in the article or in the campaign’s post is about U.S. weapons or money for the government of Israel, or about aid to Palestinians; the only connection to the subject of this card is the name of the newspaper that carried the report.
  • The identity chain, checked because a post naming an Israeli publication is exactly where a wrong-person error would hide. The campaign’s own post claims the article as being about this candidate and describes “Vic’s ownership of The Hollow in Florida”. The NBC 10 profile independently records that he lived in Florida for about thirty years, started a concrete forms company there, and returned to Rhode Island, and his Ballotpedia biography records the Marine Corps service and the Woonsocket high school. The candidate on the state’s ballot list is VICTOR GILBERT MELLOR. Nothing from either page is carried on the card.

Safety and antisemitism (context, not an answer to what America sends)

  • Nothing located, at any date. He has published no statement about antisemitism or about the safety of any religious community.

What the campaign site and his own pages say

  • [Undated; read 2026-09-19] His campaign site was read in full: the home page, About Vic Mellor, What Matters and the twelve issue pages under it, Endorsements, the team page, the photo gallery, the contact page, the GAHA page and every post on the news page. The donation, volunteer, sign-up, events, early-voting and privacy pages were not read, because they carry no statement of his. A case-insensitive search of all of it for israel, gaza, palestin, hamas, antisemit, jewish, zionis, aipac, foreign aid, foreign policy, military aid, weapons transfer and middle east returns nothing outside the single post described above and the Iran statement. The address https://vicmellor.com/ri-first/ , which our research names as a framework of his, returns a page reading “The page can’t be found.” The phrase itself appears on the about page, where his Rhode Island First movement is described as “dedicated to putting the needs of our citizens before party bosses or global interests”. That is the whole of it; there is no statement anywhere on the site about foreign spending.
  • [Undated; read 2026-09-19] The twelve subjects under What Matters are affordability, housing that is affordable, the jobs revolution, inflation, medical freedom, the Second Amendment, parental rights, free speech, community outreach, small business outreach, government dysfunction, and voter identification and election integrity. None is about foreign policy.
  • [Position, submitted 2026-08-06 and again 2026-08-09] His Ballotpedia Candidate Connection answers. He completed the survey twice, and the page carries both submissions in full with their dates. The August 9 answers run to three long key messages on jobs, parental control of children’s health care and the cost of health care, plus a self-description covering the border, patient control, parental authority, the Second Amendment, manufacturing and energy. The August 6 answers give safety, jobs and affordability as his three messages, describe his Marine Corps service as an explosives detection dog handler at Norfolk with duty assignments to the Presidential Helicopter Squadron and the Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team, and name two endorsements. Israel, Gaza, Palestinians, weapons, arms and foreign aid appear in none of it. The nearest approach is the second key message of August 6: “Creating Jobs in Rhode Island by engaging in commerce with different organizations, both foreign and domestic.” The questionnaire test is met in his favor: the form gave him open questions, he used them at length twice, and no question on it asks about this subject, so the silence is his own and not a wall of blanks.

The race

  • [Read 2026-09-19] The Rhode Island Department of State’s candidate list for Representative in Congress District 2, current as of Saturday, September 19, 2026. Four people declared: Spencer E Dickinson and Seth Michael Magaziner as Democrats, Victor Gilbert Mellor and Stephen T Skoly as Republicans. Two are marked as on the election ballot, Magaziner first and Mellor second. Mellor is marked as having won his primary and as not endorsed by his party. The general election is November 3, 2026.
  • [Read 2026-09-19] Ballotpedia’s page for the race gives the primary as September 9, 2026 and the filing deadline as June 24, 2026, and records that Mellor defeated Stephen Skoly 58.6 percent and 8,404 votes to 41.4 percent and 5,936, and that Magaziner advanced from the Democratic primary with 53,802 votes. It also carries a third name in the general election field, Armando Anzoli, described as an independent; his own Ballotpedia page says only that he “declared candidacy for the general election”, and he does not appear on the state’s list above, so this card names two candidates. The vote figures on this record come from the Board of Elections and differ slightly from Ballotpedia’s; both addresses are in the source list below.
  • [Position, 2026-08-25] The NBC 10 News profile, by Brian Crandall, published August 25, 2026. It is the longest interview with him that could be found. Its subjects are his primary contest and the state party’s endorsement of his opponent, his upbringing in Woonsocket, his thirty years in Florida and the questions about where he now lives, his registration as a foreign agent in connection with work in Cuba, his account of being at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, two criminal accusations from the 1990s that were dropped, his support for the war with Iran, gun rights, abortion and the federal response to the pandemic. Only the Iran answer is foreign policy, and none of it is about what the United States sends to the government of Israel or to Palestinians.
  • [Position, 2026-08-25] An opinion column about his candidacy covers the same ground from a critical standpoint and reaches this subject nowhere. It is a third party writing about him and nothing from it is on the card.
  • Seth Magaziner’s record is on his own card and is not narrated here.

Places that could not be read, so nothing is claimed from them

  • Rhode Island Current’s voter guide for this contest, https://rhodeislandcurrent.com/voter-guides/contests/2026-primary-2nd-congressional-district/ . It returned 403 on every attempt. It is the one guide found that appears to put the same questions to every candidate in this race, so it is the material most likely to change this card, and its questions are unknown.
  • His campaign’s accounts, none of them read here: https://x.com/VicMellorForRI , https://x.com/victormellor , https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583926523336 , https://www.instagram.com/vicmellor4congress and https://www.youtube.com/@VicMellor . His campaign site also links a second video channel at https://youtube.com/@vicmellorforrhodeisland .
  • The Coalition News article his campaign’s Iran post links to. The post reproduces his statement in full and is what is quoted; the outside article was not opened.
  • Video. The television interview above is published with a video segment that was not watched, and the recording our research cited, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kACsnICUceI , is a news clip of his primary win rather than anything of his; its page was read and the recording was not watched.
  • No iVoterGuide profile or League of Women Voters questionnaire was located for him in this race.

Not on the card, and why

  • The statement in our research that his campaign materials “emphasize a ‘Rhode Island First’ framework that prioritizes domestic investment over foreign spending”. The phrase Rhode Island First is his, and the page at that address on his site does not exist; the only wording behind it is a line on his about page about putting citizens before party bosses or global interests. Nothing of his ranks domestic spending against foreign spending, and nothing on this card says he does.
  • The campaign post about the 2022 Times of Israel article, and the article itself. Out of scope: both are about an event venue in Florida and the people who used it, and neither is about what the United States sends to any government. Both are set out above so the absence can be checked.
  • His March 2026 statement on the strikes on American forces, and his answer to the television station about that war. Iran is a different question from what the United States sends to the government of Israel. Both are quoted above.
  • Everything else on his campaign site and in his survey answers: jobs, manufacturing, shipbuilding, housing, inflation, energy and a natural gas pipeline, health care and the Great American Health Alliance, medical freedom, parental rights, the border, free speech, firearms, policing, veterans and election procedure. Out of scope, and listed above so the absence is checkable.
  • The material in the television profile and the opinion column about his residency, his foreign agent registration, January 6, 2021, and accusations from the 1990s that were dropped. None of it answers what the United States sends, and this site does not carry it.
  • Seth Magaziner’s record, and Stephen Skoly’s. Another candidate’s record belongs on that candidate’s own card.

Sources retrieved for this card (address; opened or could not open; date)

  • https://vicmellor.com/ and every page of the site, including https://vicmellor.com/about/ , https://vicmellor.com/what-matters/ , https://vicmellor.com/housing-that-is-affordable-rhode-island/ , https://vicmellor.com/jobs-revolution/ , https://vicmellor.com/inflation-rhode-island/ , https://vicmellor.com/medical-freedom/ , https://vicmellor.com/second-amendment/ , https://vicmellor.com/parental-rights/ , https://vicmellor.com/free-speech/ , https://vicmellor.com/community-outreach/ , https://vicmellor.com/small-business-outreach/ , https://vicmellor.com/government-dysfunction/ , https://vicmellor.com/voter-id-election-integrity/ , https://vicmellor.com/gaha/ , https://vicmellor.com/endorsements/ , https://vicmellor.com/team/ , https://vicmellor.com/photo-gallery/ , https://vicmellor.com/contact/ and https://vicmellor.com/news/ (opened; 2026-09-19)
  • https://vicmellor.com/vic-mellor-times-of-israel/ (opened; 2026-09-19; the post dates itself 2022-10-18 and was last modified 2026-05-29)
  • https://vicmellor.com/coalition-news-covers-vic-mellor-on-operation-epic-fury/ (opened; 2026-09-19; the campaign dates the statement to March 2026)
  • https://vicmellor.com/statement-by-vic-mellor-candidate-for-congress-ri-02/ (opened; 2026-09-19; a statement about January 6, 2021 and not in scope)
  • https://vicmellor.com/ri-first/ (opened; 2026-09-19; the page returns “The page can’t be found”)
  • https://www.timesofisrael.com/former-white-house-adviser-goes-grassroots-to-spread-christian-nationalism/ (opened; 2026-09-19; published 2022-10-18)
  • https://ballotpedia.org/Victor_Mellor (opened; 2026-09-19; survey submissions dated 2026-08-06 and 2026-08-09)
  • https://ballotpedia.org/Rhode_Island%27s_2nd_Congressional_District_election,_2026 and https://ballotpedia.org/Armando_Anzoli (opened; 2026-09-19)
  • https://vote.sos.ri.gov/Candidates/CandidateSearchSummary?OfficeType=592&Election=18239 (opened; 2026-09-19)
  • https://turnto10.com/politics/vic-mellor-republican-candidate-rhode-island-2nd-congressional-district-maga-january-6-cuba-registered-foreign-agent-assault-accusations-mindset-residency-florida-election-2026 (opened; 2026-09-19; published 2026-08-25)
  • https://www.ms.now/opinion/victor-mellor-rhode-island-2nd-district-foreign-agent-flynn-giuliani (opened; 2026-09-19; published 2026-08-25)
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kACsnICUceI (page opened, recording not watched; 2026-09-19; a news clip of the primary result)
  • https://rhodeislandcurrent.com/voter-guides/contests/2026-primary-2nd-congressional-district/ (could not open, 403; 2026-09-19)
  • https://x.com/VicMellorForRI , https://x.com/victormellor , https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583926523336 , https://www.instagram.com/vicmellor4congress , https://www.youtube.com/@VicMellor and https://youtube.com/@vicmellorforrhodeisland (not read; 2026-09-19)
  • This is a record of what was checked on 2026-09-19, not a claim that no statement exists anywhere.

Also in this race

  1. ? Seth Magaziner (Democrat)

All Rhode Island candidates.

But What Can You Do? tracks where 2026 candidates stand on U.S. weapons and funding for the government of Israel. Every claim on this page goes through at least two verification steps. Open Find Your Candidates for votes, funding and contact details.