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Conservative political activism has grown increasingly crusading. These Jews feel right at home.
NATIONAL HARBOR, Maryland (JTA) — A little more than a week ago, 120 Jews gathered at the Residence Inn in National Harbor, Maryland, to spend Shabbat together.
The Shabbaton, or programmed Shabbat, had a structure familiar to many observant Jews: Sabbath meals and prayer service options along with opportunities for group discussions and lectures. The vibe was also characteristic of observant Jewish gatherings on Friday afternoon: Frantic calls to family stuck in the Washington, D.C., area’s notorious Friday afternoon traffic, excited reunions in the lobby and a reverting to Hebrew-inflected Jewish vernacular.
“I come here to meet politically like minded Jews on a more spiritual level and for more like religious Jews, they express their political views and in a way that aligns with [their beliefs],” Jeremy Pollock, 33, said. “So it makes it all cohesive.”
The political views that Pollock alluded to are what set this Shabbaton apart from many others. The participants were there to attend CPAC, the annual conservative activist conference. And at the Gaylord National Resort conference center across the street from the Residence Inn, where the conference was being held, the atmosphere was starkly different.
The older, darker, slightly musty Residence Inn was packed with blocky furniture and buzzing with older staffers who were eager to help and to explain that yes, they understood about helping the Shabbat observant get to their rooms. In the conference center, the massive light-filled corridors across the street with overpriced eateries and harried younger staffers who were few and far between.
“This is a place for open dialogue on all topics,” said Mark Young, a Baltimore physician, noting that he still maintains a few of the liberal beliefs he grew up with, and would not hesitate to air them in the Jewish enclave. “I think it’s very much an open tent.” Pollock, who wears a kippah, said he has never been made to feel uncomfortable in his years of attending CPAC.
The attitude toward Jews at CPAC also felt different at times. One speaker called for mandatory Christian prayer at schools. Multiple sessions opened with Christian prayer. And “evil” was a word used repeatedly to describe George Soros, the Holocaust survivor, billionaire and philanthropist who funds liberal causes, and who even made it into the title of one of the events.
Paintings and prints depicting former President Donald Trump and Jesus are seen for sale on the first day of the Conservative Political Action Conference CPAC held at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland, March 02, 2023. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
Soros wasn’t alone. “Evil” was also used frequently to describe liberals, Democrats, transgender activists and RINOs (Republicans in Name Only).
But some Jews at the event said they didn’t mind that kind of language. Instead of feeling alienated by calls for Christianity in the public square, or bristling at conspiratorial statements surrounding a leading Jewish progressive philanthropist, Jews at CPAC demonstrated that they felt welcome at an event — and within a larger right-wing political movement — whose rhetoric and aims have grown increasingly assertive.
“If you look at the archives, almost every year one of the opening prayers is delivered by a Jew,” said Yitzchok Tendler, an Atlanta-based rabbi who launched the Shabbat gatherings at CPAC and who has long been involved with the American Conservative Union, which runs CPAC. “Also any religious language would not be too different from what is heard in legislatures across the United States all the time.”
The conference also demonstrated a commitment to opposing virulent antisemitic rhetoric on the right. Nick Fuentes, a Holocaust denier who Donald Trump had as a dinner guest last year (and who Trump later disavowed) attempted to enter the conference and was ejected.
“His hateful racist rhetoric and actions are not consistent with mission of CPAC,” Schlapp said in a statement. ”We are pleased that our conference welcomes a wide array of conservative perspectives from people of different backgrounds. But we are concerned about the rise in antisemitic rhetoric (or Jew hatred) in our country and around the globe, whether it be in the corridors of power and academia or through the online rantings of bigots like Fuentes.”
As an example of Jewish inclusion at the conference, Tendler referred to a panel at this year’s conference titled “A Rabbi, a Christian and a Cardinal walk into a Bar.” (The “cardinal” in this case was Deal Hudson, who is Catholic, which also makes him Christian, but is not a cardinal.)
Jack Brewer, a panelist who is a former NFL star, said “It’s up to the believer to preach the gospel of Jesus Chris, unabashedly.” Seated near him was his fellow panelist Rabbi Shlomo Chayen, a religious Zionist rabbi based in Tel Aviv who focuses his outreach on encouraging young couples to have a Jewish wedding.
Whether or not the references to Jesus made Chayen uncomfortable, that panel also showed one reason Jews may have felt at home at the conference. The moderator, Elaine Beck, a Christian podcaster, introduced Chayen by noting CPAC’s growing commitment to Israel, where it held an event last year.
“I want to say thank you for having me all the way from Israel, I want to to bless everyone here,” Chayen said, prompting a round of applause and oohs and ahhs from the audience.
The session also hinted at the tensions Jews face in negotiating such an event. Brewer advocated that schools, both public and private, should be required to offer parents the option of teaching children the Christian gospel.
“We should be demanding every single public, private school give parents an option to give their kids the gospel of Jesus Christ,” he said.
He also pushed for corporal punishment. “Some kids need their butts whooped!” he said. “Amen!” said Beck, to applause.
Chayen skillfully navigated what united the four people on the stage, a commitment to family. His work, he said, focuses on weddings and procreation. “Look at our children and grandchildren and know that we’re leaving behind the set of values that they will continue,” he said.
Another panel may have felt less welcoming to Jews — or to two Jews in particular. The session was titled “The New Axis of Evil: Soros, Schwab, and Fink,” referring to Soros’ Klaus Schwab, the founder of the World Economic Forum, who is not Jewish); and Larry Fink, the CEO of the investment firm BlackRock, who is Jewish.
Much of the panel focused on ESG funding, an acronym for environmental, social and corporate governance funding, and the perils of using political criteria to determine investment. (That principle wasn’t universally upheld: A panel just two hours later promoted investment in businesses that embrace conservative and Christian causes.)
Despite the title of the program, Soros was the only name to come up during the conversation between former Trump White House spokesman Sean Spicer, Heritage Foundation think-tanker and former hamburger chain CEO Andrew Puzder and Oklahoma House Speaker Charles McCall. Spicer cast Soros as a sinister, all-pervasive presence.
“In the title of this [session] is Soros, and one of the things that I find fascinating is over the last several cycles. George Soros has created this web where he has gone into state government, whether it’s secretaries of state, local attorneys, and started to help fund the elections of a lot of these organizations, a lot of these individuals,” Spicer said.
The singular focus on Soros, among a batch of billionaires who fund the left, and the imagery and rhetoric attached to attacks on him — he is often depicted as maintaining secretive control, sometimes as an octopus — has led Jewish organizations to call out the obsession as at least borderline antisemitic.
There were two sessions devoted to Israel, one after the other, and because of delays, they came hard on the arrival of Shabbat. One featured David Milstein, an adviser to David Friedman, the Trump administration ambassador to Israel, and another featured Eugene Kontorovich, a George Mason University professor, and Josh Hammer, a conservative Newsweek editor whom the Southern Poverty Law Center has labeled as “embracing the anti-democracy hard right,” who explained what they said were the stakes for conservatives in the current controversy over judiciary reforms in Israel.
Netanyahu’s proposed reforms, which would sap the Supreme Court of much of its power, have triggered a political crisis, sparking weeks of massive protests in the country as well as acts of civil disobedience.
Kontorovich and Hammer made the case that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faced the same nefarious elites that riled the conservatives at CPAC. “In Israel, there is a deep state,” Kontorovich said. “There’s a small group of elite lawyers and technocrats that have managed to control the country.”
Kontorovich told JTA it made sense to get into the weeds with the CPAC crowd.
“I believe the U.S. should stay out of its allies’ domestic governance, and it is particularly foolish to take sides in what are largely foreign domestic partisan disputes,” he said. “But as I said in my comments, now that the Biden Administration seems to be weighing in on the reform, it unfortunately becomes an issue for U.S. foreign policy, which those who care about Israel should have informed positions about.”
President Joe Biden has expressed his concern that Netanyahu’s proposed reforms would erode Israel’s democracy, as have almost half of Congressional Democrats and a majority of Jewish Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Support for Israel was one element that underscored the necessity of a Jewish presence at events like CPAC, said Rabbi Yaakov Menken, the managing director of the right-wing Orthodox rabbinical group the Coalition for Jewish Values.
“If you look at both the right and the left, there are voices that want to cut off aid to Israel,” Menken said in an interview. “And we know that Israel is a bastion of freedom and democracy in the Middle East and unlike most other countries where a US military presence is requested, Israel’s willing to do the work and have the boots on the ground all by themselves, they just need help to be that bastion of democracy.”
Another factor was making clear to conservatives that the Jewish community was not monolithically liberal, Menken said. “Jews need to make their presence known, especially in value spaces where there is a prevailing Jewish narrative that goes in the opposite direction,” he said. “They need to see, meaning the larger audience needs to see, that there are Jewish people who stand with them on those issues.”
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How a Trump attack on Jon Ossoff could fuel the first Jewish presidency
(JTA) — Jon Ossoff, the Jewish senator from Georgia and the focus of speculation about a 2028 run for the presidency, is prepared to be the target of an address Thursday night by President Donald Trump.
Ossoff told reporters that if Trump, as expected, questions his and Sen. Raphael Warnock’s 2021 election wins, then the president would be “calling Georgia voters illegitimate.”
Trump has repeatedly claimed without basis that his 2020 presidential election defeat in Georgia, and wins by Democrats Ossoff and Warnock in runoffs the following January, were rigged. He has deployed federal law enforcement to Georgia to search for evidence of fraud, even though repeated probes have uncovered nothing.
The speech comes as Ossoff has gained national attention for his repeated attacks on the president in his reelection bid against Trump-endorsed Rep. Mike Collins.
Ossoff’s battle with Trump could fuel buzz for his vying for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2028.
Ossoff has repeatedly denied interest in running for president this cycle. But Democratic pollster Adam Carlson imagined an excerpt from a “Former President Ossoff’s memoir in 2060.”
“I wasn’t planning on running for president. It was never an ambition of mine,” Carlson wrote on X, following initial reports that Trump’s address could come as soon as Monday. “Then Trump did that super weird address on July 13, 2026 and here we are.”
Ossoff, 39, were he to run and win, would be the first Jewish president of the United States, and his Jewish identity has crept into discussions about his potential candidacy.
He has drawn comparisons to Barack Obama, who said in 2006 that he “will not” run for president, two years before he did so successfully.
The buzz around Ossoff has largely focused on his sharp criticism of Trump, attracting some prominent left-wing figures. Progressives such as Gen Z commentator Jack Cocchiarella and Zohran Mamdani adviser Morris Katz have lauded Ossoff’s messaging.
Left-wing streamer Hasan Piker — a harsh Israel critic who has drawn allegations of antisemitism — said Ossoff “will be my dark horse pick, depending on how he presents himself if he has ambitions for higher office.”
One subject that Ossoff has largely steered clear of during his reelection campaign is Israel, a growing wedge issue among Democrats and a litmus test for democratic socialists like Piker. While multiple possible presidential candidates have sworn off the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC, Ossoff has not weighed in on the group.
Ossoff has positioned himself as an Israel supporter who opposes Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. Just over a month after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, he referred to himself as a “pro-Israel Jewish American” in an address. He said he was praying for the Israeli hostages’ freedom and urges “mercy for the innocent civilians in Gaza.”
He has since voted to block some weapons sales to the country — along with an increasing number of Senate Democrats who have questioned military assistance to Israel as the war has devastated Gaza — while voting to allow the sale of defensive weapons. He wrote in July 2025 that “the United States must continue to support the Israeli people, who face the persistent threat of rocket and missile attack and have been subjected to intense aerial bombardment from Iran, Lebanon, and Yemen.”
Ossoff’s first vote against weapons in November 2024 spurred a critical open letter from several Georgia Jewish organizations including synagogues, Jewish schools, the local Anti-Defamation League chapter and other groups. His vote also drew the attention of AIPAC, which released 30-second ads attacking U.S. senators — including Ossoff — who had voted to block weapons sales.
Radio host Eric Messersmith said last month that, in an effort to win over a party that is divided on Israel, Ossoff “might be the Democrat that can thread the needle because even though he’s Jewish, he’s very critical of the Israeli government, very critical of Benjamin Netanyahu.”
“He has credibility on that issue, so it’s possible that I think he could fill that lane in between the two extremes of the Democratic party,” Messersmith said in a widely circulated conversation on CNN.
CNN’s Elex Michaelson drew criticism online when he added, “As a Jew, some people read a little more Jewish than other people, and Jon Ossoff may not read as Jewish as [Pennsylvania Gov.] Josh Shapiro does, for whatever’s that worth.” Michaelson later apologized.
Ossoff has deep ties to the local Jewish community, and has spoken about the impact of growing up around his uncle who was a Holocaust survivor.
Living among survivors “has a profound impact on how I view the State of Israel, recognizing that the State of Israel was established 75 years ago as Jews rebuilt in the ashes of the Holocaust, and sought to establish a secure homeland for the Jewish people,” Ossoff told the American Jewish Committee in May 2023.
The Georgia Democrat’s team reported that Ossoff raised an $20 million in the year’s second quarter, ending it with $42 million in cash on hand.
Jewish Insider reported that some Jewish Georgians are torn. Collins has faced accusations of antisemitism and having ties to the far right. Collins’ son-in-law is a white nationalist social media influencer who has shared antisemitic material and Nazi imagery, CNN reported on Thursday. Collins has said some of his own statements were misunderstood, and has defended himself by citing his support for Israel.
“Donald Trump’s handpicked candidate Mike Collins is a notorious bigot, antisemite, and extremist,” Ossoff posted on social media last month.
Ahead of Trump’s address, Ossoff said he expects the president “to use whatever he puts out there on Thursday as a pretext” to interfere in the November election, or “to lay the groundwork for challenging the result.”
The post How a Trump attack on Jon Ossoff could fuel the first Jewish presidency appeared first on The Forward.
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In the wake of Graham Platner’s success (and fall), a candidate to replace him changes his mind about ‘genocide’
(JTA) — When Jordan Wood vied last fall for the Democratic nomination for Maine’s U.S. Senate seat, he avoided accusing Israel of genocide, citing a link between rising antisemitism and “the language” that people use.
Graham Platner, who went on to overwhelmingly win the nomination, did not stint on using the term. Platner is out after accusations of sexual assault, and Wood is once again running in the abbreviated primary to replace him. (Platner has denied the accusations.)
And now the former congressional staffer is changing his tune.
“I believe we can’t continue to fund Israel’s genocide in Gaza,” Wood wrote on social media last week. “It’s a moral atrocity. We should be using our taxpayer dollars to fund schools, healthcare, and childcare here at home, not on bombing innocent civilians.”
Last November, Wood said he was concerned the word was so loaded as to be dangerous. He told Democratic commentator Kaivan Shroff that he believed Israel has committed war crimes in Gaza, but stopped short of using the term genocide.
“I’ve hesitated on it because I’m also seeing a real rise in antisemitism in the United States,” Wood said then. “My husband is Jewish, and the acts of violence toward Jewish Americans is very much connected to the language that we use.”
It would be “a huge deal for the United States Congress to designate what’s going on in Gaza as a genocide officially,” Wood said
“There could be consequences to that of U.S. citizens that have served in the IDF,” he said. “Do they get prosecuted?”
Wood’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment on what prompted him to adopt the term.
The Maine Democratic Party has until July 27 to nominate a replacement for Platner, an anti-Israel progressive, in hopes of unseating GOP Sen. Susan Collins.
Wood, along with major candidates Troy Jackson, Nirav Shah and Shenna Bellows have all accused Israel of having committed genocide since launching their campaigns, underscoring the shrinking popularity of Israel among Democratic voters and their representatives in the wake of its war in Gaza – and perhaps noting Platner’s success in making Israel an issue in the race.
In an interview this week with The Advocate, Wood criticized the embattled Platner, while saying that he would “carry on that platform” that had energized Maine voters.
“I separate Graham, the movement, from the person,” Wood said. He pointed to issues like conditioning aid to Israel and rejecting corporate PAC and AIPAC money, as priorities that he shared with Platner.
Wood told Shroff in November that he would not take money from AIPAC, and added that there is a “huge amount of distrust” of the pro-Israel lobbying organization among Democratic voters.
“I believe the only way to truly prove to a voter that you are voting and prioritizing policies in their best interest, and for our country’s best interest, is to remove any perception of corruption or misdealing,” Wood said.
He has also been consistent in saying that he would vote in support of Bernie Sanders’ resolutions to block the sales of certain weapons to Israel, while maintaining that that shouldn’t mean halting the U.S.-Israel relationship altogether.
“The United States should absolutely have a cooperative relationship with Israel, and I want that relationship to work. But a real partnership is not a blank check,” Wood told Jewish Insider last week. “It comes with honesty and accountability. The United States has enormous leverage with the Israeli government, and we’ve been refusing to use it.”
Wood and a number of other candidates will participate in a televised debate on CNN on Thursday night, ahead of the July 27 nominating convention.
The post In the wake of Graham Platner’s success (and fall), a candidate to replace him changes his mind about ‘genocide’ appeared first on The Forward.
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Francesca Hong is dishing up a Wisconsin campaign that is about the working class and Israel
(JTA) — Meet Wisconsin’s Mamdani.
Francesca Hong is running for governor of Wisconsin emphasizing affordability and opposition to U.S. support for Israel.
Her message is one the Republican Governor’s Association hopes to boost ahead of the Democratic primary next month: It unveiled an ad on Thursday dubbing her “too liberal” for Wisconsin – set to run in liberal parts of the state.
The calculus appears to be to make her appear appealing to a restive Democratic base that in a number of races countrywide has turned against the party establishment, in hopes of elevating to the nomination an unabashed left-winger who likely would lose in a crucial swing state. Zohran Mamdani may take Manhattan, the thinking goes, but his policies would curdle cheese in Wisconsin.
Hong is a single mom and a former chef whose political recipe for appealing to voters has vaulted her in front of the state’s crowded Democratic primary, bringing another democratic socialist within striking distance of victory.
“I’m State Representative Francesca Hong. I’m a service worker, community organizer, and a mom. I work for a living, always have, still do,” Hong said in a video announcing her candidacy as she wore an apron and strolled through a kitchen she had previously worked in. “Five years ago, my community sent me to the Capitol. The system is rigged. I’m running for governor to fix it.”
Hong’s campaign has centered affordability issues, including housing, education and childcare. It highlights her personal story as the child of South Korean immigrants.
It is her record on Israel and antisemitism that has drawn scrutiny from some Wisconsin Jews. During her campaign, Hong has taken a more sharply critical stance towards Israel while maintaining that support for Palestinian rights should not be conflated with antisemitism. She has also called Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute a genocide.
Jeremy Tunis, the co-chair of the community relations committee of the Jewish Federation of Madison, said Hong has aligned herself with an ascendant wave of democratic socialist candidates that have gained ground in races across the country, including in New York, Pennsylvania and Colorado.
“In my view she is trying to leverage the current far-left progressive zeitgeist that has swept in certain areas, namely in New York with Zohran Mamdani,” Tunis, who explained that his personal views do not represent those of the federation.
For other Jews in the state, Hong’s bid for the Democratic nomination sparked concern about how she might fare in the November general election against presumptive Republican nominee Tom Tiffany.
“She’s probably the least electable of the candidates running,” Marc Herstand, a 74-year-old Jewish Madison resident, said. “Wisconsin is a purple state, very purple, and democratic socialism is not going to go over well outside of the liberal communities of Madison, Milwaukee, and … in some of the other cities.”
Tunis said Hong’s broader political record, including previous calls to defund the police, could make her a difficult Democratic nominee in a divided state.
“There’s probably an appetite for it in a lot of places, but … I feel strongly that she would be among the weakest general election candidates for a variety of reasons, not just her stances on issues surrounding antisemitism and anti-Zionism,” Tunis said. “She’s taken a lot of fairly controversial positions that for a 50-50 state, I think, would not serve well in the general election.”
The numbers appear to tell a different story. The race’s most recent polling, conducted earlier this month, had Hong leading with 30% of the votes ahead of former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, at 28%. Another poll in March had Hong with 14% of votes and Barnes with 11%.
The July poll, conducted by Wedgewood polls, also found that Hong led with 47% of the vote against Tiffany with 44% when tested for the November general election.
Herstand, who is a member of the Jewish Democrats caucus at the Wisconsin Democratic State Convention, said that while he believed Tiffany was “tremendously worse” than Hong, he was concerned how her potential nomination would play out amongst the state’s Jews.
“It’s going to chill Jewish support if she gets the nomination,” Herstand said. “Will they hold their nose and vote for her? Yeah. Will they work actively for her? Probably not. Will she need every Democrat to work actively for her to win? Yep.”
Speaking to fellow progressives at a virtual rally Monday night, Hong framed her campaign as a test of the left’s growing political power.
“Workers are reclaiming our power, and this is an opportunity to ensure that the rest of politics across our country, I believe, can change when we win here in Wisconsin,” Hong said. “Because they say, as goes Wisconsin, as goes the country.” She did not speak about Israel or antisemitism during the rally.
Other candidates took shots at the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC and Israeli settler violence in the West Bank, and some attendees at the online rally sent messages in the chat questioning her pro-Palestinian bonafides in light of her silence on the issue. “Is she really a Zionist?,” asked one attendee, while another wrote, “She owns AIPAC.”
Hong has spurned AIPAC support, though the group largely spends in federal elections.
Earlier this month, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Hong was now apologizing for a December 2023 call to the Madison police to report a vandalized Israeli flag, out of concern that the incident was “highly antisemitic” and urging that it be investigated as a hate crime.
Earlier this month, asked to explain her calls to police, she told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that it was an action “I regret deeply.”
“Three years ago, there was a piece of protest art at the encampments in Madison, which was photographed and posted to social media,” Hong said in a statement. “My constituents reported they felt threatened and alerted me to the social post, but the image was cropped and incomplete to misrepresent anti-Zionism as antisemitism – a distinction I take seriously.”
A week after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Hong posted on social media a plea to “prevent further devastation in Gaza; we can not answer war crimes with war crimes.”
“To the Jewish community here and around the world, I love you with my whole being and am praying for your safety,” Hong wrote. “Please know my heart continues to be with the Israeli & Palestinian people through this harrowing time.”
Since then, Hong has introduced legislation that would repeal a 2018 law banning state contracts with businesses that boycott Israel, and criticized outgoing outgoing Democratic Gov. Tony Evers for recognizing the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism. She has highlighted both efforts on her campaign website.
Hong has received endorsements from Democratic Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Ro Khanna of California, both staunch Israel critics, as well as three Democratic Socialists of America chapters in Wisconsin.
Hong’s campaign drew further scrutiny after she appeared on both Hasan Piker’s show and on a stream hosted by Michael Beyer, an influencer known as “Mike from PA” who came under fire after saying that Jewish identity is “a constructed ethnicity, this demonic ethnicity, wholly invented.”
“If Wisconsin is going to be a state that actually values human rights, then we have to ensure that we’re supporting, we’re fighting for the pro-Palestine movement,” Hong said on Beyer’s show in October.
She also encouraged constituents to fundraise for people on the “front lines in Gaza and the West Bank.”
Hong appeared a second time on Beyer’s show last month, telling the host that “The people deserve leaders who lead with moral courage and moral clarity, and the litmus test is to say explicitly that what is happening in Gaza is a genocide.”
Hong raised roughly $35,000 from Beyer’s livestream and $57,000 from Piker’s.
Herstand said that he was “absolutely appalled” by Hong’s decision to sit down with the influencers.
“It’s unconscionable for her to do and fundraise with them,” Herstand said. “She should return the money she made with these antisemitic influencers, and she should denounce the hate that they spread against Jews.”
Hong’s appearances on the podcasts also sparked condemnation from Ann Jacobs, the Democratic chair of the Wisconsin Elections Commission.
“When you decide these are the sort of people you want to hang out with in order to raise $, you have made clear that you either (1) agree with them or (2) can be bought or (3) both. Fran Hong appears to be all 3,” Jacobs, who is Jewish, wrote in a post on X. “She is willing to sell out the Jews of Wisconsin for a few bucks.”
Hong’s campaign did not respond to an inquiry from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency about her appearance on the podcasts, but in an interview with MS Now earlier this month, Hong defended her engagement.
“It’s important that we get our message out in places where campaigns struggle to reach voters,” Hong said. “Just because I am on a platform certainly does not mean that I endorse everything that has been said by either the hosts or other people who have gone on.”
Hong told MS Now, “I condemn hatred, discrimination, antisemitism and islamophobia, any sort of dehumanizing of communities.”
For Tunis, the community relations co-chair, Hong’s response to criticism of those appearances fell short.
“I think that there’s a lot of questions that she has not provided sufficient answers on, particularly her recent appearance and friendliness with Hassan Piker and Mike from PA,” Tunis said. “I think people are waiting and watching.”
Miryam Rosenzweig, the president and CEO of the Milwaukee Jewish Federation, told JTA in a statement that the federation’s “concern extends well beyond any one candidate.”
“Many in Wisconsin’s Jewish community are increasingly concerned by a political environment in which antisemitic rhetoric is too often minimized or excused, where the choices public leaders make about the voices they elevate and the platforms they share shape that environment, and where too few are willing to confront antisemitism consistently, regardless of its source,” Rosenzweig said.
Looking ahead to the crowded Aug. 11 Democratic primary, Tunis and Herstand said many Wisconsin Jews he had spoken with were supportive of Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez, who was endorsed by Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley earlier this month after he exited the race. Rodriguez came in third place in the primary’s latest polling, receiving 19% of the votes.
“I hope that Francesca Hong can tone down her rhetoric, because I do not think that it promotes Jewish community safety, and it can make life difficult,” Tunis said. “I hope that she keeps an open mind as her campaign progresses. I’m not super confident that’s going to be the case.”
If Hong does prevail next month, Herstand said he hoped that she would foster communication with Jewish communities in the state.
“I hope she doesn’t get the nomination, but if she were to do that, I would hope that she would reach out to the Jewish community and actually learn a few things that she’s probably not aware of,” he said.
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