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How a Kentucky lawmaker’s friendship with a Jewish woman helped inspire her viral speech decrying anti-trans legislation
(JTA) — Pamela Stevenson, a Democratic state representative in Kentucky, was chatting recently with her friend Zahava Kurland about one of Kurland’s duties at her Orthodox synagogue: preparing the dead for burial.
“She was trying to explain to me certain things that had to be done,” Stevenson, who is also a Black Baptist minister, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last week. The seemingly esoteric topic was one of many the two women have discussed over more than a decade of weekly Friday-morning conversations — which cover anything from politics and friendship to faith and being one’s true self.
Stevenson said her conversations with Kurland have made her attuned to Jewish sensibilities. “She’s always listening for and giving me information” about Judaism and Jewish experiences, said Stevenson, who was first elected to the Kentucky legislature in 2020.
So Kurland was not surprised when, in a viral speech on Wednesday decrying her fellow lawmakers for signing off on a law that bans gender-affirming care for trans youth, Stevenson also centered antisemitism.
“First, you hated Black people,” Stevenson said, addressing the Republican lawmakers who voted for the legislation. “Then, you hated Jews. Now, you’re hating everybody. So the question is, when the only people left are you, will you hate yourself?”
Kurland said her friend is a listener and naturally empathetic, so she would be sensitive to how hatreds intersect.
“She’s truly well balanced,” said Kurland. “She truly cares about people.”
Stevenson says she looks forward to her Friday morning talks with Kurland. She said the conversations have helped give her a more expansive perspective on life, which drives her to fight bigotry.
“I really believe that I will never know as much as she knows,” Stevenson said. “But I can develop an appreciation for what it’s like and not use my view of the world as the only view of the world.”
What prompted Stevenson’s floor speech was the overwhelmingly Republican legislature’s override of Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear’s veto of a law that bans a range of medical treatments and practices for trans youth. It outlaws doctors from providing gender-affirming treatment to youth; requires them to cease care if it has already begun; bans conversations in schools about gender identity or sexual orientation; bans school districts from allowing transgender students to use the bathroom aligned with their gender identity; and allows teachers to refuse to use a child’s preferred pronouns.
The bill was introduced weeks after state Sen. Karen Berg’s trans son, Henry Berg-Brousseau, died by suicide. Berg, who is Jewish, said that referring to the anti-trans bill as a parents’ rights bill is an “absolutely despicable affront to me personally,” according to The Washington Post. Stevenson, who has appeared alongside Berg at rallies, called her “phenomenal” and said, “This is infinitely more personal for her.”
Stevenson said that she mentioned anti-Jewish hatred in her speech because she believes hatreds are mutually reinforcing, and she connects the anti-trans sentiment she sees with rising racism and antisemitism.
“If you have a model where you have to hate somebody to win, then you always have to have somebody to hate,” she said. “People say it was out of nowhere, but it’s really out of somewhere. We’ve gone through the cycles of the Native Americans, the Black folks have been hated for a long time, the disabled. Everybody is always on the bottom of that model. And in just recent years, it was the Muslims, then it was the immigrants, and then it was back around the Blacks again. And so because of this overflow of hate, there’s been an uptick in antisemitic actions.”
Stevenson said her mission is to make people cognizant of the roots of hatred. “People want to say that all the attacks against the Jewish temples and the Jewish people in recent times came out of nowhere,” she said, referring to reports of a spike in antisemitic attacks. “No, it did not. We just have chosen not to pay attention to what’s been said.”
Kurland, who is a member of Congregation Beth Jacob in Atlanta, and Stevenson, a retired Air Force Colonel and an attorney who is running to be Kentucky’s attorney general, met in 2006 when Stevenson was serving in the Air Force and Kurland was working as an accountant in Atlanta. They attended a three-day course with Landmark, the personal development program that presses participants to face uncomfortable truths about themselves.
“When we were closer-in logistically she came over very often for Shabbos meals,” Kurland said. “I often invite people for Shabbos meals and the holidays and I love explaining, you know, how Judaism gave more to the world than anything, anybody, any person. Torah, Judaism has given the world its whole structure for society.”
The Air Force started moving Stevenson around. “That’s when we started talking on the phone all the time, because we couldn’t get together,” Kurland said.
Stevenson is “a committed listener, someone who’s going to hear you and call you out on your stuff,” Kurland said. “It’s not a friendship where you massage each other’s egos. It’s a friendship where you hold each other to account for who you say you are.”
They each speak with outrage at the lawmakers who, they feel, would breach the relationship between a parent and a child.
“As a mother, how dare you interfere with one of the most intimate relationships?” Stevenson said two weeks ago during debate on the bill, addressing Rep. Jennifer Decker, a Republican who was its lead sponsor. “We have no right to interfere in the parental rights.”
Kurland agrees. “These are all decisions to be made between a child and his parents or her parents and their doctor,” she said. “It has no place for the government to have anything to do with anything.”
And both Kurland and Stevenson say religion is a key part of their identities.
“Judaism is the center part of my life,” said Kurland. “It’s what I am, it’s who I am, it’s what I’m about. And as a Jew, you cannot sit by and let another one of God’s human beings [be excluded]. I mean, when we honor other people, we are doing God’s work. We are honoring God. When we cut people out, then we’re not “
Stevenson likewise calls herself “a woman of faith.”
“I believe what is required, in almost every faith that I know of, is to love one another and take care of the people around us,” she said.
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Iran and US Views on Sanctions Relief Differ, Iranian Official Tells Reuters
Iranian women walk past an anti-US billboard in Tehran, Iran, February 19, 2026. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Iran and the United States have differing views over sanctions relief in talks to curb Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, a senior Iranian official told Reuters on Sunday, adding that new talks were planned in early March as fears of a military confrontation grow.
Iran and the US renewed negotiations earlier this month to tackle their decades-long dispute over Tehran’s nuclear program as the US builds up its military capability in the Middle East, fueling fears of a wider war.
Iran has threatened to strike US bases in the Middle East if it is attacked by US forces.
“The last round of talks showed that US ideas regarding the scope and mechanism of sanctions relief differ from Iran’s demands. Both sides need to reach a logical timetable for lifting sanctions,” the official said.
“This roadmap must be reasonable and based on mutual interests.”
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Friday that he expected to have a draft counterproposal ready within days, while US President Donald Trump said he was considering limited military strikes.
READINESS TO COMPROMISE
While rejecting a US demand for “zero enrichment” – a major sticking point in past negotiations – Tehran has signaled its readiness to compromise on its nuclear work.
Washington views enrichment inside Iran as a potential pathway to nuclear weapons. Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons and wants its right to enrich uranium to be recognized.
Washington has also demanded that Iran relinquish its stockpile of highly enriched uranium (HEU). The UN nuclear agency last year estimated that stockpile at more than 440 kg of uranium enriched to up to 60% fissile purity, a small step away from the 90% that is considered weapons grade.
The Iranian official said Tehran could seriously consider a combination of exporting part of its HEU stockpile, diluting the purity of its most highly enriched uranium and the establishment of a regional enrichment consortium in exchange for the recognition of Iran’s right to “peaceful nuclear enrichment.”
“The negotiations continue and the possibility of reaching an interim agreement exists,” he said.
BENEFITS FOR BOTH SIDES
Iranian authorities have said that a diplomatic solution delivers economic benefits for both Tehran and Washington.
“Within the economic package under negotiation, the United States has also been offered opportunities for serious investment and tangible economic interests in Iran’s oil industry,” the official said.
However, he said Tehran will not hand over control of its oil and mineral resources.
“Ultimately, the US can be an economic partner for Iran, nothing more. American companies can always participate as contractors in Iran’s oil and gas fields.”
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Mike Huckabee’s Comments to Tucker Carlson on Israel and Middle East Land Draw Condemnation in Region
Tucker Carlson speaks on first day of AmericaFest 2025 at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix, Arizona, Dec. 18, 2025. Photo: Charles-McClintock Wilson/ZUMA Press Wire via Reuters Connect
Comments by US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee suggesting that Israel had a biblical right to much of the Middle East drew condemnation over the weekend from countries across the region, who called his remarks “dangerous and inflammatory.”
Huckabee, an evangelical Christian, has been a staunch supporter of Israel throughout his political career and a longtime defender of Jewish settlements in the West Bank – land which the Palestinians seek for a state.
In an interview with Tucker Carlson that was conducted on Wednesday in Israel and aired on Friday, the populist US talk show host asked Huckabee about Israel’s right to exist and about Jewish roots in the ancient land.
Citing the book of Genesis, Carlson asked whether the modern state of Israel had a right to the lands promised in the Bible by God to Abraham, stretching from the Euphrates River to the Nile, covering much of the Middle East. In response, Huckabee said:
“It would be fine if they took it all. But I don’t think that’s what we’re talking about here today.”
Huckabee added: “We’re talking about this land that the state of Israel now lives in and wants to have peace in, they’re not trying to take over Jordan, they’re not trying to take over Syria, they’re not trying to take over Iraq or anywhere else. They want to protect their people.”
In response, a joint statement condemning Huckabee’s comments was issued by the Palestinians and countries in the Middle East and beyond, including Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Indonesia and Pakistan.
They said his comments were: “Dangerous and inflammatory remarks, which constitute a flagrant violation of the principles of international law and the Charter of the United Nations, and pose a grave threat to the security and stability of the region.”
A US Embassy spokesperson said Huckabee’s comments did not reflect any change in US policy and that his full remarks made clear that Israel has no desire to change its current boundaries.
Israeli officials did not immediately comment on the interview or the reaction from countries that signed the joint statement.
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Jack Hughes Makes History as 1st Jewish Male Athlete with Olympic ‘Golden Goal’
Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics – Ice Hockey – Men’s Gold Medal Game – Canada vs United States – Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena, Milan, Italy – February 22, 2026. Jack Hughes of United States scores their second goal in overtime to win gold. Photo: REUTERS/David W Cerny
i24 News – Jack Hughes made history on Sunday as the first hockey player widely recognized for both having a bar mitzvah and scoring an Olympic game-winning goal, leading the United States to its first men’s hockey gold medal since 1980.
The 24-year-old New Jersey Devils star from Orlando, Florida, scored early in sudden-death overtime to secure a 2-1 victory over Canada at the Milan Cortina Olympics. Hughes finished a cross-ice pass from teammate Zach Werenski, who had wrestled the puck from Canada’s Nathan MacKinnon.
“This is all about our country right now,” Hughes said. “I love the USA. I love my teammates. It’s unbelievable. The USA Hockey brotherhood is so strong.” Hughes also endured a high stick during the game, losing a couple of teeth but continuing to play.
The victory marked the first US win over Canada in a top-level men’s competition since the 1996 World Cup of Hockey. The win completed a US sweep of Olympic hockey gold, following the women’s 2-1 overtime victory against Canada on Thursday.
Hughes ended the tournament with three goals and three assists, contributing offensively even from a lower line. His older brother, Quinn Hughes, a Minnesota Wild defenseman, scored the US overtime winner against Sweden in the quarterfinals. Their parents, Jim and Ellen Hughes, were present for the celebrations.
Team USA also paid tribute to the late Johnny Gaudreau, who was killed in 2024 with his brother. Gaudreau’s jersey hung in the locker room throughout the tournament, and players carried it onto the ice after the medal ceremony. Two of Gaudreau’s children joined the team for commemorative photos.
Sunday’s match marked the third men’s Olympic gold medal game between the US and Canada, with Canada having won in 2002 and 2010. Hughes’ golden goal solidifies him as a historic figure in hockey, blending his Jewish heritage with Olympic triumph.