The decision by Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts to release a video statement on social media opposing efforts to rebuke those who choose to platform Nick Fuentes, the neo-Nazi podcaster, has prompted the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) to call for his resignation in a statement released on Monday, as the longstanding conservative think tank faces pressure broadly over the choice to stand with controversial commentator Tucker Carlson.

ZOA National President Morton Klein said that his organization was outraged by the video released on Thursday, and that Roberts was effectively “defending, whitewashing, and allying the Heritage Foundation and himself with Jew-hating Israel-basher Tucker Carlson.”

“Roberts horrifyingly emphasized that Carlson ‘will always be a close friend of the Heritage Foundation‘ right after Carlson fawningly interviewed neo-Nazi, Holocaust denier, racist Nick Fuentes,” Klein added. “Dr. Roberts, the issue is not opposing criticizing Israel – of course that’s fully acceptable, just as criticizing France, Ireland, or the US is acceptable. What’s not acceptable is lying about Israel committing genocide, etc., or rejecting Israel’s right to exist.”

Klein continued, “Sickeningly, Roberts also proclaimed that neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes should not be ‘canceled.’ Refusing to give platforms to neo-Nazis is not ‘cancel’ culture; it is basic morality. Roberts also outrageously called those who rightly oppose Carlson a ‘venomous coalition’ and a ‘globalist class’ of ‘bad actors who serve someone else’s agenda’ (the ‘double loyalty’ libel); falsely accused all who oppose Carlson of ‘slander’; and attempted to sow division between America and Israel.”

Carlson’s Oct. 27 interview with Fuentes released on X contained a variety of antisemitic statements. Fuentes described “organized Jewry” as a “big challenge” to unifying the country and stated his opposition to “these Zionist Jews.” He said he was “always an admirer” of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.

In the discussion, Carlson, who did not challenge Fuentes on his most controversial comments, stated that “one of the reasons I’m mad about Gaza is because the Israeli position is, everyone who lives in Gaza is a terrorist because of how they were born … That’s not a Western view. That’s an Eastern view. That’s non-Christian. That’s totally incompatible with Christianity and Western civilization.”

Carlson also said he opposed “Christian Zionism” and came under fire for giving Fuentes a friendly platform to espouse his views.

While the ZOA noted that Roberts wrote a follow-up post on X condemning Fuentes’ neo-Nazism and neo-Stalinism, the group lamented how “Roberts still failed to retract [his] support of Carlson despite Carlson’s long list of antisemitic and anti-Israel pronouncements and Carlson’s platforming of Jew-haters such as Fuentes. Unless Kevin Roberts retracts and apologizes for his praise for Jew-hating Israel-basher Tucker Carlson, who legitimizes and mainstreams antisemites like Nick Fuentes, and publicly condemns and ends Heritage Foundation’s relationship with Tucker Carlson, Roberts is not fit to continue as Heritage Foundation’s president.”

ZOA Director of Government Relations Dan Pollak defended the US-Israel relationship and expressed his offense at the Heritage head’s positions.

“I was personally deeply offended by Roberts’ comments implying that pro-Israel conservatives place Israel’s needs over those of the USA,” Pollak said. “I served my country as an officer in the US Navy and have every right to promote policies I believe in without being accused of inappropriate loyalty to another country. It is obvious that supporting the American-Israeli relationship is in the national interest of both countries.”

Pollak also noted the double standard of Carlson and others harshly accusing Israel and its supporters of pushing the US to support the Jewish state without mentioning Qatar, which has spent billions of dollars to influence US policy making and public opinion in Doha’s favor.

“Roberts’ claim that a ‘globalist class’ is pushing pro-Israel policies on the US ignores that the real ‘globalist’ is Qatar,” he said. “Qatar is buying influence in Washington and runs the anti-American Al-Jazeera. Qatar seems to have extraordinary influence with Tucker Carlson. Heritage Foundation’s president is simply wrong to malign the pro-Israel community. It is also bizarre that Roberts defended Tucker Carlson in the name of Christianity, when Carlson has called all Christian Zionists ‘heretics.’ Thank God we have courageous Christians in office, including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who has robustly criticized Roberts’ remarks.”

Cruz lambasted Carlson, Fuentes, and Roberts while calling out a rise in right-wing antisemitism during remarks at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual summit on Thursday night.

“Now is a time for choosing. Now is a time for courage,” Cruz said to the audience in Las Vegas, Nevada. “If you sit there and nod adoringly as someone tells you that Winston Churchill was the villain of World War II, if you sit there and nod as someone tells you there’s a very good argument that America should’ve intervened on behalf of Nazi Germany in World War II, if you sit there with someone that says that Adolph Hitler was very, very cool, and that their mission is to combat and defeat global Jewry, then you are a coward.”

Daily Wire podcast host Ben Shapiro, one of the most prominent Jewish conservatives in the US, said on Monday that Carlson “has become the most virulent super spreader of vile ideas in America.”

Shapiro devoted his entire Monday broadcast to the Fuentes-Carlson controversy.

“Tucker Carlson acts as an ideological launderer for other people’s evils,” Shapiro said. “Tucker Carlson says many inflammatory things, always buying back just enough of it to appear as though he’s not saying what he’s clearly saying. He’s a master of gaslighting. Tucker Carlson, for example, would never say out loud what Nick Fuentes does. He wouldn’t say the things many of his guests say. And so instead, he acts as an ideological wanderer.”

At last week’s Republican Jewish Coalition event, US Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) called Carlson “the most dangerous antisemite in America.”

“He [Carlson] has chosen to take on the mantle of leader of a modern-day Hitler youth, to broadcast and feature those who celebrate the Nazis, those who call for the extermination of Israel, to defend Hamas, to even criticize President Trump for stopping Iran’s nuclear ambitions,” Fine said.

“Friends, make no mistake. Tucker is not MAGA,” he added, referring to the Donald Trump-led Make America Great Again movement. Fine also announced he would not allow Heritage Foundation staffers in his office and urged others to institute a similar policy.

On Sunday, Mark Goldfeder, CEO of the National Jewish Advocacy Center and an Orthodox rabbi, posted a letter of resignation on X, explaining his decision to step down from the Heritage Foundation’s National Task Force to Combat Antisemitism.

The National Task Force to Combat Antisemitism, a project of @Heritage, has done valuable work. But free speech includes the right to associate—and not to.
I cannot serve under someone who thinks Nazis are worth debating. Here is my resignation letter: pic.twitter.com/ccVHMdlDbO

— Mark Goldfeder (@MarkGoldfeder) November 2, 2025

“I cannot serve under someone who thinks Nazis are worth debating,” Goldfeder wrote. “Elevating him and then attacking those who object as somehow un-American or disloyal in a video replete with antisemitic tropes and dog whistles, no less, is not the protection of free speech. It is a moral collapse disguised as courage.”

Goldfeder called it “especially painful that Heritage, an institution with a historic role in shaping conservative policy, would choose this moment to blur the line between worthwhile debate and the normalization of hate.”

According to journalist Eli Lake at The Free Press, Roberts’ video “has sparked a near-insurrection inside his think tank.” Lake added that one anonymous, conservative donor he had spoken to said they were “reconsidering their annual gift to Heritage in light of Roberts’ defense of Carlson.”