Comment Jewish leaders sounded the alarm Monday about anti-Semitism they say is becoming increasingly normalized in American politics after a series of bigoted comments from aides or supporters of GOP candidates and growing calls for them to strongly reject such rhetoric. In Nevada, GOP Senate candidate Adam Laxalt’s campaign on Monday denounced anti-Semitic tweets linked to a recently fired staffer who said Jews are part of a “cult” rather than a religion. But in Georgia, Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker did not publicly reject a show of support from Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, who has made a spate of anti-Jewish comments in recent weeks, including a tweet threatening that he will leave.” death 3 to the JEW.” Democratic-aligned Jewish groups also criticized Pennsylvania Senate candidate Mehmet Oz on Monday for planning to appear at a rally this weekend with GOP gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano. Mastriano has upset Jewish Democrats and Republicans with his extremist ties and comments about his Jewish opponent, state Attorney General Josh Shapiro. The Republican candidate’s wife claimed over the weekend that she and her husband “probably love Israel more than many Jews do.” Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.), the former U.S. senator and the first Jewish candidate on the national ticket, said he is confident that most Americans reject anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry. “But if leaders aren’t clear and aligned about it, it can grow.” He said Walker should reject Ye’s endorsement given his “outspoken and vile anti-Semitism”. Lieberman, now an independent, said things have gotten worse since he made history as Al Gore’s running mate in 2000. He blamed, in part, a pared-down political discourse in which bigoted people “can feel some confidence to get out of the their holes in the ground.” Jack Rosen, president of the advocacy group American Jewish Congress, said an apparent rise in anti-Semitic rhetoric in politics is “disturbing to all of us” and argued that “on the right … we don’t see the kind of leadership it’s going to take to stop the growth of this of the kind of anti-Semitic hatred”. His nonpartisan group recently criticized former President Donald Trump for saying that American Jews should “get together” and appreciate Trump’s work on Israel more. Although Trump was a “true friend of Israel,” the American Jewish Congress said, such statements “contribute to the growing anti-Semitism that many Jews are forced to confront.” “We’re at a certain time in our country where bigotry like anti-Semitism is normalized, where people can make statements and there’s no real repercussions in the political sphere,” said Marilyn Mayo, senior researcher at the Anti-Defamation League’s Center. Extremism. In Arizona, GOP candidate in a House race, Eli Crane, urged the audience to look for an anti-Semitic sermon at a recent campaign stop. Speaking last month in Casa Grande, Crane said he was motivated to run because of “radical ideologies that are destroying this country” and was more concerned about “cultural Marxism,” which the Southern Poverty Law Center has described as anti-Semitic. conspiracy. gaining traction on the American right. He encouraged the audience to watch a speech by a right-wing pastor who blamed cultural change on a group of German-Jewish philosophers and condemned Barack Obama for a “homosexual agenda.” “If we don’t wake up,” Crane said, “if we don’t study what they’re doing and if we don’t put people in positions of influence who understand what this war is, what we’re trying to do and have and have the courage to call it out, we’re going to we will lose this country.” The Crane campaign did not respond to a request for comment. Republicans, including GOP Jewish leaders, defended their candidates’ and leaders’ responses to anti-Semitic comments and said many Democrats failed to report troubling comments in their ranks. A spokesman for the Republican National Committee pointed to comments from Democratic lawmakers using language widely denounced as anti-Semitic, such as Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-Minn.) tweet in 2012 saying Israel has “hypnotized the world.” Omar defended the comments as aimed at the country’s military action. Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said Walker, Laxalt and Oz have all been “very clear about their strong opposition and condemnation of anti-Semitism.” He said he was “absolutely not concerned” about the laid-off Laxalt staff, who joined the RJC for an event this fall to highlight its support for Israel. As for Trump’s tyranny against Jews in the United States, Brooks called it a “Rorschach test” that offended critics, but for Trump’s supporters expressed something “absolutely accurate” — that the Jewish community needs to take a stronger stance on issues such as Israel’s security. But the RJC declined to endorse Mastriano, who came under fire this summer for paying $5,000 for campaign tips on the far-right site Gab — where a gunman posted anti-Semitic insinuations before murdering 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue four years ago. Gab CEO Andrew Torba said he has a policy of speaking only to Christian journalists and said Mastriano did as well. Mastriano issued a statement distancing himself from Torba and said: “I reject anti-Semitism in any form.” In Pa. governor’s race, Shapiro emphasizes Jewish faith as he warns of Mastriano’s extremism Mastriano also drew criticism after he told supporters that his Democratic opponent, Shapiro, “despised people like us” for going and sending his children to a “privileged, exclusive, elite” school, a Jewish institution. Over the weekend, an Israeli reporter asked Mastriano about those comments, which were widely condemned as promoting anti-Semitic tropes, as well as about his relationship with Gump. Rebbi Mastriano, the candidate’s wife, chimed in and said, “We probably love Israel more than many Jews.” Hallie Shoifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, noted that the words echoed Trump’s social media post touting his relationship with Israel and said others in the Democratic Party should have criticized Trump. “To have a former president direct this kind of hostility to Jews, two weeks ago … will of course be repeated by other Republicans,” he said. Democratic candidates have drawn attention to GOP candidates’ responses to anti-Semitic comments. The campaign of Sen. Raphael G. Warnock (D) on Monday took aim at Walker’s silence on Ye’s social media post praising Walker as “PRO LIFE,” saying in a press release that Walker “needs to tell Georgians : accept Kanye West’s support? despite his divisive, racist and anti-Semitic comments?”. The National Republican Senatorial Committee did not comment on the endorsement by Ye, whose business empire has collapsed after Adidas and other companies cut ties over his repeated anti-Semitic comments. In Nevada, Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) and Jacky Rosen (D), who is Jewish, joined Jewish leaders Monday in denouncing anti-Semitism, including the former Laxalt employee’s comments first reported on Sunday from the Jewish Insider. A Laxalt spokesman, Brian Freimuth, initially told Jewish Insider only that the person was fired in August and was unrelated to the campaign. On Monday, he issued a fuller statement, saying the “grandiose views” attributed to the former field representative do not reflect Laxalt’s views. He did not specify the circumstances of the dismissal and said Laxalt’s “public and private life shows that he believes there should be zero tolerance for anti-Semitism in any form and any suggestion otherwise is a politically motivated lie.” A Twitter user with the handle “LaxaltStan,” who at one point identified himself as a GOP political operative named Michael Pecjak, described Jews as part of “a cult.” retweeted an image with the words “I hate” and “Jews”; and suggested they were unhappy with a Breitbart editor’s comment that the right-wing site is “pro-Jewish with a reputation for treating women and minorities well.” “I don’t know if I like Breitbart anymore,” LaxaltStan wrote in early October. Jewish Insider said other now-deleted tweets said “guns should have more rights than women” and that gay rights advocates were “going to hell.” The LaxaltStan account disappeared after the publication tried to reach him for comment last week. Pecjak did not respond to requests for comment. Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, president of the New York-based Center for Jewish History, warned that mass hate speech could lead to violence. “I think the overheated rhetoric is getting worse and I think people are realizing that with the election just a week away and control of the House and Senate at stake … people are not seeing these statements as just flashes in the pan,” Rosenfeld said. . “They see them as potentially being mobilized for nefarious political purposes.” Sabrina Rodriguez contributed to this report.
