• The Republican Jewish Coalition pushed back on claims that the Democratic Party 2020 platform, voted on this week by the Democratic National Committee’s platform committee, supports Israel. The Algemeiner reports:
RJC spokesperson Neil Strauss told JNS, “Democrats can put whatever they want in their platform; we know, by their actions, what their party stands for. Joe Biden has invited Bernie Sanders’ viciously anti-Israel foreign-policy team onto his team. Nancy Pelosi endorsed the most anti-Semitic member of her caucus, [Minnesota Rep.] Ilhan Omar.”
“Supposedly pro-Israel groups on the left have stood by and tacitly supported the biggest pro-BDS voices in the party, [Michigan Rep.] Rashida Tlaib and Omar,” he continued. “So they can go ahead and push off the progressive wing from putting on paper that the Democrat Party is no longer a pro-Israel party, but the party leadership has already shown the world that Democrats have abandoned Israel.”
Read more about the Democratic Party platform below.
• The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports on the rise of Parler, an alternative to Twitter. RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks is quoted at length about the problems of anti-Semitism on Twitter:
Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, sees a pattern of Twitter accounts that remain active despite a history of anti-Semitic remarks, including Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, Iran Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and Rep. Ilhan Omar, who tweeted that congressional support for Israel was “all about the Benjamins.”
“The fact that they find that people who want to showcase the Star of David in terms of their Jewish heritage and pride as hate speech is ridiculous and it’s really a crystal ball into the future where if this cancel culture and political correctness run amok is allowed to continue,” Brooks said.
For that reason, Brooks added, 2020 will be a contest that pits the right against “the progressive left who want to cancel everything and take down the Star of David and take down statues of (George) Washington and Mount Rushmore.”
• Reagan McCarthy at TownHall.com reports on a statement by RJC National Chairman Senator Norm Coleman about allegations of anti-Semitism against Senator David Perdue (R-GA).
In his tenure in the Senate, [Perdue] co-sponsored multiple pieces of legislation condemning anti-Semitism and other forms of religious discrimination; Sen. Perdue co-sponsored SR189, which condemned anti-Semitism in all forms, and the bipartisan Justice for Victims of Lynching Act, which established lynching as a criminal civil rights violation.
[Norm Coleman stated:]
“Time and again, Senator David Perdue has proven himself to be a true friend to the Jewish community and has stood firmly against anti-Semitic bigotry. Since coming to the Senate, he has consistently condemned hatred toward our community and has worked with national security leaders to protect synagogues and Jewish community centers from anti-Semitic threats and violence. Senator Perdue has made it clear that he strongly supports the right of all people to live free of anti-Semitism and hate in all forms.
I am proud to support Senator Perdue, a true ally of the Jewish community. Senator Perdue has stood with the Jewish community in both combatting anti-Semitism and his unwavering commitment to the security of the Jewish state of Israel.
On a personal note, I know Senator David Perdue to be one of the most decent individuals I have known. He is what my grandmother would call a “mensch”- a person of honor and high integrity. Any attempts to smear him with charges of anti-Semitism are simply false.”
• Sophie Panzer writes at the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent about Jewish voter outreach in 2020:
With the pandemic preventing in-person events and racial justice protests sweeping the country, Jewish political groups are adapting their strategies for an unprecedented campaign season.
Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said one of his organization’s strong points is investment in state- of-the-art Jewish voter files.
“One of the reasons we’ve invested so much money in [voter files] is that, after successive campaigns of doing this, we realized traditional voter files were horrible in terms of having accurate Jewish voters on file,” he said.
In past elections, RJC phone bankers were pleased if 20% to 25% of the people they contacted from Jewish voter files were actually Jewish. Now, thanks to a team of statisticians and demographers, RJC has compiled files that yield a 60% to 75% Jewish voter contact rate. Volunteers have made more than 400,000 calls to Jewish voters in swing states.
Read more about the RJC's sophisticated voter outreach program here.
