How badly have Congress’s newest and most vocal anti-Semites tarnished the Democratic brand? Reporters for the New York Post sought to answer that question by interviewing prominent New York-area Jews like Mark Schwartz, the Democratic deputy mayor of solidly blue Teaneck, NJ., who said, “We felt we had a home there,” referring to the Democratic Party. “And now we feel like we have to check our passports.”
Schwartz’s reaction is to House Dems’ anemic “anti-hate” resolution, which started off as a repudiation of newly minted Rep. Ilhan Omar’s anti-Jewish tropes and ended up offering her and fellow Muslims a safe harbor against the hatred of others.
Manhattanite Allison Gangi, one of the other people interviewed by the Post, said that “the watered-down resolution triggered my decision to walk away from the Democratic Party. I never dreamed anti-Semitism would have become mainstream on the left, but it has.”
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
But some Jewish Democrats aren’t just lamenting the direction their party has taken but are joining “Jexodus,” a grass-roots advocacy group that offers a new political home to moderate and conservative Jews. So far, more than 4,000 people have signed on, according to Elizabeth Pipko, a spokeswoman for the group.
According to the group’s website:
We are proud Jewish Millennials tired of living in bondage to leftist politics. We reject the hypocrisy, anti-Americanism, and anti-Semitism of the rising far-left. Progressives, Democrats and far too many old-school Jewish organizations take our support for granted. After all, we’re Jewish, and Jews vote for Democrats.
Until today.
We are determined and we are unafraid to speak for ourselves. As combatants and veterans of the campus wars, we know the threat progressivism poses to Jews. We’ve had front row seats witnessing anti-Semites hide behind the thin veil of anti-Zionism. We know the BDS movement harbors deep hatred not only for Israel, but for Jews. We’re done standing with supposed Jewish leaders and allegedly supportive Democrats who rationalize, mainstream, and promote our enemies.
Whether or not Jexodus catches fire, it is clear that the Democratic Party has a real problem to contend with in Omar and Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who up until recently followed an Instagram account that brands Jews as rats, vampires, Nazis.
