JTA — As the US’s Antisemitism Awareness Act heads to a Senate committee for a crucial vote, 10 progressive Jewish organizations have signed a letter opposing the legislation for representing an endorsement of the Trump administration’s “efforts to weaponize antisemitism.”
“Voting in favor of this legislation in this current political climate would represent an endorsement of the Trump administration’s escalating efforts to weaponize antisemitism as a pretext for undermining civil rights, deporting political dissidents, and attacking the fundamental pillars of our democracy, making the Jewish community and others less safe,” Tuesday’s letter read.
Republicans, meanwhile, added language meant to tamp down concerns by some lawmakers that the act would criminalize some expressions of Christian doctrine.
The bill drew free-speech concerns from both sides of the aisle last year when it sailed through the House but stalled in the Senate. On the left, critics charged that the bill’s enshrining of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism could bar legitimate criticism of Israel. Some on the right, including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, said they opposed the bill because IHRA identifies the belief that Jews killed Jesus as antisemitic.
Now, the bill has been reintroduced by a bipartisan coalition of senators, including Jews — and it faces a vote in the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee Wednesday in a changed political climate. US President Donald Trump’s administration, installed in January, has taken aggressive actions that it says are meant to stop antisemitism, drawing criticism from many of the bill’s Democratic sponsors as a result.
US Senator Chuck Schumer, who was the Senate majority leader until January, is a sponsor and made moving the bill forward a top priority in the last session of Congress. Schumer has since criticized Trump’s crackdown on campus antisemitism, signing a letter last week accusing his administration of using antisemitism as a “guise” to attack universities.
(L-R) US representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) squeezes by representative Lauren Boebert (R-CO) ahead of US President Joe Biden’s third State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress in the House Chamber of the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on March 7, 2024. (SHAWN THEW / POOL / AFP)
Some Democrats who previously said they supported the bill are now expected to vote against it over concerns about Trump’s approach to antisemitism, Jewish Insider reported.
During the Wednesday meeting, lawmakers will seek to finalize the bill’s language, considering several amendments that have been proposed. One, added by Republicans, is apparently designed to guard against the religious concerns of Greene and others, including senators on the committee voting on Wednesday.
The amendment, which was published in the bill’s final language on Tuesday and was first reported by The Forward, would protect “the free exercise of religion.” The claim that Jews handed Jesus over for execution has historically been part of Christian doctrine; it has also been used to support discrimination and violence against Jews.
The 10 progressive Jewish organizations signing the letter opposing the Antisemitism Awareness Act are Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, Habonim Dror North America, Hashomer Hatzair USA, J Street, Jewish Community Action, New Israel Fund, New Jewish Narrative, New York Jewish Agenda, The Nexus Project, and T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights.
While progressive groups have been vocal critics of the Trump administration, the letter puts them in the position of also undercutting efforts by Democratic and Jewish lawmakers to take steps they say would protect Jews.
“We are witnessing the co-opting of the fight against antisemitism to pursue unrelated, authoritarian goals by the Trump administration, and the so-called Antisemitism Awareness Act will give them another tool,” said Jeremy Ben-Ami, J Street’s president, in a press release. “Antisemitism is a serious problem and addressing it requires a multi-faceted strategy, but this legislation combined with the current administration’s actions aren’t making Jewish Americans any safer.”
The HELP Committee will vote on the Antisemitism Awareness Act and another bill, the Protecting Students on Campus Act, on Wednesday morning.
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