Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Holocaust Survivor Who Backs Trump Announces GOP Run For Congress

Political campaigns often attract candidates with extraordinary biographies, but none may be as unique as that of Dr. Yona Barash, who announced last month that he was running as a Republican challenger in a Sacramento swing district.

Barash was born in Romania in 1945, when it was occupied by Nazi Germany. His family made it in 1950 to Israel, where Barash joined the Israeli Defense Forces, graduated from medical school, and then served as a doctor in a paratrooper unit. He immigrated to the United States in 1975, became a citizen five years later, and has worked as a surgeon in the Sacramento area since 1989.

Barash plans to make healthcare a key focus of his campaign. He was critical of the universal healthcare model proposed by some Democrats.

“Socialized medicine creates a two-tier system,” he told the Elk Grove Citizen. “For the very wealthy that can afford to buy health care out of the system, and for the rest that have to wait for a hip transplant or a knee replacement and sit in a wheelchair for two years, that’s socialized medicine. And I see us going that direction and that’s not good.”

Barash, who voted for President Trump, cited his Israeli background when explaining his support for the travel ban on refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries.

Barash is not the only Republican in the race—he’d first have to defeat Marine veteran Andrew Grant in the GOP primary. But if he succeeds, he has a real shot at being sent to Congress: Rep. Ami Bera, his Democratic opponent, has never received more than 52% of the vote.

Contact Aiden Pink at [email protected] or on Twitter, @aidenpink

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.