Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Mike Pence Gets Jews For Jesus ‘Rabbi’ To Pray For Pittsburgh Synagogue Victims

Vice President Mike Pence was joined by a Jews for Jesus ‘rabbi’ who prayed for the victims of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting at a Republican campaign rally in Michigan on Monday.

Messianic Jewish Rabbi Loren Jacobs of Synagogue Shema Yisrael intoned prayers to “Jesus the Messiah” and denounced the “hate inspired shooting in synagogue in Pittsburgh” before Pence spoke at the rally in Grand Rapids.

Pence is an evangelical Christian who maintains close ties to so-called Messianic Jews, who mostly share his right-wing political beliefs and strongly support Israel and the occupation.

Messianic Jews believe in Jesus Christ and focus on seeking to convert Jews to their unusual belief system. Most mainstream Jewish groups do not accept them as legitimate Jews. Some retweeted stories about Pence’s rally with the hashtag #FakeJews, a play on Trump’s penchant for bashing the media.

Like President Trump did over the weekend, Pence quickly pivoted away from the tragedy in Pittsburgh to partisan pot shots.

“All that talk about a blue wave, let’s just make sure that blue wave hits a red wall right here in Michigan,” Pence said, according to the Detroit News.

The veep stumped for GOP Rep. Mike Bishop, who is trailing Jewish Democrat Elissa Slotkin in a tightly contested race. Pence also boosted Lena Epstein, a Jewish Republican, who is locked in a tight race with Democrat Haley Stevens for an open seat outside Detroit.

Epstein, who ran Trump’s successful 2016 campaign in Michigan, has invited Jacobs to pray at other campaign events, Talking Points Memo reported. She claimed that inviting Messianic Jews is a sign of embracing “religious diversity.”

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.