Big Difference: Brownback Succeeds Saperstein As Religious Freedom Envoy
Image by Getty Images
By Nathan Guttman January 29, 2018
It took the tie-breaking vote of Vice President Mike Pence, but on Wednesday the Senate finally approved, in the narrowest of margins, Sam Brownback as the State Department’s next ambassador at large for international religious freedom. Immediately after, Brownback announced his resignation from his post as governor of Kansas.
Brownback will fill the position previously held by Rabbi David Saperstein. And while both have spent their lives working for religious freedom, Brownback and Saperstein could not be farther apart in the way they interpret the term. For a comparison, click on the graphic below.
Laura E. Adkins created the graphic that accompanies this text.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
