The Depths of Nixonland

Image by getty images

Serial Anti-Semite: President Richard Nixon would often regale aides, including Henry Kissinger, with anti-Semitic rants, a new expose reveals.
Will the extent of our 37th president’s anti-Semitism ever cease to shock?
Just when it seems we might have arrived at the last recorded utterance of “Jew boy” (sometimes said in front of Henry Kissinger, the Jewish secretary of state), there are new tapes to endure. The latest piece of evidence to add to the psychological profile of Richard Milhous Nixon comes from the duo who were his greatest tormentors, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. They have joined forces again for the first time in 36 years.
In a comprehensive Washington Post article meant to stave off any revisionist history about Nixon’s own role in the corruption that came to characterize his disgraced tenure, Woodward and Bernstein also remind us what the president thought of Jews. Nixon would often tell his aides — again, including Kissinger — that “the Jewish cabal is out to get me.” And, in one conversation quoted from the tapes by Woodward and Bernstein, Nixon says the following to H.R. Haldeman, his chief of staff, on July 3, 1971: “The government is full of Jews. Second, most Jews are disloyal. You know what I mean? You have a Garment [White House counsel Leonard Garment] and a Kissinger and, frankly, a Safire [presidential speechwriter William Safire], and, by God, they’re exceptions. But Bob, generally speaking, you can’t trust the bastards. They turn on you.”
Reading these words — and, even worse, hearing them spoken in the Oval Office — is a sobering experience. At the same time, it’s also gratifying to know that in Nixon’s case, his paranoia and all-consuming rage were not limited to just Jews. He saw enemies everywhere and was willing to try and subvert the rule of law in order to triumph over them. The anti-Semitism was just a symptom of his dark pathology. And, in the end, it brought him down.
At the close of their article, Woodward and Bernstein remind us of some of Nixon’s strangely self-aware last words as he bade farewell to his White House staff. “Always remember,” he told them, “others may hate you, but those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.”
And destroy himself, he did.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
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.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Make a Passover Gift Today!
Most Popular
- 1
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 2
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
- 3
Opinion What Jewish university presidents say: Trump is exploiting campus antisemitism, not fighting it
- 4
Opinion Yes, the attack on Gov. Shapiro was antisemitic. Here’s what the left should learn from it
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Harvard president: As a Jew, ‘I know very well’ that concerns about antisemitism are valid
-
Fast Forward Ben Shapiro, Emily Damari among torch lighters for Israel’s Independence Day ceremony
-
Fast Forward Larry David’s ‘My Dinner with Adolf’ essay skewers Bill Maher’s meeting with Trump
-
Sports Israeli mom ‘made it easy’ for new NHL player to make history
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
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 comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag 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.