Will Trump’s efforts to fight antisemitism help degrade democracy?
Jews should worry about the extent to which claims of fighting antisemitism might contribute to the suppression of free speech
Students protest against the war in Gaza and in support of Israel on the first anniversary of Oct. 7. Photo by Victor J. Blue for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Contributing Columnist Emily Tamkin November 15, 2024
President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to fight antisemitism. He will be, he said, the “best friend” to Jews.
But the policies we should expect Trump to pursue are more likely to weaken institutions that should be core to the preservation of our democracy.
It will almost certainly begin with crackdowns on higher education institutions — crucial bastions for cultivating freedom of speech and thought. In September, Trump vowed that “Colleges will and must end the antisemitic propaganda or they will lose their accreditation and federal support.” But who determines what constitutes antisemitic propaganda? Is it Trump? Republican Jews? Trump’s Christian Zionist allies?
There is no general agreement about what types of ideas and materials merit that description. Some Jewish studies professors have argued that Israel, in order to survive, needs to be divorced from Zionism, or that Israel is engaged in genocidal actions.
Is that antisemitism? For that, should schools lose their funding?
Trump has promised to deport non-citizen student protesters against Israel. A president pushing for the deportation of students for practicing their legally protected right to protest is something about which those of us who want to preserve the right to speak out against the government should be deeply concerned.
Then there is the recently released Project Esther, a plan to fight antisemitism from the influential right-wing Heritage Foundation, which has deep ties to the Trump team. The plan Project Esther proposes involves going after the so-called “Hamas Support Network,” in which the plan’s author includes the anti-Zionist Jewish group Jewish Voice for Peace, by using counterterrorism and immigration laws as well as the the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, which was used against the mafia. This is to say that the plan would treat groups pushing for a particular foreign policy position like the mob.
What the plan tellingly doesn’t deal with: the dangers of white supremacy or antisemitism from the right.
Further, as the Forward’s own Arno Rosenfeld has pointed out, “This dragnet would also target major progressive foundations like Tides and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, which fund a handful of pro-Palestinian organizations as well as many other liberal causes.”
This is to say that, under the pretense of fighting antisemitism, Trump could use the Project Esther template to go after not only pro-Palestinian groups, but also progressive outfits more broadly, eroding civil society organizations that might otherwise help push back against his administration.
Plus, with the Republicans assuming control of both chambers, we should expect to see renewed attempts to pass bills like H.R. 9495, which failed in the House of Representatives on Tuesday, and which, if passed, would have allowed the secretary of the Treasury Department to revoke the tax-exempt status of nonprofits considered to be “terrorist supporting organizations” — a label that can be warped to fit its wielder’s goals. (It’s true the bill had bipartisan support, but the policies it proposes are particular favorites on the conservative side of the political spectrum.)
Could these measures fight antisemitism? Maybe, although I’m personally skeptical. What they will certainly do is make it more difficult to speak out against American policy toward Israel.
And it will make it more difficult to speak out toward American policy toward Israel as — if Trump’s early cabinet and ambassadorial picks are any indication — the United States embraces the most rightwing elements of Israeli policies. In other words, we can and should expect the Trump administration to bolster policies toward Israel that the majority of American Jews do not support, and to silence criticism by claiming they are fighting antisemitism.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Trump’s pick to be ambassador to Israel, said in an interview Wednesday that he could “of course” see the annexation of the West Bank as a possibility during Trump’s term. (He has previously rejected the use of the term “West Bank” and said there was no such thing as a settlement.)
Pete Hegseth, Trump’s reported choice to lead the Pentagon, has apparently mused about the reestablishment of a temple on the Temple Mount — an unfathomable violation of a holy Muslim site that would likely send the Middle East up in flames. He made a documentary for Fox, where he works as a host, on the “battle” for the Holy City — one clearly aligned with right-wing Israeli interests.
Rep. Elise Stefanik, whom Trump intends to nominate to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, went viral for grilling university presidents over antisemitism after Oct. 7. But she is far from a stalwart warrior in the fight against antisemitism. She has pushed, among others, the great replacement theory and conspiracy theories around George Soros; she also attacked Sen. Chuck Schumer after he called for elections in Israel in a repudiation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s current chokehold on power.
And this is, in a way, the embodiment of what we will get by going along with Trump’s particular fight against antisemitism: a fight against education and free speech, led by people who will condemn antisemitism in one breath and boost it in the next.
I know that even people who are themselves critical of Israel are sometimes uncomfortable with what they hear at protests, or from students, or on social media. But attacking the institutions that keep us a pluralistic, liberal democracy will not keep Jews safe. Empowering Trump — who has repeatedly accused Jews who do not vote for him of being “disloyal” and said we need to have our heads examined — to hack away at the freedom to protest, as well as the privilege to learn more and differently, would be a mistake.
And so when all of those efforts at democratic suppression unfold — when Trump tries to pick up the tools to dismantle our democracy, go after free speech and bolster his anti-intellectual project while proclaiming he’s just trying to fight antisemitism — I hope that we, American Jews, do not support him.
I know that it will take courage to not let fear goad us into supporting measures that might, in the short term, be tempting to some who have reasonable concerns about increasing antisemitism, but which will have deeply deleterious long term impacts on democracy. Rabbi Nachman of Breslov famously taught that “The whole world is a very narrow bridge, and the main thing is not to fear at all.” As Rabbi Marc Margolius noted, the Hebrew word used doesn’t translate precisely to “to be afraid,” but rather to “to cause oneself to be afraid.”
Per Margolius, what Nachman was articulating was that “the fundamental principle of courage is choosing not to frighten ourselves beyond the fear we already experience. Fear is unavoidable, perhaps even required. Courage involves moving forward despite our fear, and not exacerbating our anxieties.”
When Trump presents us with the false choice between fighting antisemitism and preserving pluralistic, liberal society, this is what I hope we manage. Our democracy is a very narrow bridge. The main thing is not to fear it at all.
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