A Democrat running in New York City for the U.S. House of Representatives this year touted an endorsement by anti-Israel activists.
Jamaal Bowman, a progressive Democrat running to unseat incumbent Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) in New York’s 16th Congressional District, said he was “grateful to be endorsed by” and “incredibly proud to work with ‘the Jewish Vote’ to take on anti-Semitism,” according to the organization in a statement.
Founded in 2018, ‘the Jewish Vote’, the electoral arm of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, has defended anti-Semitism on the left.
Its leadership, including co-founder Rafael Shimunov, has expressed support for anti-Semites, including Washington, D.C., City Councilman Trayon White Sr., who blamed Jews for snowfall in the U.S. capital and for controlling the U.S. government and World Bank. White donated to a Nation of Islam event where Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan slandered Jews.
Shimunov is also a delegate for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
The Jewish Vote has defended former Women’s March board members Linda Sarsour and Zahra Billoo over anti-Semitic remarks.
After the two were removed from the movement, Jewish Vote co-founder Katie Unger, who spoke at a rally to endorse Bowman, said Sarsour is “a true ally against anti-Semitism,” and that Billoo’s removal was a “smear.”
Jewish Vote steering committee member Elana Levin called Sarsour “amazing.” Its executive director, Audrey Sasson, said Sarsour is “not the problem.”
“More than just offensive politically, it is the deceptive tactics being practiced by these groups and their stooges and stage-managed ‘candidates’ that are intended to deceive and whitewash their anti-Israel, anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic ideas, positions, partnerships and true purpose, which is to undermine the Jewish State and America’s only steadfast ally in the Middle East,” Josh Block, a former Clinton aide and CEO and president of the Israel Project, told The Washington Free Beacon. “That should be a klaxon warning of how truly toxic are such groups and those who affiliate [with] them.”