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  • 5 days ago
At a House Judiciary Committee hearing on antisemitism last week, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) pointed to examples of antisemitism from both the left and the right.
Transcript
00:00Because, as a number of my colleagues on the Democratic side have raised today,
00:11the anti-Semitism that seems to be given permission from this administration
00:19through its hiring of avowed anti-Semites
00:24and through its defunding of a number of programs that would fight anti-Semitism
00:31stands in stark contrast to a lot of the rhetoric that we hear.
00:38Now, I am going to do as Mr. Nosenchuk suggested,
00:44which is I will call out anti-Semitism wherever it exists.
00:49It certainly exists on the right, Mr. Schneider.
00:52You are right. That has been there for a long time.
00:55We've seen it in circles, Unite the Right and other neo-Nazi extremist groups.
01:06And there is no question that we are seeing a significant rise on the extreme left.
01:12I am a Democratic elected official who condemns extremism and anti-Semitism
01:22wherever it is on the extreme right and the extreme left,
01:26including phrases such as globalize the Intifada or from the river to the sea
01:31or all sorts of other slogans that are well understood to be anti-Semitic by Jews.
01:41And as a Jew, I can tell you I'm sick and tired of being told by others
01:47what is anti-Semitic and what is not.
01:50But we all need to take a bipartisan view of this,
01:55a non-partisan view of this,
01:57if we're going to tackle this problem.
02:00And I say that to my Democratic colleagues
02:02and I say it to my Republican colleagues.
02:04And the reason why you hear frustration on the Democratic side of the aisle here
02:11is because we hear so much lip service from our Republican colleagues
02:16about anti-Semitism,
02:19about how terrible the protests are and the rallies
02:21and what's going on in universities.
02:23And I agree.
02:25But then, on the other hand,
02:28we see non-profit security grants
02:30funded at $305 million,
02:34which is the same as fiscal year 23 before October 7th.
02:38That protects Jewish synagogues.
02:40We're seeing a rise in violent hate crimes now
02:45where Jewish institutions need much more protection.
02:50We're not getting it.
02:51We see anti-Semitism being used as a pretext
02:57to go after immigration policy
03:00or to go after universities
03:02that has nothing to do with anti-Semitism.
03:06And I concur with Mr. Nosenchuk,
03:09and I have said this to the chairman himself,
03:12I was very pleased that he introduced
03:15a very straightforward resolution condemning anti-Semitism.
03:20Unfortunately, on that same day,
03:22there was another resolution
03:24that tried to use anti-Semitism as a pretext
03:27with the Boulder, Colorado shooting
03:30related to some immigration policy.
03:33And I look forward,
03:35I hope to have a little bit more time to ask some questions,
03:37but I really want to take this opportunity
03:39to urge all of my colleagues
03:41and all of these witnesses here
03:43to stop playing the blame game.
03:45And let's focus on anti-Semitism.
03:47Let's put the funding where it needs to be
03:49so that we can actually attack the issue.
03:53And I thank the chairman.
03:55I yield back.
03:57The gentleman yields back
03:58to the gentleman from Georgia.
03:59The gentleman from Georgia yields back.
04:01I will now recognize the gentleman from Georgia.

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