Hill.TV: Trump doesn’t share values of Jewish community, says Dem Jewish advocate
By Julia Manchester
The head of the Jewish Democratic Council of America told Hill.TV’s “What America’s Thinking” on Wednesday that President Trump does not share the values of the Jewish community.
Executive Director Halie Soifer, when asked by Hill.TV’s Jamal Simmons about Trump’s response to the deadly 2017 protests in Charlottesville, Va., said, “It was shocking in the Jewish community and beyond.”
“To see our president equate neo-Nazis and white supremacists with those protesting them and to label both — including those who had murdered an innocent protester — as ‘very fine people,’ just, again, spoke to the values of our community and the fact that the president clearly does not share those values,” she added.
Trump faced bipartisan backlash after the events in Charlottesville, which were triggered by a white supremacist rally, when he said that there was “blame,” as well as “very fine people,” on “both sides.”
The president has taken steps that have been well received by some Jewish groups in the U.S., from fostering a close relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
White House counselor Kellyanne Conway in October defended Trump against accusations that his opposition to globalism has anti-Semitic connotations.
“This president has been a great friend to Israel, to Jewish people worldwide,” Conway said on CNN. “Also, when he says he’s a nationalist, he explained what that means, it means America first.”
Polling indicates that while Trump has received support in Israel, he does not receive as much support from the American Jewish community.
Trump received 24 percent of the Jewish vote when he was elected in 2016, according to the Pew Research Center.