HAARETZ: Opinion | Biden vs. Trump Is a Simple Choice for American Jews: Democracy or Dictatorship
Click here to read the full op-ed by Halie Soifer on Haaretz.com.
In four months, the American people will face the most consequential election of our lifetimes where nothing less than the future of democracy is at stake.
While there are two names on the ballot, this election isn’t just about the candidates – it’s also about the values they represent. President Joe Biden is a champion of Jewish and American values, including support of Israel, and a staunch defender of democracy. Donald Trump is a 34-time convicted felon and twice-impeached former president who has repeatedly denigrated and threatened our values and system of government.
As we mark America’s 248th Independence Day this Thursday, it is not hyperbole to question whether our democracy will survive under Donald Trump. We must take him at his word.
Trump pledges to be a “dictator on day one.” He lauds and aligns with dangerous authoritarians, threatens retribution against his political opponents, and recently called for a televised military tribunal for former Congresswoman Liz Cheney. He praises Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orban, and invokes the rhetoric of Adolf Hitler, whom he reportedly said “did some good things.” Trump’s campaign recently posted a video declaring the United States would become a “Unified Reich” if he wins a second term, after using Nazi imagery in his last campaign for president. As one CNN reporter put it, “Donald Trump dabbles in Nazi allusions too often for it to be a coincidence.”
For Jewish Americans, apparent admiration for Hitler alone should make Donald Trump anathema, but he’s also repeatedly invoked “dual loyalty” accusations and other antisemitic tropes, disparaging the vast majority of American Jews at least seven times in the past five years.
In addition, Trump’s policy toward Israel appears both variable and transactional. As his own former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, recently told The New York Times, “Trump’s support for Israel in the first term is not guaranteed in the second term, because Trump’s positions are made on the basis of what’s good for Donald Trump, not on some coherent theory of national security.”
This has been clear in the aftermath of the horrific Hamas attacks of October 7. Instead of empathizing with and offering support to Israel, as Biden has continued to do, Donald Trump mocked Israeli leaders and praised Hezbollah. While Trump has repeatedly referred to freeing “hostages,” he’s not referencing the 120, including eight Americans, held in captivity in Gaza. He’s referring to hundreds of incarcerated insurrectionists, whom he’s pledged to release as one of his first acts as president.
As recently as last week, Trump evaded questions about whether he’d accept the results of the 2024 election after nearly four years of lying about the outcome of the last one. In a decision issued Monday by six Supreme Court justices – half of whom were appointed by Trump – he was granted broad immunity from prosecution for “official” acts while serving as president. This cloak of immunity makes it virtually impossible to prosecute Trump for crimes he committed as president, including attempting to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election, as well as any future crimes he may commit if he’s reelected.
With a depraved sense of malignant narcissism, Trump declared Monday’s Supreme Court’s ruling “a big win.”
It was a win for his ongoing effort to evade criminal prosecution, but it was a devastating loss for the United States. In her dissent, Justice Sonya Sotomayor warned the decision now effectively made U.S. presidents “a king above the law.” Trump has always considered himself something of a king, even before he became president. He demonstrated this in 2016 as a presidential candidate when he said it was “incredible” that he “could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters.”
Since winning that election, he has acted with impunity, attacking democracy and the rule of law – impunity that has now only been fortified by a dangerous ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States.
Last week’s presidential debate didn’t go well for either candidate. Biden stumbled while speaking and failed to hold Trump accountable for the more than 30 outright lies told in such quick succession that it was hard to count.
What may have been missed amid the morass of the debate was when Biden pressed Trump on his emboldening of and alignment with the Proud Boys. According to a recent in-depth report by Reuters, this violent all-male right-wing extremist group is rebuilding to support Trump. The report also noted that “some historians compare the Proud Boys to fascist European militias…that helped bring Hitler to power.” Given Trump’s record of invoking Hitler, such comparisons are fitting.
At the debate, Biden reminded the American people that four years ago, from the debate stage, Trump blatantly refused to denounce white supremacy and instead incited the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by.” On January 6, 2021, they heeded his call by leading a deadly insurrection to stop the peaceful transfer of power. In response to Biden’s references to January 6, Trump falsely blamed Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi for the insurrection. In addition to demonstrating a distinct inability to tell the truth, Trump continues to demonstrate his clear unwillingness to take responsibility for his own wrongdoing.
Today, having fully embraced Trump’s call, the Proud Boys are preparing for the 2024 election, ominously warning that “bad things are going to happen” if Trump doesn’t win, and they are right. Having previously incited a violent insurrection, there are reasons to believe Trump would incite political violence if he’s not reelected. But far worse would happen if Trump wins. He’s pledged to erode our democracy “on day one” and our judicial system now has few tools to hold him accountable for it.
It is up to American voters to hold Trump accountable on November 5 and render their own judgment. It’s particularly incumbent on minorities, including Jewish Americans, who would likely be the target of Trump-emboldened extremists, to defend our democracy, fundamental freedoms, and rights.
That is what is at stake in this election. While some voters may dislike the two men at the top of the ticket, this election is not just a binary choice between Biden and Trump. It is also a binary choice between American ideals and our future as a democracy, in fact the very question of whether or not America will exist as we have known it for two and half centuries, or become a dictatorship.
Halie Soifer is CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America (JDCA). She previously served as national security adviser to then-Sen. Kamala Harris, senior policy adviser to U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power, and foreign policy adviser to Sen. Chris Coons. On X: @HalieSoifer