Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said on Saturday that Jews in the United States are facing their greatest threat since World War II.
“What’s happening with Israel and Jewish people, there has never been a more dangerous time since the Holocaust if you happen to be Jewish in America,” the former president told supporters at a rally in Wilkes-Barre in northeastern Pennsylvania.
He made similar remarks on Thursday at a “Fighting Antisemitism” event with Miriam Adelson at the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
“What’s going on now is exactly what was going on before the Holocaust,” he said.
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The New Jersey event, featuring prominent Jewish supporters, took place the day the Trump campaign launched an initiative to reach out to Jewish voters.
The former president announced Jewish Voices for Trump, which the GOP campaign describes as “a coalition of thought leaders, business trailblazers, former administration officials, authors, influencers and those within the Jewish community.”
According to the group’s mission statement, it seeks to stand up against “radical antisemitism.”
“While the world has fallen into chaos with [presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala] Harris, President Trump’s Abraham Accords chartered new territory in regional stability, not just for Israel, but for the world,” it states.
At the Wilkes-Barre rally, Trump also accused his opponent of not choosing the governor of the Keystone State, Josh Shapiro, as her running mate because he is Jewish, a charge that Shapiro has denied.
“They turned him down because he’s Jewish,” said Trump. “They turned him down for other reasons, but the primary reason is because he’s Jewish.”
Trump also said during his nearly two-hour campaign event at Mohegan Arena at Casey Plaza that “any Jewish person that votes for [Harris] or a Democrat has to go out and have their head examined.”
At the New Jersey event, Trump claimed that “instead of aggressively confronting these venomous antisemites in her party, Kamala Harris has maneuvered for their support.”
Pennsylvania is a critical swing state, with fierce competition to secure its 19 electoral college votes. The latest New York Times/Siena and Quinnipiac polls show a slight lead for Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who was announced in Philadelphia earlier this month.
Trump tapped Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance for the vice presidential nominee at the Republican convention in Milwaukee last month. The Democratic convention takes place in Chicago from Monday to Thursday.
The battleground states also include Arizona, North Carolina, Nevada and Georgia.
Trump’s comments come amid a surge in antisemitism in the United States and globally after Hamas started a war against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. According to the 2023 Antisemitism Worldwide report, released on May 1 by Tel Aviv University and the Anti-Defamation League, last year saw the highest number of antisemitic incidents in the United States ever recorded by the ADL.
Antisemitism has run rampant on college campuses, including pro-Hamas rallies featuring calls for genocide against Jews.
In the United States, the ADL recorded 7,523 incidents in 2023 compared to 3,697 in 2022. The number of assaults increased from 111 in 2022 to 161 in 2023, and incidents of vandalism rose from 1,288 to 2,106, per the ADL.
In New York, the city with the largest Jewish population in the world, the New York Police Department recorded 325 anti-Jewish hate crimes in 2023 in comparison to 261 in 2022.
In Los Angeles, the city’s police department recorded 165 antisemitic incidents, up from 86, and in Chicago, there were 50 up from 39.
