The party of aggrieved white people has been up to its usual racist tricks. Senator Tom Cotton says slavery was “a necessary evil”; the racist in the White House has snubbed John Lewis, whose coffin was two miles away: a dozen Texas GOP county chairs recently posted racist tweets in response to the George Floyd protests…but let’s not forget how the GOP also treats Jews.
It has long amazed me that roughly 30 percent of Jewish voters typically support the Republican party – and that the percentage is still sizeable despite Trump’s refusal to condemn the “very fine people” who marched in Charlottesville chanting “Jews will not replace us!”, despite numerous Republican candidates digitally depicting their Jewish opponents clutching wads of cash, despite Trump’s brainless claim that the well-documented spike in anti-Semitic acts on his watch has been orchestrated by Democrats to make him look bad. And despite so much more, like when he tweeted an image of Hillary Clinton’s face atop a pile of cash next to the Star of David.
But this week we got a classic.
Jon Ossoff, a Jewish Georgian who is threatening to topple Republican David Perdue in one of the nation’s many competitive Senate races, has a conventionally sized nose. But the Perdue campaign recently decided to enlarge it. In a Facebook ad launched on July 22, Ossoff was paired with Senator Chuck Schumer as the text screamed that Democrats were trying to “buy Georgia.” An eagle-eyed Jewish news outlet, The Forward, happened to notice that Ossoff’s nose had been magically elongated.
The Forward consulted three professional graphics designers, all of whom determined that the Perdue campaign had used a 2017 Reuters photo of Ossoff, and had lengthened and widened his nose without altering the rest of his face; as one designer said, the Jewish candidate’s nose is “the primary difference where the altered version is larger than the original.”
Jews with large noses have long been featured in anti-Semitic propaganda; in Ossoff’s words yesterday, “this is the oldest, most obvious, least original anti-Semitic trope in history.” Ossoff said that Perdue owes “an unqualified apology to Georgia’s Jewish community” – and, presumably, to all gentile voters who are fed up with Trump Republican bigotry.
But here’s the fun part: Team Perdue says there’s nothing to apologize for because the elongation of Ossoff’s nose was merely “accidental.” Plus, they didn’t do the accident. Plus, Perdue himself knew nothing about it.
I love the Perdue campaign’s defense: “In the graphic design process handled by an outside vendor, the (Ossoff) photo was resized and a filter was applied, which appears to have caused an unintentional error that distorted the image. Obviously, this was accidental.” But just to avoid any “confusion,” the Perdue campaign has now removed its Facebook ad.
Well, I’m glad that clears things up.
Perhaps Trump should do the same. He could avoid “confusion” by condemning Henry Ford’s notorious anti-Semitism instead of praising Ford for his “good bloodlines, good bloodlines.” He could avoid “confusion” by condemning Sebastian Gorka’s notorious ties to Hungarian anti-Semites instead of appointing Gorka to a federal education post. He could avoid “confusion” by condemning the anti-Semitic pastors, like Rick Wiles, who said the impeachment probe was a “Jew coup.”
Nevertheless, roughly 30 percent of Jews may still vote for people like Trump and Perdue – because, you know, Israel. What’s even more amazing is that prominent Jewish Republicans think the GOP’s share should be much higher.
But alas, there’s a big problem. During an online meeting of the Republican Jewish Coalition on July 19, ex-Bush flak Ari Fleischer asked his allies: “What’s your best advice for what we as a community should say to our friends who are inclined to support the president because of his pro-Israel policies, but probably won’t support him because of his personality. How can we convince them that they should vote for President Trump?”
Knock yourself out, pal.