Back in 2020, Joe Biden carried 77 percent of the Jewish vote, a statistic that has traditionally been fairly typical for Democrats. But according to a new survey conducted by the Jewish Electoral Institute, Biden has now lost ten points of support in that demographic. According to the people who conducted the survey, an increasing number of American Jews feel "abandoned" by their party. The crowds showing up in the streets chanting for intifada and attacking worshippers outside of synagogues certainly aren't helping matters. Can you blame them? Yesterday, the New York Post interviewed a number of long-time Democratic Jewish voters who have changed their voter registration forms and are preparing to vote Republican for the first time. And yes... they will be voting for Donald Trump.
With the 2024 election almost upon us, Donald Trump is gaining a new cohort of voters: Jewish Americans who feel abandoned by the left.
According to exit polls, 77 percent of Jewish voters went for Biden in 2020. But a recent poll from the Jewish Electoral Institute found the president has lost 10 points on his lead against his rival.
Between college protests erupting into chants for an “intifada revolution,” Democrats like Jamaal Bowman leaning hard into pro-Palestine messaging, and progressive organizations like Black Lives Matter chapters celebrating the October 7th terrorist attacks, many Jewish Americans feel abandoned by their party.
The Post spoke with Melissa Chapman, a Jewish voter from Staten Island. Chapman describes herself as always having been "a bleeding heart liberal." She said that the illusion that the Democratic Party would keep her safe was shattered after the October 7 terror attacks and that she has been "completely abandoned" by her party. She has been harassed endlessly on social media, with correspondents she was formerly friendly with telling her to "go back to Poland" and they they hoped she would be burned in an oven.
Another lifelong Democrat, Danny Cohen, grew up in a Syrian Jewish community in Brooklyn. He described his former party as now having "a cancer" and how there is "antisemitism coming out of the woodwork." He too has experienced abuse over his Jewish faith. He describes some of his fellow Democrats treating him like a traitor to their cause. Cohen is gay, and his friends ask him "What about gay rights?" He responds by telling them that he's "Jewish first" and that he has also registered as a Republican.
The article includes interviews with others in similar situations. What the rest of the Democrats don't seem to realize is that all of their antisemitic outbursts and demonstrations are driving people like these Jews straight out of their party and into the arms of the GOP. But there is clearly a deeper lesson to be learned from this. These recent GOP converts all expressed shock at the antisemitism that was seemingly "suddenly" on display in their own ranks. But that sort of hatred doesn't simply spring up out of nowhere overnight as the result of one bad news cycle. It's been there all along, simmering under the surface. They just used to be better at hiding it. Clearly, October 7 was the catalyst that brought it back to the surface. And the more they saw others in their ranks acting out, the more they became emboldened to join them.
So will losing ten percent of the Jewish vote knock Joe Biden out of the race? Probably not by itself, no. But if he loses ten percent of the Jewish vote, ten percent of the Black vote, ten percent (or considerably more) of the Hispanic vote, and some unknown percentage of the youth vote, that could easily add up to a rising tide that the Democrats will be unable to escape. The current trends suggest that it's already happening, and as this boulder starts heading down the hill, it may begin picking up speed.
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