Media Appearances
Rabbi Yaakov Menken on Newsmax: Tucker Carlson deserves “Antisemite of the Year”
Rabbi Yaakov Menken on Newsmax Chris Salcedo Show: Fractures in the Conservative Movement over Tucker Carlson
Rabbi Yaakov Menken on Todd Starnes Radio: Antisemitism Working Its Way into the Republican Party
Rabbi Yaakov Menken on Newsmax Greg Kelly Reports: Carlson’s Rhetoric Fits Classic Patterns of Antisemitism
NPR: Conservatives reckon with how to handle antisemitism after Tucker Carlson controversy
by Sarah McCammon on NPR
SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Nick Fuentes has suggested that a lot of women want to be raped, claimed that Jim Crow segregation laws were better for Black Americans and expressed admiration for Hitler, among other things. Those kinds of statements have mostly kept Fuentes on the fringes of the conservative movement. But in an episode of “The Tucker Carlson Show” published on October 27, Carlson sat down with Fuentes for a friendly conversation that lasted more than two hours. In one exchange, Fuentes invoked an old antisemitic trope, suggesting that Jewish loyalty to Israel and other Jews is standing in the way of a unified American society.
LINDSEY GRAHAM: But I just want to make it really clear, I’m in the Hitler-sucks wing of the Republican Party (laughter).
MCCAMMON: That’s South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham at the Republican Jewish Coalition meeting in Las Vegas last weekend, where several speakers called out rising antisemitism. But another prominent conservative, Kevin Roberts, the head of the influential think tank The Heritage Foundation, defended Tucker Carlson.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
KEVIN ROBERTS: Who remains, and as I have said before, always will be a close friend of the Heritage Foundation – the venomous coalition attacking him are sowing division. Their attempt to cancel him will fail.
MCCAMMON: In that video, posted to X on October 30, Roberts also said conservatives should feel free to critique Israel despite pressure from what he described as the globalist class. That sparked backlash from some Heritage staff and allies, including Rabbi Yaakov Menken, with the Coalition for Jewish Values.
YAAKOV MENKEN: Obviously, if you want to deride the U.N. as a collection of globalists, that’s fine. But if you want to refer to unnamed globalists protesting against antisemitism, hmm, who do I imagine that’s talking about?
MCCAMMON: Menken was part of a task force Heritage convened to fight antisemitism. Several members, including Menken’s organization, ultimately stepped down from the task force in response to Roberts’ handling of the situation.
Read the full article on NPR.
Image credit: Kevin Roberts by Gage Skidmore on Wikimedia with CC BY-SA 2.0 license.