A local chapter of the Anti-Defamation League issued a blistering critique of a progressive Jewish congressman-elect as soon as his race was called on Election Night, prompting a reproach from the politician, Daniel Biss.
“It saddens me to watch the ADL, once a preeminent civil rights organization, devolve into an entity that traffics in fear, intimidation and extremism,” Biss, who easily prevailed in the state’s 9th District in suburban Chicago, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in a statement Wednesday. “This kind of rhetoric does nothing to keep the Jewish people safe; in fact, it undermines that very cause.”
Biss, the grandson of Holocaust survivors who held Israeli citizenship when he was younger, was responding to ADL Midwest’s statement late Tuesday that the organization “has serious concerns” about his “approach to antisemitism.”
The ADL highlighted what it called problematic positions that Biss had staked out in his previous office as mayor of Evanston, including his decision not to involve local police in breaking up a pro-Palestinian encampment at Northwestern University. The group also criticized Biss’s objection to a state law barring pension funds from being invested in certain companies that boycott Israel, and to some of his campaign’s opposition to pro-Israel lobbyists AIPAC, which had spent heavily on a different Democratic primary candidate.
“We expect him to recognize when rhetoric about Israel or AIPAC crosses into antisemitic tropes, collective blame or hostility toward Jewish Americans,” the statement from Rebecca Weininger, ADL Midwest’s senior regional director, continued. “We expect him to engage respectfully with Jewish constituents, including those whose views and beliefs differ from his own.”
ADL also criticizes progressive congressional candidates following election victories
Biss is one of several progressively-minded Jewish legislators headed to Washington, along with New York congressman-elect Brad Lander and others. An ADL regional office in Philadelphia issued its own statement on Election Night denouncing progressive Chris Rabb, who won his own election to Congress.
The organization’s targeting of Biss was criticized by other Jewish groups. The Nexus Project, a rival antisemitism monitor, said the ADL was “wrong. Period,” and added, “This apparent strategy of creating adversarial relationships with progressive members, often by distorting reality and politicians’ records, is self-defeating and damaging.”
J Street, the liberal Zionist lobby, wrote, “Tonight of all nights, for the ADL not to welcome his election and congratulate him but instead to lead with ‘serious concerns’ about his approach to antisemitism is, to put it in Jewish communal terms, a Shanda.”
Following pushback, the ADL office issued a second statement Wednesday morning, saying, “We look forward to working with elected officials across our region to help protect the Jewish community.” That statement congratulated other winning Illinois politicians, including Gov. JB Pritzker, who is Jewish. Biss’s name was excluded.
In his own statement, Biss said that “Jewish safety has always been intertwined with the safety of every marginalized community,” adding that President Donald Trump “has made Jews less safe at home and abroad.”
ADL warns of antisemitic rhetoric and demonization of Israel following elections
The ADL’s national office issued its own statement on the election results late Wednesday. Without naming any candidates, the organization noted that the campaign season “underscored the dangers of portraying Jews as dangerous, disloyal or responsible for society’s problems, as well as the blatant fixation on and demonization of Israel.”
The ADL added that the group “stands ready to work with leaders of both parties at every level of government.”