July 25, 2019

(JTA) — More than 1,400 Jewish clergy from across the United States have signed a letter that calls on government officials to protect the legal right to seek asylum in the United States.

HIAS, an immigrant advocacy and aid group formerly known as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, organized the petition. It calls on elected officials to “act immediately to provide a just and humane asylum process for those seeking safety in our country, wherever they come from and however they arrive.”

A delegation of rabbis, attorneys and advocates for asylum seekers delivered the petition last week to congressional representatives on Capitol Hill.

“Our tradition teaches that each and every person deserves to be treated justly and with compassion,” it says. “However, under current U.S. policy and practice, asylum seekers instead face an ever-lengthening list of injustices including family separation, long periods of detention in jail-like facilities, and denial of due process in their legal proceedings. Simply put, our country is treating these individuals as criminals, even though seeking asylum is a legal right. This must change.”

It also says: “The Jewish people know what it means to be turned away and to be denied protection. As Jews we understand the heart of the refugee, and the current actions of our government echo some of the darkest moments of our own history.”

NEW YORK (JTA) — One of Jeffrey Epstein’s private charities donated half a million dollars to the Ramaz School, an elite Orthodox Jewish prep school in New York City.

The foundation also donated to several other Jewish causes.

The Ramaz administration said in an email sent Tuesday evening that Epstein gave it “a significant gift” in 2007. Tax documents for the foundation show that the amount of the donation was $500,000.

“At the time, the source of the foundation’s funding was not made known to the School,” read the email, which was sent from Ramaz’s chairman, Philip Wilner, and head of school, Jonathan Cannon. “However, we very recently learned that the foundation was associated with Jeffrey Epstein, whose unconscionable behavior is widely known.”

Epstein was arrested and indicted for sex trafficking earlier this month. The financier is accused of having sexually abused dozens of underage girls. A decade ago, he served 13 months in a private wing of a county jail after agreeing to a deal that has since been criticized as an extremely light punishment.

In the email, Ramaz said the donation was used to establish an educational program and that almost all of the money has since been spent. The school also said it was committed to implementing measures to ensure greater transparency regarding major gifts, and to identify the major donors associated with foundations before accepting gifts from them.

“We are confident that reviewing and improving our approach will further strengthen our development process, reflecting our commitment to honoring the strong values on which Ramaz is founded,” the email said.

The Ramaz donation came the same year that Epstein gave more than $14 million to the YLK Charitable Fund, one of Leslie Wexner’s charities. The next year, he gave YLK more than $40 million, according to CNBC. Wexner was one of Epstein’s only clients and was his close associate.

Wexner said he broke off ties with Epstein 12 years ago, and has said in a statement that he “regretted that my path ever crossed his.”

The year before Epstein went to prison, though, his foundation distributed money to a few Jewish causes. In addition to Ramaz, the foundation’s tax return listed a $50,000 donation to the Aspen Jewish Congregation in Colorado, as well as $5,000 to the National Council of Jewish Women.

The last donation the foundation appears to have given went to the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. That donation, made in March 2011, was the only one made that year and also was for $50,000. According to tax documents, it represented 86.1 percent of Epstein’s COUQ foundation’s net assets that fiscal year. The foundation shut down the next year.

NBC News has reported on charities that said they did not receive the donations Epstein has claimed to have made.

(JTA) — Ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff has asked President Donald Trump to commute his sentence.

Madoff, 81, filed a request with the Justice Department between one and three months ago, The Hill reported.

The Justice Department’s website lists the request as “pending,” and says it is updated to July 1. The request is for clemency, not a pardon.

Madoff is serving a 150-year sentence in federal prison in Butner, North Carolina, for his $19 billion Ponzi scheme, which began in the early 1970s and lasted until his arrest in 2008. He pleaded guilty to 11 felony charges related to money laundering, perjury and falsifying financial documents.

The uncovering of the Ponzi scheme revealed the tens of billions of dollars in fake profit that victims believed they had earned through Madoff. Many prominent Jewish nonprofits also suffered big losses, with Yeshiva University taking a $140 million hit, Hadassah $90 million and the late Elie Wiesel’s foundation losing $15 million.