fbpx

Jewish Groups Blast Trump for Dinner with Kanye West, White Nationalist Nick Fuentes

Trump said that he agreed to the dinner to give West “advice” and that West “has been very good to me,” but also called the rapper “a seriously troubled man.” West has lost various business deals, most notably with Adidas, after his various antisemitic comments.
[additional-authors]
November 29, 2022
(Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Myriad Jewish groups are issuing staunch condemnations of former President Donald Trump’s dinner with rapper Kanye West and white nationalist Nick Fuentes at Mar-a-Lago on November 22.

In a November 26 post on his social media platform Truth Social, Trump claimed that he didn’t know who Fuentes is, or that West was bringing him to the dinner. Trump said that he agreed to the dinner to give West “advice” and that West “has been very good to me,” but also called the rapper “a seriously troubled man.” West has lost various business deals, most notably with Adidas, after his various antisemitic comments.

Jewish groups denounced Trump’s dinner with West and Fuentes. Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt tweeted that it was “awful, appalling and yet entirely in character.”

The American Jewish Committee similarly tweeted, “It is outrageous that Mr. Trump met with Kanye West, one of social media’s biggest antisemites. That in and of itself is enough to send a shiver down the spine of every American. Equally alarming, far-right leader Nick Fuentes, a white supremacist, was also at the meeting.”

Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC) Founder and Dean Rabbi Marvin Hier said in a statement that Trump’s dinner with West and Fuentes was akin to meeting with “members of the Ku Klux Klan.” Rabbi Abraham Cooper, the SWC’s Associate Dean and Director of Global Social Action Agenda, also said in the statement, “It is unacceptable that a former President of the United States who has announced his candidacy for a second term would meet with anti-Semites and an avowed white nationalist. The result of this meeting is the mainstreaming of bigotry at a time of surging anti-Semitism in the United States. The SWC urges President Trump to disavow Nick Fuentes and his anti-Semitic bigotry.”

Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) National President Morton A. Klein, who gave an award to Trump earlier in the month, said in a statement: “I, who was born in a displaced persons camp in Germany, lost almost my entire family who were murdered during Hitler’s holocaust. My parents, both Holocaust survivors, Sarah of Poland and Rabbi Herman Klein of Czechoslovakia—who lost his first family to Hitler’s evil—would have demanded this statement of me and ZOA as history demands that all people of good faith denounce Jew-hatred.” The ZOA statement also called on former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton to condemn Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, “the source of much of Kanye West’s and other Jew-haters’ bile.” “President Obama must finally come clean about the infamous 2005 photo of him and vicious antisemite Farrakhan standing together smiling from ear to ear and his helping organize Farrakhan’s major march on Washington,” the statement read. “President Clinton must denounce Farrakhan, after sharing a stage with him and smilingly shaking his hand at Aretha Franklin’s funeral in 2018.” Additionally, the ZOA urged President Joe Biden to denounce members of The Squad, including Representatives Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI).

The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) said in a statement to New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman: “We strongly condemn the virulent antisemitism of Kanye West and Nick Fuentes and call on all political leaders to reject their messages of hate and refuse to meet with them.” The RJC also retweeted a tweet from David Friedman, the U.S. Ambassador to Israel during the Trump administration, stating to Trump: “Even a social visit from an antisemite like Kanye West and human scum like Nick Fuentes is unacceptable. I urge you to throw those bums out, disavow them and relegate them to the dustbin of history where they belong.”

Stop Antisemitism asked in a tweet that if one assumes that Trump didn’t know who Fuentes is, then “where is the condemnation of Fuentes” now?

Did you enjoy this article?
You'll love our roundtable.

Editor's Picks

Latest Articles

Print Issue: Got College? | Mar 29, 2024

With the alarming rise in antisemitism across many college campuses, choosing where to apply has become more complicated for Jewish high school seniors. Some are even looking at Israel.

More news and opinions than at a
Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.

More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.

More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.