MILFORD, Pa. — Second gentleman Doug Emhoff told Jewish youth that the Biden White House has “got your back” during a visit to his old summer camp Thursday as the U.S. suffers an uptick in antisemitic incidents and waning Democratic support for Israel.
Speaking to a small circle of campers, Mr. Emhoff said it is awful to see increasing reports of hate crimes against Jewish people and antisemitic rhetoric online, both domestically and abroad.
“I know it’s horrible, I know it hurts sometimes, but we got your back,” Mr. Emhoff said at Cedar Lake Camp, a summer program for Jewish children and teens in northeastern Pennsylvania, roughly 60 miles from New York City in the foothills of the Pocono Mountains. “I’m going to continue to be a leader in this fight along with President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.”
Mr. Emhoff, who is the first Jewish spouse of a president or vice president, grew up in New Jersey and attended the camp from 1975 to 1978.
He took a trip down memory lane a few weeks after Democratic leaders worked to tamp down charges that segments of their party are anti-Israel and courting antisemitism.
Several liberal House members boycotted an address to Congress by Israeli President Isaac Herzog last month, and tensions reached new heights when President Biden criticized judicial reforms pushed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his right-wing government.
Mr. Biden’s uncomfortable position was compounded by Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal calling Israel a “racist state” as she tried to calm pro-Palestinian protesters at a Chicago conference last month. The Washington state Democrat walked back the comments, but senior Democrats scrambled to distance themselves from the remark and the White House said it welcomed her apology.
Mr. Emhoff received a hero’s welcome at the campgrounds nestled in Pike County, Pennsylvania, where Republican voters outnumbered Democrats 20,758 to 14,286 as of last November.
While quite rural in places, the county seat of Milford is dotted by antique shops and serves as a getaway spot for liberal New Yorkers.
Mr. Emhoff reminisced about seeing the same friends summer after summer and learning to swim in the central lake of the camp, joking it seemed like “an ocean” when he was younger.
“This is so surreal,” he said. “I love this lake so much, I still think about it.”
The second gentleman is racking up travel miles as his wife, Vice President Kamala Harris, and Mr. Biden perform the back half of their term and gear up for a 2024 election fight.
Mr. Emhoff visited New Zealand to cheer on the U.S. national soccer team at the Women’s World Cup and, on his way back, became the highest-profile U.S. official to visit Samoa. He will head to Rhode Island on Friday to deliver remarks at a reception for one of Mr. Biden’s political-fundraising groups.
The second gentleman has made combating antisemitism, in particular, one of his key issues. He visited the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland in January to meet with Holocaust survivors and participate in a memorial service.
The Anti-Defamation League recorded 3,697 antisemitic incidents in the U.S. in 2022, a 36% increase from the 2,717 incidents it tabulated in 2021, and the highest number since the league started to track incidents in 1979.
Mr. Emhoff said Mr. Biden and his wife “really encouraged me to lean into” the fight against antisemitism, adding he wished it wasn’t necessary.
He has addressed antisemitism in a speech to the U.N. and met with global envoys to discuss ways to combat the problem.
Mr. Emhoff also took a starring role in Seder and Hanukkah celebrations at the White House and vice presidential residence.
He said the most important thing for Jewish youth to remember is, “Be yourself.”
“Chest back, chin up, and be proud of who you are. Live openly and freely and with joy as young Jewish people,” he said.
Washington’s attempts to combat the problem have devolved into political infighting at times.
GOP leaders last month held a vote condemning antisemitism and making it clear that Israel is not a “racist state” as it tried to use the Jayapal incident to make inroads with Jewish voters who’ve tended to back Democrats.
Democrats have deflected charges of antisemitism by highlighting right-wing incidents such as the 2018 mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh that killed 11 people.
The gunman, Robert Bowers, had been active on white nationalist websites and posted antisemitic theories online. A jury on Wednesday voted to give the gunman the death penalty.
Mr. Biden often points to the violent, right-wing rally in Charlottesville during the first year of President Donald Trump’s term as one of the forces that motivated him to run against Mr. Trump in 2020.
“The cross-claims about which side fuels more antisemitism misses the truth that antisemitism today hits American Jews from the right and the left,” said Pamela S. Nadell, the director of the Jewish Studies Program at American University. “Antisemitism from the right is particularly dangerous because all too often white nationalists use violence to achieve their aims. The Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in August 2017, where the protestors chanted, ‘Jews will not replace us,’ and the man who murdered eleven Jews at worship in a Pittsburgh synagogue are only two examples.”
And when the left “delegitimizes Israel, convinced that the resolution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict is the destruction of the only state for Jews in the world, it has crossed the line to antisemitism,” she said. “When it targets American Jews for supporting Israel, as occurred in May 2021 at a restaurant in Los Angeles, the left demonstrates that antisemites on the right are not the only ones using violence against Jews.”
Ms. Nadell said the political infighting matters far less than concrete actions to combat antisemitism.
In May, Mr. Biden released a plan for combating antisemitism that includes over 100 actions to increase awareness about antisemitism, improve anti-bias training in the workforce and bolster security in Jewish communities.
Yet the document sparked controversy by embracing both the working definition of antisemitism from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) — often viewed as the global standard — and saying it “welcomes and appreciates the Nexus Document,” which says treating Israel differently than other countries should not necessarily be considered antisemitic.
Sam Markstein, the national political director for the Republican Jewish Coalition, said Mr. Biden “failed to define the problem [of antisemitism] because of pressure from the anti-Israel left.”
“While Mr. Emhoff, in a non-policy role, can raise awareness, without a clear policy commitment from the White House his summer camp visit is unlikely to amount to much,” he said.
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Mr. Emhoff’s office pointed to efforts to build a real legacy on the issue, including his willingness to call out antisemitic statements by public figures like rapper Ye, who once dined with Mr. Trump.
A study by Pew Research of the 2020 presidential cycle shows Democrats maintain a distinct edge with American Jewish voters.
It found that 50% of Jews described their political views as liberal, or triple the share who said they were politically conservative (16%).
“While Jews overall are a strongly Democratic and liberal cohort, there is one segment of the Jewish population that is notably more inclined toward conservatism and the GOP,” the Pew study from 2021 said. “Three-quarters of Orthodox Jews identify with or lean toward the Republican Party, more than three times the share who identify with or lean toward the Democrats (20%).”
Mr. Markstein said the GOP is seeing progress as Democrats tussle with Israel and its conservative government. A Fox News exit poll after the midterms found 33% of American Jews who voted in the 2022 contests opted for Republicans, compared to 30% in 2020 and 24% in 2016.
A majority of Jewish voters opted for New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and Florida Democratic challenger Charlie Crist in the 2022 governor’s races in those states.
But 46% of the Jewish vote went to Republican Lee Zeldin in New York and 45% of it went to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, which were records for GOP candidates in both places, according to Mr. Markstein.
