The first few times that Russell Miller, a Democratic activist in the Tampa Bay area, took to social media to share incendiary content about Israel following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks, Jewish volunteers in the party felt uncomfortable seeing a fellow Democrat compare Israel to Nazi Germany, but chose not to make a public fuss about it. After all, 2024 was an election year, and they needed to focus on electing Democrats — an increasingly difficult task in Florida. 

But by the summer of 2024, Miller took to Facebook to publicly lambaste the Hillsborough County Democratic Jewish Caucus, an official branch of the Democratic Party, and urge Democrats against working with them. 

“Please do not attend future HCDJC meetings or accept support from them,” Miller wrote in July, alleging that the Jewish Caucus “is actively trying to intimidate and punish” people who discuss the “genocide” in Gaza. He accused Jewish Democrats of “petty, effete, self-serving whining and complaining” and called for the removal of the Jewish caucus’ chair. 

He created a group called “Anti-Genocide Democrats” and promoted it in correspondence with party volunteers, and described those who disagreed with his characterization of the war in Gaza as genocide as “Zionazi sympathizer[s].” 

Jewish Democrats in the county, which is one of the largest in the state, asked party leaders to take action against Miller, hoping that the matter could be resolved quietly without affecting their work to elect Democrats. Over the next few months, Miller was stripped of his titles as a volunteer coordinator and a district leader, and he was privately reprimanded. But his antisemitic postings continued.  

Through all of it, he remained a precinct captain, an elected leadership position with the Hillsborough County Democrats. 

Vanessa Lester, the local Democratic Party chair, refused to weigh in on the matter. Instead, at the urging of the Jewish Caucus and Nikki Fried, the statewide Democratic Party chair, Lester brought the matter to a vote among the party’s executive committee — who voted on Monday to let Miller remain a precinct captain. Lester did not take a stand on whether Miller’s actions crossed a line.

“The problem is that the local leadership was not loud enough in speaking out against him. The current chair of the party, Vanessa Lester, should be speaking out forcefully against antisemitism,” Steve Shaiken, president of the Hillsborough Democratic Jewish Caucus, told Jewish Insider. “She’s running a party, and there’s a guy preaching hatred … you could at least come out and say antisemitism is wrong.”

In a statement provided to JI on Wednesday, two days after the vote, Lester declined to address Miller’s postings, but she said there are still grievances pending against him. “I am committed to ensuring that hate has no home in our organization, which includes any and all antisemitism,” said Lester. Miller declined to comment. 

The vote by the leadership of the Hillsborough Democrats to allow Miller to retain his elected role puts the county party at odds with the Florida Democratic Party at a time when the organization’s political prospects are dimmer than ever, following decisive Republican victories in the Sunshine State last year. 

Miller’s role is just one of hundreds of similar positions for Democratic activists across the state. But the Hillsborough Democrats’ inability to decisively confront antisemitism within its ranks is a concerning signal for Jewish Democrats already worried about antisemitism on the left. 

“There’s no question there are outright antisemites [in the organization],” Shaiken said on Tuesday, “and there are people who know that he’s an antisemite, but they are so committed to this political position against Israel, that they’ll tolerate anything.”

Jewish Democrats’ concerns over Miller were shared by Fried, a Jewish Democrat who has led the Florida Democrats for two years. In early December, she wrote a letter to the Hillsborough Democrats’ executive committee, urging them to “strongly consider” voting for Miller’s removal. 

“Mr. Miller has engaged in an extensive and well-documented campaign to harass and malign the members and leadership of the Hillsborough County Jewish Caucus,” wrote Fried, adding that he has “repeatedly violated” the Florida Democratic Party’s “prohibition against engaging in hateful conduct.” 

“Hate has no home within the Florida Democratic Party. This is not who we are,” Fried concluded. She did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.

Shaiken wrote to Lester at the same time and asked her to schedule a vote to remove Miller. She never responded to him directly, instead sending other party officials to encourage him to consider a different course of action. “The negative aspects of bringing it forward and the hurdles and the difficulties have been repeatedly brought to my attention,” said Shaiken. The Jewish Democrats pushed forward with the vote.

The matter reached nonpartisan local Jewish communal leaders. Jonathan J. Ellis, the chair of the Tampa Jewish Community Relations Council, wrote to Lester last week to formally request that the party “take the necessary actions to renounce Mr. Miller’s antisemitic activity, antisemitic tropes and the undermining of Jewish members” within the Democratic Party.

Lester never responded to the letter. 

Jewish Caucus leaders spent the days before Monday’s meeting whipping votes. Miller apparently did, too — on the Zoom call open to the public, where the vote took place, commenters wrote that the vote was a violation of his “due process,” a claim that was outlined extensively in a letter that an attorney wrote on Miller’s behalf. 

The actual discussion took place behind closed doors in an executive session, where the party chair still declined to criticize Miller’s rhetoric. The measure to remove Miller from his precinct captain role failed, leaving Jewish Caucus members questioning their own place with the Hillsborough Democrats.  

“There are special rules for Jews. That’s what it’s all about, really,” Shaiken said. “When a minority person tells you something offends them, you shouldn’t argue with them. You should listen to them.” 

The meeting finally came to a close on Monday evening at 10:30 p.m., after nearly four hours of bureaucratic business.

“Yikes, this was my first meeting and it’s honestly no wonder we lost the election,” one attendee commented in the Zoom chat. “It’s been 2 hours and 15 minutes and nothing has been accomplished. I’m so disappointed. 🙁 Logging off.”