Michael Blake, who is mounting a primary challenge to Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY), praised Joe Kent, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who resigned on Tuesday with a conspiratorial statement that lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have characterized as antisemitic.

Kent has a history of affiliations with far-right and antisemitic extremists and, on Tuesday, issued a statement announcing he would leave his post in opposition to the war in Iran, which Kent claimed Israel and pro-Israel advocates had tricked the U.S. into joining. 

Kent also, falsely, blamed Israel for the Iraq war and the U.S. operations against ISIS in Syria, and asserted in the letter that there was no immediate threat to the U.S. necessitating an operation in Iran.

“An absolutely breathtaking, courageous and bold resignation letter stating that Iran posed NO IMMINENT THREAT to us and Trump made this decision due to the Israeli government and its American Lobby,” Blake said on X on Wednesday. “This is the person who led COUNTERTERRORISM.”

Blake has made criticism of Israel and AIPAC a centerpiece of his campaign, despite himself being a onetime ally of AIPAC and vocal supporter of Israel. He also faced criticism for featuring an antisemitic activist who supported the murder of two Israeli Embassy staffers in his campaign launch video.

“Michael Blake just called a neo-Nazi-adjacent, Proud Boy-affiliated, January 6th conspiracy theorist ‘breathtaking, courageous and bold,’” Benny Stanislawski, a Torres spokesperson, said. “It should be possible to oppose the war without praising antisemites and bigots in the process.”