New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin — the first Jewish person to hold her role — slammed a newly elected Brooklyn Democrat’s promotion of antisemitic conspiracy theories, but declined to call her commentary disqualifying.

Jewish Insider reported on Friday that Carmella Charrington, elected in Tuesday’s far-left wave to the unpaid but important party position of district leader with help from politicians in the Democratic Socialists of America, last November shared an antisemitic video endorsing industrialist Henry Ford’s infamous antisemitic pamphlet series The International Jew.

The video, which Charrington declared “the truth” and demanded become “the topic at the table,” blamed Jews for everything from gay rights to slavery and rehashed paranoid fantasies about a world-spanning plot to dominate the media, banks, controlled substances, and the education system.

“Obviously I strongly disagree with those views, and those views are deeply, deeply offensive,” Menin, a Manhattan lawmaker, told JI at an unrelated press conference at City Hall. “It’s unacceptable, it’s abhorrent, and there’s no place for that, and I’ll leave it at that.”

However, she did not answer JI’s question as to whether Charrington’s views should bar her from holding the role to which she was elected, which wields significant power over local party leadership and judicial nominations, as well as positions in the city Board of Elections. 

Charrington, who deleted the post after speaking to JI, did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this story. She initially defended her post as “facts” on Friday, and told a JI reporter to “get your rabbi,” before issuing a written apology to The New York Times and on social media, vowing to “start a dialogue with my Jewish neighbors.” 

To date, none of the officials JI has pressed have called for her to resign. This includes state Sen. Jabari Brisport and Assembly nominee Eon Huntley, both prominent DSA leaders who campaigned alongside her and helped her make the ballot, although both denounced her remarks.

Councilman Chi Ossé, another prominent DSA member who helped make Charrington’s legal battle to recover control of her family brownstone a citywide cause celebre, also condemned the content of her post without calling her out personally. Similarly, fellow district leader Mark Hanna — who served as Charrington’s election attorney and also is the treasurer of the anti-AIPAC American Priorities PAC — argued her commentary “can be a teachable moment” rather than an occasion for criticism.

Charrington has long claimed to have been a victim of deed theft, a form of fraud, and on Friday blamed some of her legal problems on Jewish investors and a Jewish judge. 

New York state Attorney General Letitia James found that her residence was sold as part of a complicated dispute over the estate of her infirm father, who the New York City Sheriff’s office took custody of in Brooklyn on Saturday and returned to Georgia, where a court had declared him a ward of the state.

An activist that two politicians from the Democratic Socialists of America helped elevate to a leadership position in the Brooklyn Democratic Party on Tuesday posted a vitriolic antisemitic screed to her Instagram last year — declaring as “the truth” a notorious work beloved by Adolf Hitler that describes a Jewish world conspiracy.

Carmella Charrington was part of an army of left-wing insurgents who captured office on Tuesday: in her case, the role of district leader in the Brooklyn Democratic Party, an unpaid but important position that elects the party’s influential chairperson and plays a significant role in nominating judges and filling jobs at the city Board of Elections. 

Although the DSA itself did not formally endorse Charrington for the post, two of its most important local figures campaigned with her and helped her make the ballot: state Sen. Jabari Brisport and state Assembly candidate Eon Huntley, who defeated an incumbent lawmaker in a closely watched race earlier this week. 

Charrington’s candidacy was part of a broader campaign to depose the present centrist leadership of the official party organization. But in November 2025, Charrington shared a video to her Instagram account — which features various photos and videos of herself at Brisport and Huntley’s joint campaign headquarters — promoting the “hidden history” in industrialist Henry Ford’s notorious 1920s series of conspiracy pamphlets, The International Jew.

“This better be the topic at the table#dad #deedtheft #ceo #love #ericadams #brooklyn #lovers #lovers #corruption #diddy #nyc ##cardio#cardib #trump,” Charrington captioned the since-deleted post, adding in the comments: “The only way to change is understanding the truth!”

The video itself is a summary and update of Ford’s century-old conspiracy theories, presented by a wellness influencer.

“You find out who owns all the social media, and then who also owns the tobacco industry, the cotton industry, the banking industry, the theater, the newspaper, the radio, and then we can clearly see who owns the government as well,” the speaker in the video says. “This is why in school things like reading the Bible, praying, celebrating Christmas, got to get rid of all that. Then it gets deeper when you find out who brought in all the liquor and all the drugs, and also made people into drunks during the Great Depression, because the same people caused the Great Depression.”

The video further asserts that Jewish people created plastic surgery to “blend in,” “brought the slaves” to America, established the gay rights movement and plotted the infamous 1921 massacre of Black residents of Tulsa, Okla. It asserts Jewish people are “always changing their names” and variously call themselves Zionists, Communists and Bolsheviks.

It then pivots to the issue that propelled Tuesday’s socialist sweep: Israel.

“It gets deeper when you talk about Palestine and the takeover of that with the Rothschilds, same people, and the whole Palestine thing connects back to the Rothschilds, who are the bankers, who then control everything, including the schools,” the speaker continues. “All the media and the newspapers and the radios are owned by a small group of people who control everything.” 

The video concludes with an image promoting the Swedish neo-Nazi film series “Europa: The Last Battle,” the conspiracy tome The Curse of Canaan: A Demonology of History, the Holocaust denial tracts of Fred Leuchter and the anti-Israel pamphlet Zionism: The Terrible Secret of the Cold War.

Reached by Jewish Insider, Charrington maintained that she was not prejudiced, but also insisted the video “was some facts.” She repeatedly told the reporter to “get your rabbi,” as she intended to hold a future “roundtable” on what she called a “bullying community.”

“There’s so much harm that your community has done to me,” she said. “It’s a problem in our community and it needs to be addressed.”

Charrington rose to prominence as part of a legal fight over possession of her family’s brownstone in the historically Black but fast-gentrifying Brooklyn neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant. She alleged in numerous media appearances that she was the victim of deed theft, a form of fraud, but New York state Attorney General Letitia James’ office determined it was a complicated but legal inheritance dispute.

In one of several phone calls with JI, Charrington railed against Jewish investors she accused of gaining access to her home and a Jewish judge who sentenced her to six days on Rikers Island for contempt of court.

Helping to promote her cause has been another leading DSA official: New York City Councilman Chi Ossé, who was arrested demonstrating outside the home in April. The incident inspired New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to create a new Office of Deed Theft Prevention.

Ossé, for his part, stressed in a phone conversation with JI that he had not endorsed Charrington for district leader and was unfamiliar with her posting history.

“We condemn this antisemitism and bigotry in the harshest possible terms,” Ossé said in a subsequent written statement to JI. “There is no room for this kind of hate in Brooklyn. I reject it completely.” 

Brisport similarly said he was unaware of Charrington’s views but repeatedly refused to answer whether he would have supported her for party office had he seen the video she shared — or if he considered such beliefs disqualifying for a person to hold power in the Democratic Party. Huntley, the nominee for Assembly, did not respond to repeated calls or emails.

However, the two DSA leaders subsequently sent a joint statement denouncing the content of the video, and harping on the right-wing elements of its message.

“The antisemitic post that Carmella shared has no place in our movement. This incident illustrates exactly what antisemitism does — it misdirects the justified anger of working people and oppressed communities away from systems of power and onto Jews,” they wrote. “We are committed to working with all constituents and fellow electeds alike to unlearn and dismantle these deeply antisemitic, anti-LGBT, and anti-communist narratives which hurt and divide our communities.”

JI also contacted Mark Hanna, a Mamdani ally and Brooklyn district leader who served as election attorney for the insurgent slate on which Charrington ran. Hanna is also the treasurer of American Priorities PAC, a committee dedicated to combatting the influence of AIPAC and uplifting anti-Israel candidates.

“Any kind of antisemitism or Islamophobia or hatred I’m not going to be supportive of,” Hanna said in an initial phone conversation.

After JI sent him the video, he wrote back that he hoped the post “can be a teachable moment.”

“I will have to speak with her about it,” he wrote. “I want to work with Carmella on issues related to deed theft and the other concerns she has in her community, and I think calling her in to learn and ensure inclusivity, rather than calling out for a repost, will be more fruitful.”

Hitler reportedly kept German translations of The International Jew in his office, where he also displayed a portrait of Ford. He praised the American industrialist in Mein Kampf, and in 1938 awarded him the Grand Cross of the Order of the German Eagle, a medal the Nazi leader created to honor foreign allies of his genocidal regime.

Nika Soon-Shiong, the publisher of Drop Site News who is also the daughter of Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, is circulating conspiracy theories seeking to tie a California-based Jewish couple behind a major pistachio processor to the recent U.S.-Israeli military strikes in Iran.

In a recent social media post that drew more than 1 million views, Soon-Shiong, citing unverified online claims that the United States and Israel had targeted pistachio warehouses in Iran this month, singled out Stewart and Lynda Resnick, the billionaire owners of the Wonderful Company, which grows and processes a large percentage of California’s pistachios as well as other products including almonds and mandarin oranges.

“The Resnick family’s Beverly Hills-based pistachio empire stands to gain,” she said of the alleged attack on Iranian pistachio warehouses. “You won’t believe the backstory,” she added, linking to the teaser for a recently released documentary she helped distribute called “The Pistachio Wars,” which seeks to implicate the Resnicks’ business interests, ties to hawkish think tanks and pro-Israel philanthropy in a shadowy effort to drive American hostility toward Iran and isolate its pistachio market.

There is little dispute that U.S. trade embargoes as well as steep tariffs on Iran — once a major pistachio producer — helped American competitors dominate the market after the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis. But the documentary has faced skepticism for overstating cherry-picked evidence to support a narrowly tailored argument suggesting that U.S. pistachio growers hold blame for American hostility toward Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

In addition to promoting the documentary on X, Soon-Shiong, a fierce critic of Israel, also pointed to the Resnicks’ contributions to what she called “Israeli military-linked groups from 2015–2022,” well before the current war began in February, while highlighting their donations to progressive causes, in keeping with their record of contributions primarily to Democrats.

She concluded by referring to their widely scrutinized use of California’s water supply, claiming they “stole” the scarce resource “in a series of secretive meetings two decades ago.”

In a separate post last year, she said the Resnicks’ pistachio business “underpins the California water crisis, the IDF and the propaganda war against Iran.”

Soon-Shiong, whose father is a biotech billionaire who took control of The Los Angeles Times in 2018, has also been outspoken in her criticism of other American companies with ties to the Jewish state. 

In the 2024 presidential election, she disclosed in a statement, refuted by the Times, that she personally intervened in order to block the paper’s endorsement of former Vice President Kamala Harris — a decision she said had been motivated by her opposition to the Biden administration’s support for Israel and “openly financing genocide” in its war with Hamas in Gaza.

Late last year, Soon-Shiong shared the stage as a speaker at the Doha Forum in Qatar with Neil Patel, the co-founder and CEO of the Tucker Carlson Network, during a panel discussion focusing on “Media Power and the Search for Truth.”

Soon-Shiong, 33, became the publisher of Drop Site News, a media startup that regularly features hostile coverage of Israel and sympathetic interviews with Hamas leadership, in September 2025, voicing admiration of its Gaza coverage.

“For media institutions that downplayed genocide, ignored apartheid and fail to cover America’s role in foreign wars,” she explained at the time, “the verdict of history will be merciless.”

Drop Site launched in July 2024 with an 8,000-word interview with two senior Hamas leaders in an article described as an “exclusive” conversation with officials from the terrorist group about “their motivations, political objectives and the human costs of their armed uprising against Israel.” Since then, the outlet has gained a reputation of credulously reporting on Hamas’ claims and repeating the group’s propaganda.
More recently, the site has faced scrutiny for publishing a Palestinian journalist in Ireland who called for violence against Israelis and an Irish pro-Israel commentator in particular, among other controversial claims.

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) in an interview on the “Pod Save America” podcast praised former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) — once a vocal Omar foe who called for the congresswoman’s deportation while they were both in the House — and far-right influencer Candace Owens over the pair’s break with President Donald Trump.

All three have faced repeated accusations of antisemitism. Owens, in particular, has become a propagator of rampant and often bizarre conspiracy theories, including becoming one of the most prominent antisemitic voices on the right. Greene and Owens have broken with Trump over his continued support for Israel and the war in Iran, among other issues.

“I think as Americans, it is really important for us to work together for the preservation of everything that is good in our country, and to support leaders that we can trust to safeguard what is good of our country,” Omar said, in response to a clip of Greene disavowing Trump on conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ podcast. “And I believe the thing that has been very fascinating, especially about Marjorie and Candace, is that they are not just coming out — like the other ones that you’d mentioned — where they’re saying, ‘This action is wrong,’ right? They’re saying, ‘I am done with you.’”

“We should give them credit for that, the fact that they’ve had this wake up call to finally seeing this con man, this corrupt, chaotic man for what he is,” Omar continued. “I think is an important thing for us to put our arms around and say, ‘Yes, and now let’s figure out, how do we save our country from the disaster that this man is creating?’”

While Omar is not the first Democrat to praise Greene or to suggest that Democrats should be partnering with her, her comments are particularly notable in light of the enmity between the two women while they served in the House together.

Greene, in 2024, sought to censure Omar for allegedly working as a foreign agent on behalf of Somalia, in what Greene described as “treasonous tendencies” in violation of Omar’s oath of office.

“I would love to have her expelled. I’d love to have her deported,” Greene said at the time. “Unfortunately, I don’t think we have the votes to do that.”

Asked about the past opposition that she faced from Greene and others, Omar brushed it off as a product of their “brainwashed” cult-like devotion to Trump and his movement.

“I’m glad, as my fellow Americans, that they understand that, that they want us to chart a new chapter in America,” Omar continued.

Omar said she had approached Greene on the House floor before Greene resigned from Congress to thank her for her advocacy against Israel and opposition to U.S. support for Israel.

Tomorrow (April 15) isn’t just Tax Day, but it’s also the deadline for candidates vying in the pivotal midterms to report their latest fundraising figures — an important marker on the political calendar in determining which candidates are raising enough money to run credible campaigns and which will be left financially behind. 

Historically, having a critical mass of prominent, well-heeled supporters was a prerequisite for a congressional candidate being able to get their message out to the public. 

Not long ago, candidates with extreme or exotic views — such as those affiliated with the Democratic Socialists of America on the left or those embracing conspiracy theories on the far right — would have a hard time being taken seriously by rank-and-file donors, who typically want a back a winner and would shy away from those with far-out-of-the-mainstream views. 

Similarly, the pro-Israel community historically benefited from the presence of strong organizations like AIPAC that helped pool supporters’ money to favored candidates, giving them outsized impact within both parties. More recently, AIPAC’s super PAC has led the way in engaging directly in political campaigns, directly spending money on behalf of favored candidates and attacking some of the most radical candidates on the ballot.

But in our brave new decentralized world of politics and media, where a critical mass of small-dollar donations from passionate individuals can easily be amassed online (especially through an incendiary video clip or well-timed fundraising appeal), the comparative advantage of having a defined group of reliable donors can be neutralized by an online feeding frenzy that galvanizes enough individuals to give to a radical cause or candidate. 

At the same time, the social media-driven public conversation — without any guardrails and few standards — has totally transformed what is viewed as normal. One recent example: 27-year-old Kat Abughazaleh, a far-left social media influencer without any roots in the Chicago-area district she was running in, raised well over $3 million for her (unsuccessful) primary campaign, fueled by high-volume, low-dollar, largely out-of-state contributions. 

If Tip O’Neill once said all politics is local, the opposite is true today. All politics is now nationalized, with the most outlandish hot takes and incendiary commentary most likely to go viral. 

The same viral clips that lead unsuspecting audiences to extreme voices like Hasan Piker and Candace Owens live in the same ecosystem that makes it easy for a candidate like Abughazaleh to bring in big money. It’s not a coincidence that former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) were among the top fundraisers within their respective parties this cycle. 

There are two different ways for Jewish and pro-Israel voices to adapt to this still-evolving revolution in both media and politics — one on the supply side and one on the demand side. 

On the demand side, it’s clear that the algorithmic preferences for leading social media platforms prioritize constant unthinking engagement (at best) and rage and radicalism (at worst). 

It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that Twitter/X’s decision to unblock neo-Nazi influencer Nick Fuentes from the platform in May 2024 quickly led to an upsurge in antisemitic content being embraced by a wide range of far-right podcasters. There are thoughtful policy proposals that have been floated to do a better job regulating what has increasingly become an anarchic space. 

Most of the focus, however, has been on how politicians and outside groups can adapt on the supply side. As Obama campaign manager David Plouffe wrote in The New York Times last week, “A successful campaign in 2026 must operate like a full-time production studio…  It means creating output tailored specifically for TikTok or Instagram or YouTube.”

Plouffe also noted that campaigns need to focus on what he called “answer engine optimization” for artificial intelligence, essentially working to ensure friendlier responses from AI bots. 

If the old media and fundraising model was to rely on scale (of donations) and volume (of ads) to persuade voters, the new media ecosystem requires nimbleness and adaptability. Raising the most money and saturating the airwaves with advertisements was once a time-tested tool of success. 

Now, campaigns and advocacy groups alike are facing a multifront challenge, figuring out whether to accommodate what appears to be a new political and media reality where the loudest and most polarizing voices prevail — or fight for a more fair-and-balanced ecosystem while also engaging with the fractured landscape as best as possible. 

Maureen Tkacik, a top editor for The American Prospect, an influential progressive magazine in Washington, has made no secret of her self-avowed hatred of Israel, particularly in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks and the ensuing war in Gaza.

“Hating Israel is everything to me,” Tkacik wrote in one social media post in February, while adding in another, “If you don’t hate Israel I strongly question your humanity.”

In recent months, however, she has increasingly entertained conspiracy theories about Israel, used antisemitic rhetoric and expressed her approval of far-right extremists stoking anti-Jewish sentiment, raising questions over her ongoing association with a periodical that had long been viewed as a paragon of modern liberalism.

The Prospect — a magazine first published in 1990 that has helped to launch the careers of Ezra Klein, Matt Yglesias, Jonathan Chait and other prominent liberal pundits — states on its website it “is devoted to promoting informed discussion on public policy from a progressive perspective,” while highlighting its efforts “to dispel myths, challenge conventional wisdom and expand the dialogue.”

But Tkacik’s online commentary has clashed with that editorial ethos, as she is drawn to conspiracy mongering about Israel and what she views as its malign influence on U.S. politics and government.

In some social media posts, for instance, she has indicated that she believes it is possible Israel was involved in the assassinations of both President John F. Kennedy and conservative activist Charlie Kirk. 

“JFK did not want Israel to develop the nuclear weapons they still refuse to acknowledge having,” she wrote last month, in response to commentary from far-right commentator Tucker Carlson tacitly suggesting that Israel was behind the killing, a conspiracy theory that has recently gained renewed currency on the far right.

Regarding Kirk, Tkacik has frequently cast doubt on the FBI’s investigation into his killing, saying “there appears to be probable cause that he was scared of being harmed by Israel in the weeks prior.”

“The evidence that he was embroiled in a serious feud with the Israel lobby is abundant,” she wrote about Kirk last week, adding, “Israel has killed for far less.”

In other posts, Tkacik has railed against “ZOG,” short for “Zionist Occupied Government,” which the American Jewish Committee and Anti-Defamation League have called a white supremacist conspiracy theory alleging that the United States is controlled by Jews. 

As she expressed her growing horror with Israel’s military operation in Gaza, Tkacik, the Prospect’s investigations editor, largely abandoned the pretense of journalistic objectivity about related matters — dismissing hostage posters as “genocidal propaganda,” calling reports of Hamas engaging in widespread sexual violence “the systemic rape lie” and labeling a Jewish New York Times reporter “a Likud asset,” among other incendiary statements.

Last week, Tkacik lashed out in response to a Jewish Insider report about a democratic socialist mayoral candidate in Washington who had privately apologized to a group of Jewish communal leaders for saying she would not attend events “promoting Zionism.”

“What is so apparently impossible about saying GO F*** YOURSELF to Nazis?” she said of the rabbis and communal leaders in a characteristically vituperative post reminiscent of social media comments in which she has smeared pro-Israel Jews as Nazis and told them they should move to Israel.

In a handful of posts, Tkacik has otherwise referred to JI as “Jewish supremacist insider” while seeking to discredit its reporting.

Tkacik has alternatingly described Israel as a “Zionist cabal that in the end may be dominated by non-Jews,” “a genocidal demon rapestate hellbent on obliterating civilized humanity,” “the literal HQ of US Homeland Security” and — in one even more extremely worded comment she has only tentatively walked back — “a brainwashed psychopathic death cult that might need to be nuked to save the human race.”

Her invocation of demonic rhetoric to denigrate Israel echoes the antisemitic conspiracy theorist Candace Owens, whose show Tkacik has said she “secretly” follows. “Candace says some ludicrous things but ‘our government is occupied by Zionists’ ain’t one of them,” Tkacik argued in a social media post last November. 

In addition to occasionally praising Owens and Carlson — who have emerged as the right’s most vicious critics of Israel — Tkacik has defended Ian Carroll, an antisemitic influencer who has pushed Holocaust revisionism while promoting conspiracy theories about Israel’s connection to Kirk’s killing and other issues.

Addressing the recent foiled terrorist attack at a synagogue in Michigan, Tkacik seemed to suggest that the congregation had played a part in inviting the violence due to its support for the Jewish state. 

“My kids went to summer camp at a reform synagogue where I was surprised to learn ‘lots of Israeli flags’ hung indoors,” she wrote last month. “It is heartbreaking to imagine kids targeted over a camp venue, but given that this is the world OUR overlords have made I don’t understand how a place of worship hangs a flag associated w genocide.”

In response a request for comment from JI on Tuesday, Tkacik said: “Every single one of these quotes has been stripped of its context, so I don’t imagine any response here will fare any better, but there is no polite or respectable or levelheaded way to engage honestly with the unrelenting indiscriminate violence Israel has perpetrated over the past two and a half years, or for that matter apartheid lobby stenographers who spend their days trying to get people fired for opposing genocide.”

Editors at the Prospect did not return requests for comment about her posts and whether they reflect the magazine’s values.

Tkacik, who goes by Moe, has long been regarded as a strong investigative journalist known for a fiercely independent streak, focusing on such diverse issues as corporate malfeasance, private equity and health care. She co-founded the feminist website Jezebel in 2007, following stints with The Wall Street Journal, Time and Philadelphia magazine. She started at the Prospect in 2023, according to her LinkedIn profile.

In her reporting on Israel-related subjects while at the magazine, Tkacik has appeared to avoid the sort of extreme rhetoric that has characterized her social media output, even as she has been highly critical of Israel — in keeping with the outlet’s approach to the Jewish state and pro-Israel advocacy groups such as AIPAC.

In a Facebook post last month, Tkacik described herself as someone who “argues with strangers on the internet about Israel,” while also acknowledging “how insane and pathologically self destructive that would seem to someone with normal hobbies.”

“It is not healthy,” she wrote elsewhere on social media last year, “to hate anything as much as every human being needs to hate Israel at this moment.”

An AI-generated Instagram account portraying an Orthodox-looking rabbi is pushing antisemitic conspiracy theories to its more than 1.4 million followers, and it’s not the only one, a study published this week about antisemitic content on the social media platform has found. 

An account called “Rabbi Goldman” “uses fake, AI-created authority figures to spread hate” in “a troubling and growing tactic,” according to the report, published on Wednesday by the Combat Antisemitism Movement.

The 12-page report, titled “Engineered Exposure: How Antisemitic Content Is Pushed and Amplified to Millions Across Instagram,” documents 100 posts that researchers described as antisemitic, pushed directly to Instagram accounts over a 96-hour period from March 19-22. 

These posts, actively suggested by the platform’s recommendation systems, generated more than 5.3 million likes and 3.8 million shares, with an estimated reach of 150 to 280 million users, according to the report. 

CAM defined antisemitic posts as ones that invoke conspiracy theories — such as Jews controlling the media or manipulating global conflicts — and posts that claim Jews, often referred to as “Zionists,” are linked to demonic forces or satanic imagery, all of which have been used to justify antisemitic violence. 

The report raises particular concern around the creation of “closed content environments,” in which users are repeatedly fed similar antisemitic themes, with little or no countervailing content. 

“This type of algorithmic clustering reaffirms dangerous beliefs, contributing to a process of radicalization that can have lethal real-world consequences,” the report states. Researchers identified 12 AI-generated “rabbis” with a combined following of 2.1 million Instagram users, all of which promote classic antisemitic stereotypes. 

The “Rabbi Goldman” account features many of these, including one video in which the “rabbi,” wearing a tuxedo and seemingly seated in a luxury airplane, claims that Jews utilize empty private jets to evade taxes. The community note attached to the clip reads, “This is an AI generated rabbi who is trying to scam you by selling a fake 9$ get rich handbook. This account is ran by scammers based in south India.”

Meta, which is the parent company of Instagram — as well as Facebook and WhatsApp — did not respond to a request for comment from Jewish Insider about the report’s findings. 

“Simply put, this is evidence of a broad systemic failure on the part of Instagram and Meta,” Sacha Roytman, the CEO of CAM, said in a statement. “When a platform actively recommends content that dehumanizes Jews to mass audiences, we are no longer talking about a simple oversight or a mistake in the algorithmic design. We are talking about infrastructure that normalizes hatred at scale that must be addressed immediately.”

“CAM is calling on Meta to go beyond basic enforcement and take real responsibility. What’s been uncovered here must be taken seriously. This isn’t a fringe problem. Rather, it points to a broader, systemic issue with global reach, shaping how millions of people encounter and engage with antisemitic ideas in 2026,” the report states. 

Last year, Meta received pushback from Jewish leaders when it introduced a new community-driven fact-checking system, ending its third-party fact-checking program and replacing it with a system modeled after the community notes feature on Elon Musk’s X.  Some Jewish leaders expressed concern that the move would “open the floodgates to content” that could target Jewish communities and individuals, and called the decision a “step back” in the fight against rising antisemitism.

Dangerous implications of social media have extended beyond the Jewish community, with a jury in Los Angeles ruling on Wednesday that Meta, as well as Google, are liable for creating addictive products that caused a teenager’s depression and anxiety. The verdict marks the first time juries have decided that tech companies are at least partially liable for distress online and offline. 

The rapid turn within the Democratic Party against Israel — especially from several of its prospective presidential candidates — is awfully reminiscent of right-wing Republicans’ growing agitation against Ukraine several years ago when the Biden administration provided support to Kyiv as it defended itself from Russian aggression.

Both situations involved an activist faction of the party out of the White House speaking out against a longtime ally, fueled by conspiracy theories and memes floating online. It was propelled by a growing isolationist vibe within both parties that the country should focus on domestic concerns instead of dealing with national security challenges abroad. And it led many politically ambitious elected officials who knew better to spout some of the most poisonous slander against close partners who are (literally) under fire from enemies. 

In our polarized political landscape, support for Israel and Ukraine are now becoming partisan issues — Republican elected officials and voters are overwhelmingly supportive of Israel, while Democrats are standing by Ukraine.  

As The Atlantic’s David Frum put it: “The two most militarily capable US allies are Ukraine and Israel. Weird to have a political system where one of the two parties despises the first, and the other is deciding it hates and resents the second. America needs and benefits from both those friendships!” 

There were plenty of senior Republican figures who withstood political pressure to vote for military funding for Ukraine despite the tough internal politics, and now Democrats are facing that same type of pressure to abandon the Jewish state for short-term political gain. 

Given that California Gov. Gavin Newsom — one of the leading Democratic presidential candidates — is now saying the U.S. should reconsider its military support for Israel, and that it’s reasonable to consider Israel as an apartheid state, it’s clear that the party is facing a moment of choosing. 

Newsom has generally been a supporter of the U.S.-Israel relationship, and governs a state with a sizable Jewish constituency. But as Israel’s support within the Democratic Party drops, many elected officials are willing to jettison their long-held views on foreign policy for short-term political expedience. Newsom’s anti-Israel turn was so extreme and so sudden that he received praise from antisemitic podcaster Tucker Carlson on his most recent show. 

If the consensus in the aftermath of the 2024 election was that the party needed to moderate and reject the left-wing activists that cost Kamala Harris the presidential election, the vibes have shifted dramatically since then. Moderate candidates like Gov. Josh Shapiro, Gov. Andy Beshear and former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel emerged as trendy presidential candidates eager to speak out against the excesses of the far left. 

Just look at all the developments since the resistance wing of the party has reasserted itself, capped by the election of an anti-Israel mayor in New York City. Graham Platner, an anti-Israel Maine Senate candidate who had a Nazi tattoo (that he later covered up when it was revealed) and has associated with antisemitic figures, is the unlikely star of the party’s leftward pivot. Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) entered the Senate as a pro-Israel moderate, and he’s now testing out tropes accusing Israel of leading the U.S. into war with Iran. 

Party leaders are treating AIPAC, which advocates for a close U.S.-Israel relationship, as a slur in primaries across the country. 

This is happening amid the rise in explicit antisemitism from the online far right, from Carlson’s routine blood libels against Jews — including an ugly slur against Chabad on his most recent show — to racist and antisemitic group chats percolating among young conservatives from New York to Florida. 

A number of leading Republican elected officials, like Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and John Cornyn (R-TX), have spoken out forcefully against rising antisemitism on the right, but far too often the response to some of the most egregious hate has been silence — even from typical allies. 

The rise of anti-Jewish hate and conspiratorial anti-Israel nuttiness isn’t trivial. As we note in these pages, there has been a 95% increase in violent online posts targeting the Jewish community since the U.S. war against Iran has begun. Chabad, which Carlson is now going after, just faced a horrifying terror attack on Hanukkah that killed 15 in Australia — and recently experienced a car ramming at its Brooklyn headquarters closer to home. 

Playing footsie with radical actors for short-term political gain or clicks — even if it feels advantageous in the moment — could carry all-too-serious consequences.

Weeks before Graham Platner promoted an antisemitic conspiracy theorist in a now-deleted social media post on Thursday, the controversial Maine Senate candidate appeared on a popular YouTube show whose host has spread specious claims about Jews and Israel.

Platner faced blowback this week for boosting a social media comment about a looming war with Iran by Stew Peters, a neo-Nazi influencer who has frequently espoused antisemitic tropes and engaged in Holocaust denial. Platner’s team said the post was made in error and “immediately” removed it after learning it elevated a “despicable account.”

In late January, however, Platner sat for a lengthy online interview with Nate Cornacchia, a retired Green Beret who has also promoted antisemitic conspiracy theories. Near the end of their hour-long conversation, Platner, a fellow military veteran, called himself “a longtime fan” of Cornacchia’s YouTube channel, “Valhalla VFT,” and said it was “an absolute pleasure being” on the show.

Cornacchia, whose show claims nearly 500,000 YouTube subscribers, has in recent months helped stoke a burgeoning far-right conspiracy theory alleging that Israel was involved in the assassination of the conservative activist Charlie Kirk. 

Two days before speaking with Platner, for instance, Cornacchia went on a podcast hosted by Jake Shields, a former mixed martial arts fighter who is now a prominent Holocaust denier, and pointed to what he described as “huge links” connecting Israel to Kirk’s killing. “The biggest one, the way I look at it, is because he was basically so important from the Zionist side to the young right wing, sort of that counter Nick Fuentes audience” that “Israel needs desperately,” he said.

“Charlie Kirk said that he was tired of being bullied by his Jewish donors” and that he “no longer could support the pro-Israel cause, and he was dead 48 hours later,” Cornacchia added on the show, where he also agreed with Shields’ assertion that President John F. Kennedy had “probably” been assassinated in a covert “venture between the CIA and Mossad,” the Israeli intelligence agency. “100%,” he replied.

In addition, Cornacchia has suggested that the global war on terror was conducted “on behest of Israel” and claimed Israel would benefit if another 9/11-style attack were carried out during the tenure of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, saying it would help to drum up Islamophobic sentiment and lead to another foreign military entanglement in the Middle East.

The Jewish state “got exactly who they wanted” in Mamdani, the city’s first Muslim mayor whom the Israeli government has accused of antisemitism, he argued on his own show in November. “That’s their candidate, guys. You got to pay attention.”

The conservative YouTube commentator has also questioned why George Soros’ son Alex was seen posing for a photograph with Mamdani on the night of his election. “You may immediately be thinking, ‘Oh, well, of course, that’s because Soros funds all the socialists,’” Cornacchia said of George, a Jewish billionaire donor to left-wing causes and a Holocaust survivor who is often a target of antisemitic attacks. 

“No, no, no, no, that’s surface level,” he told his viewers, claiming that the philanthropist “moves in coordination with our greatest ally,” a term he uses to sarcastically allude to Israel.   

Platner’s interview with Cornacchia, which he promoted on his social media channels, did not touch on such topics. His team did not respond to a request for comment on Friday about Cornacchia’s antisemitic remarks.

The 41-year-old Senate candidate, who is running in a competitive Democratic primary to challenge Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), faced skepticism from critics last fall after he denied knowing a tattoo that was on his chest for years closely mirrored a Totenkopf, the skull-and-crossbones icon adopted by an infamous Nazi SS unit. A former acquaintance of Platner who spoke with Jewish Insider said he had identified the symbol as such more than a decade ago, a claim he has denied. He had the tattoo removed last October. 

Still, even as he maintains a commanding polling advantage in the Maine Democratic primary against Gov. Janet Mills, Platner’s explanation of the tattoo — combined with past and recent online blunders — is raising questions about whether he can weather scrutiny in a general election that party leadership views as key to reclaiming the Senate majority.

Mills, for her part, strongly hinted at such doubts in a snarky X post on Friday. “For what it’s worth,” she wrote, “I don’t have any tattoos.”

And on the same day he was drawing backlash for amplifying a conspiracy theorist this week, Platner was fielding a combative call from a listener during an appearance on a podcast hosted by the comedian Tim Heidecker.

The caller cast suspicion on Platner’s claim that he did not know the tattoo represented a Nazi symbol until recently, citing his self-proclaimed knowledge of World War II history, and called on the candidate to apologize rather than “dodging around” the issue.

But Platner held firm. “I’m not going to apologize for something that I didn’t know about or do,” he insisted. “The moment that it was clear and I was putting it in that context I had it covered, because I don’t want that on my body.”

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his team refused to condemn social media posts from the co-founder of the group ‘Hot Girls for Zohran’ that boosted antisemitic and pro-Iran voices and bashed police and leading U.S. politicians.

The refusal came one day after Jewish Insider revealed Kaif Gilani — a finance professional who spearheaded a social media, merchandising and volunteer canvassing operation  supporting the mayor’s election last year — had shared conspiracy theories from a Holocaust revisionist and a video cheerleading ex-Hamas military chief and Oct. 7 mastermind Yahya Sinwar, along with posts insulting law enforcement and various political figures. 

From City Hall on Thursday, Mamdani would only stress that Gilani’s organization operated independently of his official election effort.

Asked by a reporter about his association with Gilani, Mamdani said, “This was an individual leading an outside group and was never paid for by our campaign. If New Yorkers want to know my views then they can hear it directly from me.”

When JI pressed the mayor directly whether he condemned the content of Gilani’s posts, Mamdani refused to respond and left the room, similar to how he fled questions on the matter from Politico on Wednesday. His press secretary maintained he had answered the question. 

Mamdani spokeswoman Dora Pekec acknowledged that the mayor had posed for photos with Gilani, but would not say anything about his view of the activist’s promotion of conspiracy theories of Israeli involvement in 9/11 and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, as well as the amplification of explicit pro-Iran and pro-Hamas messaging, or of posts asserting that “all cops are going to hell” and “there’s no such thing as a good cop.”

“As the mayor says, if you want to know what he thinks, you can hear it from him,” Pekec said.

The mayor also did not answer a question from another reporter of whether he knew Gilani or had given him a referral to the campaign of former City Comptroller Brad Lander, whose congressional bid Mamdani has endorsed. 

JI discovered that Gilani, through a company he formed in November, had been the highest-paid consultant to Lander’s congressional campaign — though Lander, a self-described progressive Zionist and outspoken Israel critic, insisted through a spokesperson that his team had been unaware of Gilani’s posts and terminated his contract after JI shared its findings.

The highest-paid consultant for former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander’s congressional bid is the founder of the “Hot Girls for Zohran” campaign — and a prolific X user who has shared posts lauding Hamas and insinuating Israeli involvement in 9/11 and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, all while attacking police and Democratic elected officials.

Among the 21 payments appearing in the first campaign finance filing from Lander — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s endorsed candidate against Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) — the largest is $15,000 disbursed to a company called Brain Child LLC for “Website and social media.” State corporation records reveal that the two-and-a-half-month-old firm belongs to Kaif Gilani and is based out of his triplex Brooklyn apartment.

According to his LinkedIn, Gilani serves as the vice president of the enterprise data office at Citi (the financial company did not confirm or deny this when reached for comment, but said it is “investigating the matter”). But Gilani gained attention, often using the name Kaif Kabir, during the 2025 mayoral campaign as one half of the team behind “Hot Girls for Zohran”: a viral merchandising, social media and volunteer canvassing effort backing the insurgent democratic socialist.

“Hot Girls for Zohran” also organized such high-engagement events as a Mamdani look-alike contest and a costumed Halloween bash profiled in Vanity Fair. In a photo posted to Substack, the future mayor posed with Gilani holding up one of the group’s signature T-shirts.

But amid all the fanfare, Gilani’s X account — from which he tweeted as @chunkyfila, after formerly using his own name as a handle — passed unnoticed, despite numerous extreme views he expressed or amplified on the platform. After Jewish Insider requested comment, Gilani deleted his X and LinkedIn profiles; he also set his Instagram profile, which also uses @chunkyfila as a handle and formerly linked an empty — now deleted — account for Brain Child, to private.

A representative for Lander, a self-proclaimed progressive Zionist who has been deeply critical of Israel during its war against Hamas, maintained that the campaign was unaware of the posts JI uncovered at the time it contracted with Gilani. They added that they have ended their relationship with his firm as of Tuesday in response to JI’s findings.

“We were not aware of these tweets when we hired them. As soon as we became aware, we terminated their contract. They definitely do not reflect Brad’s views,” said spokeswoman Lauren Hitt. “Brad has denounced and condemned Hamas, the October 7th attacks, and the sexual violence that they committed on after [sic] October 7th, on many occasions.”

Hitt did not answer, however, how the campaign came to hire Brain Child in the first place, or whether it would scrap any products the company created for Lander’s congressional bid.

Gilani’s social media activity includes numerous posts and retweets assailing Israel, which he has called a “settler project country.” In January 2025, just a few months before “Hot Girls for Zohran” launched, Gilani retweeted a post by Holocaust revisionist Ian Carroll — a recurring guest on Tucker Carlson’s show — in which Carroll suggested that Israel was implicated in the Kennedy assassination and the 9/11 attacks.

Giliani also retweeted a conspiratorial post from Carroll which read, “AIPAC purchased the seats of about 90% or more of our current congress. JFK famously wanted them registered as a foreign agent right before he was shot.” The post further repeated the long-debunked “dancing Israelis” conspiracy theory, which falsely claims Mossad agents had advance notice of 9/11.

The pinned post at the top of his Instagram is a photo of posters bearing the slogan “long live Palestine” and showing the entire territory of Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip swathed in a keffiyeh with no boundary lines. Last May, he shared another X user’s assertion that “‘Israel has a right to exist’ is a racist, anti-Palestinian dog whistle which implies the extermination of the Palestinian People.”

Gilani has also repeatedly authored or promoted tweets sympathetic to or supportive of Hamas, in March 2024 sharing a post claiming that the bargaining table position of the terrorist organization — which rejects Israel’s existence and which initiated the latest wave of the conflict with its rampage into Israeli territory on Oct. 7, 2023 — is “we want lasting peace and our basic human rights.” 

He also retweeted a clip of former Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by Israeli forces in October 2024 after he masterminded the previous year’s attacks, with a caption that read, “Does the world expect us to be well-behaved victims while we are getting killed? For us to be slaughtered without making a noise?” Gilani also retweeted a post that attacked stylistic differences between the Time cover honoring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is Jewish, as “Person of the Year” and the issue announcing Sinwar’s death as “A tale of two ethnicities.”

In November 2023, Gilani reacted to a tweet decrying a Hamas rocket that struck an Israeli kindergarten in Sderot by writing, “I thought this was satire for a second.” He further boosted tweets mocking or dismissing Jewish Americans’ concerns about rising antisemitism, retweeting one post stating that such fear “makes me laugh” because of how American Muslims purportedly downplay their own experience of Islamophobia, and another that sneered “really love the internet when I can watch videos of a Jewish pogrom in the West Bank where 3 Palestinians were killed and then see people on the Upper East Side tweeting about how unsafe they feel as Jews in New York after a Democratic primary election.”

He also shared multiple posts denying or downplaying well-documented incidents of antisemitic violence during November 2024 riots in Amsterdam.

In October 2024, after Iran launched more than 200 ballistic missiles and drones at Israel, he reposted a tweet, the text of which stated, “One side is cartoonishly evil in this war, and it ain’t Iran.” On June 13, 2025, when Israel severely damaged Iranian nuclear sites and military installations, Gilani tweeted about the news, saying, “May Allah protect the children of this earth. Those who have to learn about the perils of war before getting to experience the simple pleasures of this dunya.” One day later, he retweeted a post stating “Tell Iran we voting for a Muslim in NYC please let them know lmao.”

Gilani has also repeatedly signal-boosted individuals and organizations linked to the global propaganda network controlled by Beijing-based tech mogul Neville “Roy” Singham, including CODEPINK, BreakThrough News and pundit Rania Khalek, who first became famous as an apologist for Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad on Russian state-owned media.

And in July of last year, Gilani retweeted a post asserting “there is no negotiating with Israel,” which the user labeled “a racist supremacist state.” He also shared another post that called for “overwhelming military force” against Israel over its policies toward Gaza. 

He also shared multiple posts urging Mamdani not to abandon the slogan “globalize the intifada,” a phrase that has been invoked at anti-Israel demonstrations and criticized as an anti-Jewish call to violence, and which the now-mayor has distanced himself from but refused to condemn.  

That same month, he retweeted a post from a now-deleted account that denied the extensive evidence of sexual assaults conducted by Hamas during the Oct. 7 attacks, denouncing such assertions as “so obscenely racist it’s disgusting anyone remotely believed that shit.”

In a statement to JI, Gilani did not directly address the content or substance of any of his tweets. Rather, he insinuated that he was being singled out for his Muslim faith. He denied holding any animus toward Jewish people, and maintained those he knows personally hold the same views as he does. 

“My critiques of the Israeli government as it carries on a U.S.-backed slaughter are not antisemitism, they are indicative of a basic level of morality and empathy for others,” he wrote in an email. “I’m grateful for my many Jewish friends who share my opinions. Free Palestine.”

Gilani has also gone after leading Democratic politicians, including some with whom Mamdani and Lander would need to work to achieve their policy aims. 

In 2020, Gilani referred to then-candidate Joe Biden as “a pedophile with dementia,” while in 2024 he quote-tweeted the then-president with the message: “My prayer is that your heart stops beating.” He has also asserted that Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) “is going to hell.” He also urged a primary campaign against House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), writing to City Councilman Chi Osse: “Let’s get his ass.” Mamdani reportedly discouraged Osse from running against Jeffries, and intervened to block an endorsement of his candidacy from the Democratic Socialists of America.

Gilani has also lashed out at City Councilwoman Inna Vernikov, a Jewish Republican representing parts of Brooklyn. In May 2024, Gilani tweeted at the lawmaker, “You’re a f*cking idiot and your face resembles that of a horse.” 

He has also attacked Mamdani’s close ally Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), tweeting at him “u a f*cking b*tch fr.”

Gilani has vented strong anti-police sentiments, having written that “all cops are going to hell,” as well as “there’s no such thing as a good cop” and “we literally do not give a f*ck about videos of cops or military on their knees. we won’t be satisfied until the entire racist system is on its knees.” He has also tweeted “f*ck the police” on at least two occasions. 

As the NYPD cleared the anti-Israel encampments at Columbia University on May 1, 2024, Gilani retweeted a post which stated, “Cops are violent psychopaths who pray for a moment like this where they get to live out their rotten fantasies of beating and killing protestors,” and added, “Reform isn’t real.” Additionally, Gilani shared a statement from activists at Emory University that labeled police “pigs.”

Besides his political and religious musings, Gilani’s feed consists largely of references to sports gambling, cryptocurrencies and lewd jokes.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who entered office in 2021 with a record of espousing antisemitic conspiracy theories and emerged since Oct. 7, 2023, as one of the most vocal opponents of Israel in the House Republican conference, announced on Friday that she will resign her seat, effective Jan. 5, 2026.

Greene’s announcement comes a week after President Donald Trump disavowed her, calling her a “traitor” and indicating that he would endorse a primary challenger, if a viable one emerged.

The Georgia congresswoman rose to political prominence due to her long history of promoting various antisemitic and otherwise fringe conspiracy theories. Greene was elected in spite of efforts from fellow Republicans to defeat her after she won the GOP primary in her district in 2020. She continued to face accusations of antisemitism during her time in office and repeatedly invoked a range of antisemitic tropes.

Though she initially cast herself as a supporter of Israel, she more recently flipped on the issue, now condemning the Jewish state, accusing it of genocide in Gaza and repeatedly attempting to pass measures to cut off all U.S. aid.

In her farewell message, Greene repeatedly railed against U.S. foreign engagement and “foreign interests.”

“Americans’ hard earned tax dollars always fund foreign wars, foreign aid, and foreign interests,” Greene said in a lengthy resignation letter. “America First should mean America First and only Americans First, with no other foreign country ever being attached to America First in our halls of government,” Greene said.

Jewish Republicans have long opposed the congresswoman, and the Republican Jewish Coalition repeatedly backed challengers to her. The RJC responded mockingly to her announcement with a gif of Trump waving, with the caption, “And we say bye bye.”

The controversial Georgia congresswoman spent much of her first term in office in the political wilderness, sidelined by her own party and expelled from her committee assignments by bipartisan House votes led by Democrats.

But she later emerged as a key ally of Trump in the House after Republicans retook the chamber in the 2022 midterms, and also became a close ally of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA).

Greene’s influence waned, however, after McCarthy was booted from the speakership in 2023, and she has more frequently been relegated to the sidelines as a hard-right opponent of the House Republican leadership’s agenda. She contemplated a run for Senate or governor in Georgia, but Republican leaders declined to back those efforts.

In recent months, she has grown increasingly critical of key elements of the Republican and Trump agendas, including his support for Israel and attack on Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025.

Following Trump’s break with Greene last week, she implied that Israel and pro-Israel interests had pressured him into disowning her.

In her resignation letter, Greene was defiant, insisting that she could beat back any primary challenger but saying that she did not want to put herself, her family and her district through such a challenge.

“I have too much self respect and dignity, love my family way too much, and do not want my sweet district to have to endure a hurtful and hateful primary against me by the President we all fought for, only to fight and win my election while Republicans will likely lose the midterms,” Greene said. “And in turn, be expected to defend the President against impeachment after he hatefully dumped tens of millions of dollars against me and tried to destroy me.”

She said that she is being cast aside by “MAGA Inc” to be replaced by “Neocons, Big Pharma, Big Tech, Military Industrial War Complex, foreign leaders, and the elite donor class.”

But she also teased plans for a political comeback. Greene has been rumored to have aspirations for a presidential run in 2028, something she has denied.

“When the common American people finally realize and understand that the Political Industrial Complex of both parties is ripping this country apart, that not one elected leader like me is able to stop Washington’s machine from gradually destroying our country, and instead the reality is that they, common Americans, The People, possess the real power over Washington, then I’ll be here by their side to rebuild it,” Greene said.

Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL), one of the few Jewish Republicans in the House, said on X, “One antisemite down. One to go.”

President Donald Trump on Friday night publicly disavowed Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), once one of the president’s closest and most committed allies on Capitol Hill, saying he was withdrawing his endorsement of Greene and is prepared to support a primary challenger to the far-right Georgia congresswoman.

Greene, long dogged by controversy for her record of promoting antisemitic and otherwise fringe conspiracy theories, has emerged as one of the most vocal opponents of Israel on the right, accusing the country of genocide and leading efforts attempting to cut off U.S. aid to the Jewish state.

She has also repeatedly publicly criticized Trump’s policies and Republican leadership on Capitol Hill since the start of the government shutdown, earning Trump’s ire. Her breaks with the GOP have made her into a budding star in liberal media circles, where her ongoing promotion of conspiracy theories has increasingly been overlooked.

Trump said on his Truth Social platform that he has heard that “wonderful, Conservative people are thinking about primarying Marjorie” and that “if the right person runs, they will have my Complete and Unyielding Support,” accusing her of having “gone Far Left.”

Greene’s district is among the most heavily Republican in the country, and losing Trump’s support could prove a significant blow to the congresswoman.

“All I see ‘Wacky’ Marjorie do is COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN!” Trump wrote, adding that Greene’s criticism began after he showed her statewide polling that placed her at just 12% support and discouraged her from running for Senate or governor, both positions Greene had been eyeing.

According to NOTUS, Greene is discussing a presidential run in 2028, though she denied that to the publication.

“[Greene] has told many people that she is upset that I don’t return her phone calls anymore, but with 219 Congressmen/women, 53 U.S. Senators, 24 Cabinet Members, almost 200 Counties, and an otherwise normal life to lead, I can’t take a ranting Lunatic’s call every day,” Trump continued in his post.

He later called Greene a “Traitor” and a “disgrace to our GREAT REPUBLICAN PARTY!”

Greene responded on X, saying Trump had lied to her and claiming that two recent text messages about files related to child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein had “sent him over the edge,” saying it is “astonishing really how hard he’s fighting to stop the Epstein files from coming out.”

Greene is one of a small number of Republicans cosponsoring a measure to force a vote, over Republicans’ objections on files related to Epstein. Trump, an associate of Epstein, has sought to prevent the full release of those files, calling the push for further disclosure “the Epstein hoax.”

“Most Americans wish he would fight this hard to help the forgotten men and women of America who are fed up with foreign wars and foreign causes, are going broke trying to feed their families, and are losing hope of ever achieving the American dream,” Greene said. “I have supported President Trump with too much of my precious time, too much of my own money, and fought harder for him even when almost all other Republicans turned their back and denounced him. But I don’t worship or serve Donald Trump.”

In a subsequent post, Greene shared a graphic showing she has not received support from pro-Israel groups alongside another graphic comparing her “Liberty Score” to that of Trump-backed pro-Israel Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC). In the post, she wrote: “This and the Epstein files is why I’m being attacked by President Trump. It really makes you wonder what is in those files and who and what country is putting so much pressure on him?”

She also claimed that Trump’s posts are driving a wave of security threats against her.

Trump has also worked to defeat Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), another of the most vocal anti-Israel Republicans The president has endorsed retired Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein, who is challenging Massie in the GOP primary. 

On Friday, Trump called Massie a “LOSER!” in a separate Truth Social post, claiming that “the Polls have him at less than an 8% chance of winning the Election” and mocked his recent remarriage.

So much of the conversation about the rise of right-wing antisemitism has been focused on the supply side of the equation — the growing number of online commentators and podcasters, led by Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens, who are mainlining anti-Jewish tropes, conspiracy theories and Holocaust revisionism to their sizable audiences.

Less scrutinized is the demand-side part of the equation: Why are so many people in the independent podcasting ecosystem mimicking the same antisemitic arguments and hosting the same extremist guests? Is there really a significant audience for this nonsense?  

On paper, there’s no constituency for this type of extremism. As an example: Carlson’s public sympathizing towards Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, for instance, is about as politically toxic as you can get with the American public. A recent NBC News poll found just 3% of Americans view Putin favorably, while a whopping 84% view him negatively. 

But in the world of social media, a small but passionate audience of superfans — even if they’re extremists — can be more lucrative than a much broader audience of mainstream news consumers. The problem is that the perception of influence, fueled by these social media platforms, can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

We saw this pattern play out on the left in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election, when politically toxic views about policing, immigration, race and gender identity received outsized attention on Twitter, were enforced by a small number of online influencers and quickly became conventional wisdom in institutional liberal circles. The shift was so profound that most of the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates embraced left-wing positions that they later ended up regretting.

With Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter (now X), the platform’s algorithm now incentivizes far-right discourse, creating a marketplace for bigoted and antisemitic influencers. It’s what’s creating a demand for the conspiratorial content of Carlson, Owens and others, and it also explains why more-mainstream figures in the “independent” media space, like Megyn Kelly, are increasingly flirting with these extremist narratives.

“It’s not lost on me that there was a great celebration on the right when Elon Musk bought Twitter — and now it looks like one of the worst things for the right in a long time. The algorithms on X really promote the worst excesses of the post-liberal right,” said one former official at a conservative policy institution granted anonymity to discuss concerns. “Tucker and Megyn are in the business of monetizing the algorithm more than building an audience.”

For all the ideas being floated around on how to fight back against the surge of antisemitism, it’s telling that very few conservatives are focused on an obvious source of the hate — the lack of guardrails on social media, especially from X. It’s not a coincidence that the acceleration of some of the most virulent antisemitism on the right occurred after Musk unblocked Nick Fuentes, a neo-Nazi influencer, in May 2024. (Fuentes remains blocked on other major social media services, including Meta and YouTube.)

The First Amendment protects anyone’s freedom to say whatever they want, no matter how odious. It doesn’t guarantee anyone to have their extreme views amplified on private platforms to the point where our public discourse now resembles a modern-day Tower of Babel story.

As a result of the excesses of left-wing ideology on social media in the last decade, the conservative rallying cry was to rail against any curation or regulation on these social platforms as censorship. We’re now seeing where that zero-sum game way of thinking leads. 

It’s muted those mainstream voices alarmed by what’s happening on social media from even suggesting that, at the very least, our tech titans have a responsibility to prevent hate and extremism from distorting the body politic — before it’s too late.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) first became a household name for her embrace of a range of wild conspiracy theories — including antisemitic claims about the Rothschild family like the idea that space-based weapons controlled by the Jewish banking family were the cause of California wildfires.

But as the congresswoman has emerged as an unlikely star in liberal circles and mainstream media after breaking with her party on the government shutdown, health care funding and the Jeffrey Epstein files, her erstwhile critics have all but ignored her increasingly frequent use of antisemitic tropes and embrace of conspiracy theories targeting Jews.

Earlier this week, the controversial Georgia congresswoman vowed on X, “No bar codes on me. I’ll never take 30 shekels. I’m America only! And Christ is King!”

Her rejection of “30 shekels” appears to be a reference to the pieces of silver paid to Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus, and the currency of Israel. Greene’s mention of “bar codes” refers to claims by former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) about AIPAC fundraising events, which AIPAC has denied.

She has also repeatedly boosted claims that Israel and Jewish people were involved in last month’s killing of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and are seeking to co-opt his organization.

“Do not allow a foreign country, foreign agents, and another religion tell you about Charlie Kirk,” Greene said on X. “And I hope a foreign country and foreign agents and another religion does not take over Christian Patriotic Turning Point USA.”

Last week, Greene reposted an X post by Holocaust denier Evan Kilgore, in which Kilgore shared a video of Candace Owens — a primary propagator of Israel-related conspiracy theories about Kirk’s death — claiming that Kirk had announced prior to his death that he was abandoning his support for Israel.

And she lauded a eulogy delivered by far-right commentator Tucker Carlson at Kirk’s funeral, in which Carlson compared Kirk’s killing to the death of Jesus.

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that no matter which party is in charge, the secular government of Israel always gets its way,” Greene wrote on X.

Greene has been one of the few Republican lawmakers to attack AIPAC and other pro-Israel advocacy groups, accusing them of exercising malign influence over the U.S. government and demanding they register as foreign agents. AIPAC is funded and led by American citizens, not the Israeli government.

She has accused Israel of “meddling in campaigns and elections” and of “meddling in government policy — government of the United States policy — as well as dictating what America does in foreign wars.”

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that no matter which party is in charge, the secular government of Israel always gets its way,” Greene added on X.

Regarding the war in Gaza, Greene has employed language sometimes indistinguishable from that of far-left Israel opponents, accusing Israel of committing genocide and of deliberately killing innocent people and children, particularly Christians. She led an effort in the House to cut off U.S. missile defense aid to Israel, which failed overwhelmingly.

She also shared posts suggesting that Israel had foreknowledge of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks and chose to delay its response, and claimed that “Most of America has Israel fatigue” because politicians ignore domestic problems in order to “talk about Israel all day” and that a GOP colleague is “fighting for his life to maintain his pro Israel money.”

“I am not suicidal and one of the happiest healthiest people you will meet. I have full faith in God and Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. As a sinner, I am only saved through His grace and mercy,” Greene said. “With that said, if something happens to me, I ask you all to find out which foreign government or powerful people would take heinous actions to stop the information from coming out.”

Greene described the Anti-Defamation League as a “dangerous hate group that targets Christians,” praising the FBI for recently cutting ties with the group.

Amid her escalating social media campaign against the pro-Israel world and her advocacy for the release of files related to the Epstein investigation, Greene suggested last month on X that a foreign government or other powerful individuals were planning to assassinate her.

“I am not suicidal and one of the happiest healthiest people you will meet. I have full faith in God and Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. As a sinner, I am only saved through His grace and mercy,” Greene said. “With that said, if something happens to me, I ask you all to find out which foreign government or powerful people would take heinous actions to stop the information from coming out.”

The post was widely interpreted — including by at least one fellow lawmaker — as a suggestion that Israel or Jewish people were targeting Greene.

“Why do crazy people keep thinking ‘the Jews’ are trying to kill them?” Rep. Ted Cruz (R-TX) replied.

Greene has also claimed Israel is operating a social media campaign targeting her.

Outside of Israel policy and the Jewish community, Greene has also continued to lean into other conspiracy theories, such as posting in August that it is “oddly consistent and strange” that several mass shooters have authored manifestos, asking, “who tells them to do that?” In the past, she has repeatedly spread conspiracy theories about mass shootings, speculating that demonic possession or military mind control may be responsible for school shootings.

Last month, she also shared a Carlson documentary claiming the truth of the 9/11 attacks had been covered up and convened a congressional hearing on weather modification that heavily featured conspiracy theories and false and misleading claims.

“The RJC has endorsed multiple GOP primary challengers to Marjorie Taylor Greene. She is out of step with the Republican Party, and with President Trump. The people of Georgia deserve better — and we are determined to do what we can to retire her,” RJC CEO Matt Brooks said.

“While the president and congressional Republicans back our ally, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene is aligned with Reps. Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to demonize Israel and weaken a partnership that makes America safer, strong and more prosperous,” AIPAC spokesperson Marshall Wittmann told Jewish Insider. “Our 5 million members will not be deterred by her rancid anti-Israel and unhinged raving.”

The Republican Jewish Coalition, which has repeatedly opposed Greene, said it continues to support efforts to defeat her.

“The RJC has endorsed multiple GOP primary challengers to Marjorie Taylor Greene. She is out of step with the Republican Party, and with President Trump. The people of Georgia deserve better — and we are determined to do what we can to retire her,” RJC CEO Matt Brooks said.

Greene did not respond to a request for comment.

Greene has recently been a thorn in the side of GOP leadership for a number of reasons, including criticizing the party’s approach to a health care tax credit central to the current government shutdown, critiquing the Trump administration’s mass deportation strategy and Middle East policy, backing an effort to force a House vote on the release of documents related to the Epstein investigation, accusing the party of blocking women from leadership roles and voting against other elements of the House Republican leadership’s agenda.

Her disputes with the Trump administration could create an opportunity for a Republican primary challenger to make a run against her — though Trump hasn’t personally spoken out against Greene as he has against Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), another anti-Israel House GOP colleague, and Greene has continued to profess her loyalty to Trump and his movement.

She does not yet face any serious primary competition.

Greene previously accumulated influence in the House as a close ally of Trump and former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) but has found herself increasingly sidelined. National Republican Party leaders did not back her as she considered a run for Georgia’s Senate seat against Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) or the state’s governorship.

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) distanced himself from antisemitic influencer Ian Carroll after the congressman posted to social media an excerpt from a YouTube documentary that featured separate clips of himself and Carroll.

Carroll, described in the documentary as a researcher, is an antisemitic conspiracy theorist who has engaged in Holocaust distortion. He has claimed that Israel and Jewish people are involved in a malign global conspiracy, control the U.S. government and were responsible for the 9/11 attacks. He has also asserted that pedophile and financier Jeffrey Epstein was a “clearly a Jewish organization working on behalf of Israel and other groups.”

In the excerpt shared by Khanna alongside his own comments, Carroll stated that recipients of pro-Israel support are “operat[ing] our government on behalf of someone else,” referring to AIPAC and Israel. Khanna himself discussed his concerns about interest group spending in U.S. elections.

“This was a documentary made by Tommy G who interviewed me. I did not speak to or meet Ian Carroll. I stand by my words and should be judged by them,” Khanna said in a statement to Jewish Insider. “I vehemently disagree and reject any views blaming Israel for 9/11, denying the Holocaust, or conspiracies about a Jewish syndicate exerting control.”

In the documentary, Khanna described the U.S. as “complicit” in the destruction in Gaza and stated that Israel has committed war crimes in the enclave and that the International Court of Justice should examine and adjudicate the issue.

“The Hamas terrorist attack was awful, and I said that people who committed those crimes had to be brought to justice and the hostages had to be released,” Khanna said. “But that happened months in. Netanyahu has been bombing for 2 years.”

“Who says, ‘We’re going to starve the people so much that they suffer that we’re going to force the surrender?’ It’s sick, and your tax dollars, my tax dollars, are funding them,” Khanna added.

The documentary itself, posted by a YouTube videomaker with the handle Tommy G, is filled with antisemitic tropes. The thumbnail for the video frames Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a puppetmaster with strings controlling several men in suits, posed in front of the White House, flanked by Israeli and AIPAC flags. There are also several dollar bills superimposed over the image.

The documentary highlights anti-Israel arguments — including some conspiracy theories — and repeatedly brushes off or attempts to rebut arguments from pro-Israel voices featured in it. Anti-Israel voices receive the majority of the screen time in the video.

The narrator, Tommy G, opens the documentary by highlighting claims of a coverup or Israeli foreknowledge of the Oct. 7 attack, and plays up alleged Israeli abuses in Gaza.

While condemning Hamas’ actions, he suggests that the terrorist group’s actions could be seen as reasonable or provoked by Israel’s own actions, framing the group — as well as the Taliban in Afghanistan — as “freedom fighters” and “resistance movements.”

Tommy G also makes passing mention of — and does not interrogate — baseless claims that Israel may have been involved in the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

The documentarian describes Carroll as “one of the internet’s top conspiracy analysts,” who critics “label an antisemite … but to others he is a fearless journalist that speaks on what some perceive as an extremely strong Zionist pressure on our government.”

He also suggests that it is inherently suspicious that many lawmakers have traveled to Israel.

And he concludes the documentary by stating, “A lot of us feel deep in our gut something is off here, something is wrong here and I will not be intimidated into not asking questions.”

Carroll himself suggests in the documentary a connection between the pro-Israel cause and the John F. Kennedy assassination, that Israel had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attack and that Israel dispatched Jeffrey Epstein to cultivate relationships with U.S. leaders and blackmail them.

Another anti-Israel voice in the documentary is Anthony Aguilar, a former Gaza Humanitarian Foundation contractor whose key claim of Israeli and GHF abuses has been disproven.

Aguilar states in the documentary that American politicians aren’t allowed to talk about Israel and that shows “who controls you.”

Other featured guests include Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Reps. Nancy Mace (R-SC) and Hank Johnson (R-GA), as well as Code Pink leader Medea Benjamin, an IDF reservist and a U.S. doctor who volunteered in Gaza. 

Mace, Johnson and the IDF reservist all spoke in defense of Israel. 

The video includes a clip of Norman Finkelstein, an antisemitic scholar who has voiced support for Hezbollah and accused Jews of exploiting the Holocaust.

In the documentary, Paul suggests, falsely, that the U.S. has created “easier” rules around lobbying disclosures for countries the U.S. considers to be allies and that many pro-Israel activists are dual-citizens, part of a segment of the documentary that attempts to interrogate why AIPAC is not registered as a foreign lobbying group.

The group’s members and leaders are American citizens who act on their own recognizance, rather than at the instruction of the Israeli government.

Khanna, pushing back on the narrative framing AIPAC supporters as foreign agents, states in the documentary, “They’re American citizens. If you’re an American citizen and you’re articulating a point of view, that’s your right. … They’re American citizens. They’re lobbying for their interests. They’re lobbying for the Netanyahu government’s interests because they think that’s what benefits America. And they’re paying millions of dollars, which under Citizens United is legal.”

Khanna argues in the documentary that spending from outside super PACs on behalf of favored candidates should be outlawed.

The California congressman, rumored as a potential 2028 presidential candidate, has also recently faced scrutiny for his appearance at ArabCon, where other speakers defended Hamas and laughed off the idea of condemning its Oct. 7 attacks.

Kingsley Wilson, a deputy press secretary at the Department of Defense who has come under fire from Democratic and Republican lawmakers and Jewish communal organizations for promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories, has been promoted to serve as the department’s press secretary, the Pentagon announced on Friday. 

“Kingsley’s leadership has been integral to the DoD’s success & we look forward to her continued service to President [Donald] Trump,” Sean Parnell, the chief Pentagon spokesman and a senior advisor to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, posted on X on Friday. 

When Wilson was named deputy press secretary in March, she faced widespread condemnation for dozens of tweets viewed as antisemitic and racist. On two different occasions, she attacked the Anti-Defamation League for sharing its origin story — the organization was founded after the lynching of Leo Frank, an Atlanta Jew widely believed to have been wrongly convicted of raping and murdering a white child over a century ago. 

“Leo Frank raped and murdered a 13-year-old girl,” Wilson wrote in 2023 in response to a post from the ADL, and repeated the claim a year later. “He also tried to frame a black man for his crime. The ADL is despicable.” (The tweet has not been deleted.) 

Wilson has also called Confederate General Robert E. Lee “one of the greatest Americans to ever live” and regularly promoted the antisemitic “Great Replacement Theory.” 

Her appointment in March drew bipartisan criticism. “Obviously I don’t agree with her comments. I trust the Pentagon will address this,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) told Jewish Insider at the time. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called for her firing. 

Spokespeople for the Pentagon and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Friday.