Asked about Antisemitism, Karine Jean-Pierre Talks about Hate Crimes against Muslims Instead

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Monday was asked about rising antisemitism, and her response was to talk about “disproportionate” hate crimes against Muslims.

Here is a clip from a remarkable exchange during today’s press briefing. Asked the president’s “level of concern right now about a potential rise in antisemitism,” Jean-Pierre first discussed how there was no credible specific threat, but then pivoted to discussing Islamophobia, noting that “Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim have endured a disproportionate number of hate-fueled attacks.” (If you don’t want to just rely on the RNC clip below, C-Span has the entire press briefing, with the relevant portion at around the 45-minute mark.)

Just over two weeks removed from the worst attack on Jews since the Holocaust, with antisemitic incidents on the rise on college campuses and U.S. cities, with synagogues and Jewish schools closing in response to terrorist threats, that the White House has to deflect questions about antisemitism by focusing on threats to Muslims is simply sick.

And it isn’t even a one-off. Earlier today, I had observed that when mentioning antisemitism, Biden had to explicitly mention Islamophobia, but he does not mention the threat to Jews when calling out Islamophobia.

It is also worth noting, regarding Jean-Pierre’s statement about disproportionate attacks on Muslims, actual statistical evidence. While it’s true that Muslims, who make up about 1 percent of the population, were the victims of about 10 percent of anti-religious hate crimes in 2021, per FBI data, Jews, who are about 2 percent of the population, are the victims of 51 percent of such crimes.

When, in response to the Black Lives Matter movement, anybody attempted to assert that “all lives matter,” they were shouted down as racist. The argument was that doing so downplayed the unique threat of racism to black Americans and hijacked the conversation at a time when the national attention was turning to a focus on racism in the criminal-justice system.

By trying to turn the October 7 massacre — in which Jews were targeted specifically for being Jewish — into a universal lesson about hate and the need to combat Islamophobia, the Biden administration is downplaying the threat of antisemitism and making American Jews less safe.