Ocasio-Cortez accuses President Trump of ‘deliberate, atrocious’ anti-Semitism

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) made an astonishing claim about President Donald Trump on Saturday: that he is an anti-Semite.

The controversial freshman lawmaker claimed the president’s attacks on House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) constitute “deliberate, atrocious, targeted” anti-Semitism.

“Understand that Trump is engaged in deliberate, atrocious, targeted antisemitism towards Chairman Schiff,” Ocasio-Cortez claimed. “Then ask yourself why no one cares to denounce it – esp when his accusation of it towards others drove full news cycles earlier this year.”

Understand that Trump is engaged in deliberate, atrocious, targeted antisemitism towards Chairman Schiff.

Then ask yourself why no one cares to denounce it – esp when his accusation of it towards others drove full news cycles earlier this year. https://t.co/bjEw6eb7Md

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) October 5, 2019

“It’s wrong. It’s harmful,” she added in a separate tweet. “And his bigotry is reflective of the white supremacist base he relies on for political gain.”

Ocasio-Cortez linked her tweet to an article from the Intercept that claims Trump is engaging in anti-Semitic rhetoric amid the push by House Democrats to impeach him.

The article centers on comments in which Trump attacks House Democrats by name on social media:

To be clear: More than 200 House Democrats have signed onto an impeachment inquiry and yet the president chose to target only three of them by name, two of whom are Jewish: Adam Schiff and Jerrold Nadler, chairs of the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees. The third target was — surprise! — a woman of color, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Shamefully, he attacked all of them as “savages.”

How is such rhetoric not racist?

On October 2, Trump escalated his brazenly anti-Semitic attack on Schiff. “We don’t call him ‘Shifty Schiff’ for nothing,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office. “He’s a shifty, dishonest guy.”

The stereotype of Jews as “shifty,” the suggestion that they are sneaky and manipulative, has a long and ignominious history.

The article also claims that Trump is engaging in rhetoric that abides by a Neo-Nazi “style guide” and that “Trump’s anti-Semitism is nothing new.”

However, what the article does not point out is that Schiff and Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-Calif.) chair two of the committees — the House Intelligence Committee and the House Judiciary Committee — leading the impeachment inquiry against him.

Indeed, Trump has an extensive track-record of nicknaming his political enemies by modifying their name, so it was not surprising to see Trump mock Schiff by slightly altering his last name.

Meanwhile, Ocasio-Cortez has yet to rebuke her Democratic colleagues — Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Minn.) — for routinely engaging in anti-Semitic rhetoric this year.