opinion
Mastriano Shows How Not to
Defuse an Antisemitism Controversy
BY JONATHAN S. TOBIN
A merican conservatives have gotten to the
point where they are often unmoved by eff orts
by their liberal antagonists to get them to disavow
extremists on the far-right. The existence of hateful
and dangerously extreme groups, including those
that spread antisemitism, is a problem that needs to
be confronted, however small their numbers may be.

So deep is the distrust between the two sides
in the tribal culture war that passes for political
discourse these days that they assume every such
request is merely a setup. They see no reason to
comment on people who are wholly unrelated to
them, and they also believe that no matter what
they say, their remarks will be twisted or misinter-
preted to falsely portray them as extremists by a
partisan liberal media.

There are plenty of examples of this dishonest
game being played by some in the press, not
the least being the way former President Donald
Trump’s remarks were taken out of context and
fallaciously portrayed as an endorsement of the
participants in the 2017 “Unite the Right” neo-Nazi
march in Charlottesville, Virginia, when his “very
fi ne people” line was actually not about them, but
those there to preserve certain statues. Trump still
hasn’t escaped that false narrative.

But the scandal that Doug Mastriano is dealing
with can’t be dismissed as a similar example of
liberal bias or unfair reporting. On the contrary, the
Republican Pennsylvania gubernatorial nominee,
whose ties to a brazen antisemite were recently
made public, is the author of his own troubles.

Mastriano spent 21 years in the Army before being
elected to the Pennsylvania State Senate. He is no
stranger to controversy. A hard-core conservative
and ardent Trump supporter, he believed that the
2020 presidential election results in Pennsylvania
were “rigged.” He helped organize attendance at
Trump’s Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally and was pres-
ent when some participants later broke into the
Capitol, though did not himself join in.

That’s enough for Democrats to label him an
“insurrectionist.” Interestingly, his opponent —
Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who is Jewish
— and other Democrats spent heavily on ads pro-
moting Mastriano in that primary over other more
moderate opponents. They did so because they
believe him to be the weakest GOP candidate.

In a year in which President Joe Biden’s pop-
ularity is cratering amid record infl ation and an
impending recession, it’s not entirely clear whether
that cynical tactic, which has also been employed
elsewhere by Democrats, will backfi re on them. But
18 AUGUST 4, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
in the case of Mastriano, who trails Shapiro in the
polls, they might have been right.

The issue is Mastriano’s decision to invest some
of his campaign funds in ads on Gab, a social-media
platform. Gab says it is devoted to free speech and
proclaims its willingness to host “off ensive” mes-
sages. In theory, that’s OK since, in a free country,
there should be room for all kinds of speech, includ-
ing messages that are off ensive. The willingness of
major platforms like Twitter to censor ideas or opin-
ions its liberal owners and staff don’t like is a threat
to democracy since it is, along with Facebook, for
all intents and purposes, the modern public square.

But Gab isn’t merely a site for those who are sick
of Twitter’s woke censorship. It is a place where
genuinely extremist and hateful messages from the
far-right are commonplace.

So, Mastriano’s decision to invest even a rela-
tively small sum in advertising there is troubling.

The deal he cut with Andrew Torba, its CEO, which
led to all new accounts being automatically made
followers of Mastriano’s account, reportedly also
involved some additional consulting fees.

Torba is also not merely the impresario of a plat-
form that is home to despicable hate. He’s some-
one who is himself antisemitic.

Torba went beyond the usual critique of some
Democrats, especially those in law-enforcement
positions like Shapiro, getting support from leftist
billionaire George Soros, which ought to be con-
sidered fair comment and not antisemitic. Instead,
he spoke of Mastriano as the leader of a “Christian
movement” and denounced Jewish conservatives
like Ben Shapiro and Dave Rubin. He thinks they
should be shunned because they are Jewish and
therefore undermining his goal of making America
an exclusively “Christian country.” Even after the
fi rst criticisms of his ties to Mastriano surfaced, he
said that all those who are not Christians would be
welcome, but only so long as they “repent.”
Indeed, he went even further in saying he wished
to expand this sphere of Christian dominance to
the entire planet, declaring, “Our generation of
Christians is not buying dispensational Zionist lies.”
That such a person would be regarded as an
ally by Mastriano is troubling. But so intense is the
distrust of the media and so strong is the instinct of
many on the left to ignore all accusations about ties
with extremists that Mastriano delayed for weeks
saying anything to disassociate himself from such
a bizarre and delusional personality.

It was only on July 27 after pressure and con-
demnations of his silence grew that he deleted his
Gab account and fi nally stated that Torba “doesn’t
speak for me or my campaign,” and added, “I reject
antisemitism in any form.”
Still, Mastriano’s complaints about “smears
from Democrats and the media” aren’t enough to
answer the questions that must be posed about
his decision to partner with Gab and Torba until it
became politically expedient to back away. In order
to fully defuse this controversy, he would have to
explicitly state his condemnation of Torba.

That probably won’t happen because Mastriano
is following the lamentable example of Trump, who
believes it is counterproductive to apologize for
off ensive statements because he not incorrectly
believes that it will make no diff erence to his critics.

But there is a distinction that should be pointed
out. Trump is blamed for extremism because his
opponents claim radicals are encouraged by his
contempt for the conventional pieties of public
discourse. That is largely unfair because it involves
blaming Trump for people with whom he has no
contact and who often don’t even support him. But
Mastriano’s endorsement of Torba isn’t a matter of
connecting otherwise disconnected political dots.

Antisemitism is on the rise on the political left
largely because of the way intersectional ideology
and ideas related to critical race theory are linked
to antisemitism and anti-Zionism. Those politicians
on the left who associate with or support open
Jew-haters — such as, for example, congressio-
nal “Squad” member Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) —
deserve the opprobrium directed at them. But if
Bush should be condemned for fundraising with
an anti-Zionist who said she wanted to “burn every
Israeli alive,” then the same conclusions should be
drawn about Mastriano. That’s exactly the conclu-
sion drawn by the Republican Jewish Coalition,
which condemned Mastriano for his actions.

Right-wing antisemitism is an unfortunate fact
of life that cannot be ignored. There can be no
tolerance for hate or antisemitism on either side of
our polarized political landscape. And there should
be no room for excuses, rationalizations or exam-
ples of “whataboutism” in which leftist Democrats’
misbehavior is cited, put forward on behalf of
Mastriano. It is a sorry commentary on the state of American
politics that someone who is comfortable associ-
ating with far-right wing antisemites has worked
his way into the political mainstream. But citing the
actions of bad actors on the left who are also no
longer confi ned to the fever swamps of American
discourse is not a suffi cient reason to avoid treating
Mastriano as having gone beyond the pale. JE
Jonathan S. Tobin is editor-in-chief of JNS —
Jewish News Syndicate.