A Modest Proposal: Let Julia Salazar Take The Blame

As the great Jimmy Durante said, “Everybody wants ta get inta da act!” Brooklyn's Democratic-Socialist candidate for the Democratic Primary in New York’s18th Senatorial District Julia Salazar claims to be Jewish, but that claim doesn't seem to be Kosher.

Salazar is trying to do what Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did in June's Congressional primary, that is to use a socialist philosophy to defeat a well-established Democratic Party incumbent. In Salazar’s case the incumbent Martin Malave Dilan who has been in the State Senate since 2003.

Because of the success of Ocasio-Cortez, and the similarity of what they are trying to achieve Julia Salazar has received much press, especially from Jewish sources. On the one hand, her claim to be a Latina Jew is appealing to Jews in her district and beyond. The fact that she has been a successful professional appeals to the young voters in her district.

Allison Kaplan Sommer in the Israeli paper Ha’aretz explained that Salazar is "one of the first politicians to embody the new breed of far-left Jewish activist engaged in 'Jewish resistance' politics." This includes the endorsement of the Democratic Socialists of America’s support of the boycott, sanctions and divestment movement against Israel. Based on political trends this is popular across liberal youth of all faiths including many Jews. And while not officially supporting the BDS movement, the entire Democratic Party has been moving toward an anti-Israel position for over a decade, so she is in compliance with the entire Democratic party

So being an extreme leftist, Jewish Latina professional woman, who supports the anti-Semitic BDS movement covers all the bases for many of the Democratic Party voters in her district. There’s only one problem, while Julia Salazar claims to be Jewish, if she is really genuinely Jewish, this Yid will eat his lid.

In mid-July Ms. Salazar told The Forward, she:

“came from a unique Jewish background. She was born in Colombia, and her father was Jewish, descended from the community expelled from medieval Spain. When her family immigrated to the United States, they had little contact with the American Jewish community, struggling to establish themselves financially.”

In college, Salazar claimed to have become an advocate for criticizing Israel, opening up a J-Street chapter at Columbia University and writing for the anti-Israel website Mondoweiss.  She explained to The Forward, that her Jewish identity, “propelled her into politics.

Gee that sounds like great training for what she is today, but not so fast.

But an article in The Tablet last week exposed her real background. It explained that Salazar was actually born in Miami, neither of her parents were Jewish, was a practicing Catholic until six years ago, and used to be a pro-Israel conservative.

After seeing The Tablet piece, she admitted on her website that she was born in Miami,

“As I stated clearly in a transcribed interview with reporter Emma Whitford on May 5th, at the outset of my campaign, I made it crystal clear that I had been born in Miami. I also confirmed this fact to the JTA earlier this week, when I realized that there was ambiguity about where I’d been born.”

She may have told the truth about her birth in May but doesn’t remove the fact that she has always described herself as an immigrant, and in July she told The Forward she was an immigrant from Columbia.

In the same campaign website post, Julia Salazar doubled-down on claiming to be Jewish.

“Some have attempted to question whether I am Jewish. I have never demanded or expected that everyone recognize and accept my Jewish identity.

Well except for this?

In the State Senate race in District 18, only one candidate has the chutzpah we need in Albany: @SalazarSenate18. #JewsForJulia pic.twitter.com/zD1gWnIfES

— The Jewish Vote (@TheJewishVote) August 2, 2018

Julia Salazar continued:

My religious and spiritual life have never been a focus of my campaign for State Senate. I can only point out that the article that provoked this is clearly politically motivated, seeking to discredit my conversion and my Jewishness in a misguided attempt to attack my credibility as a progressive candidate.”

She went on to claim that the attack on her Jewishness was based on a racist view of “who is a Jew” from those who reject Jews of color, and those who claim Jewishness through patrilineal descent.

Of course, no one cares about the pigment of her skin, she is being attacked because it seems as if she is lying. The traditional Jewish view is that "Jewishness" is passed down through the mother. But even if she wants people to accept the “either parent” view of Reform Judaism, she would still have a problem, because her father wasn't Jewish either.

Per the Tablet, the evidence shows Salazar had a Christian upbringing; her father was a practicing Catholic until the day he died, and her mom is an Italian-American and a practicing Christian.

“A 2009 funeral notice for her father, a former commercial airline pilot named Luis Hernan Salazar, indicates that the service was held at the Prince of Peace Catholic Church in Ormond Beach, Florida.”

When Julia Salazar was 21 (she’s now 27), “Salazar had both the politics and religious beliefs of a conservative Christian. In a series of tweets preserved by pro-Israel activist Hen Mazzig, Salazar quotes a pastor at Apostles Church in New York in a tweet that includes the hashtag #John13, referring to a chapter in the New Testament. “A thought I plan to ruminate on this week:” she tweeted in September of 2012, “Follow #Christ for his own sake if you plan to follow Him at all,” quoting the 19th-century Anglican Bishop J.C. Ryle. One acquaintance who knew Salazar during her time as Christians United for Israel activist said that she wasn’t shy about her religious faith, dropping the occasional “praise Jesus” into casual conversation.”

She even appeared on the Glenn Beck show as a representative of Christians United For Israel.