How The Left + Right Teamed Up to Kill the Antisemitism Awareness Act

The Horseshoe is horseshoeing

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One thing about the far left and the far right is that they will do anything to screw the Jews. And the ongoing drama with the Antisemitism Awareness Act is so wild I’m not even upset anymore – it’s just laughable.

So let’s catch up.

Back in 2024, when Biden was still President and we had a Democratic Senate, a bipartisan bill called the Antisemitism Awareness Act was passed in the Republican-led House.

The legislation would codify a Trump-era executive order declaring that antisemitism is a prohibited form of discrimination in schools and universities, and that the Department of Education should use the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA)’s working definition of antisemitism in assessing cases of antisemitic discrimination.

A few Democrats voted no because they were concerned about “free speech” (which it would not impede) and “liked another bill better,” while a few Republicans voted no because they wanted to say that “Jews killed Jesus.”

Due to a nonsensical power struggle, it never made it to the Senate floor. But leaders on both sides of the aisle promised they would make it happen in 2025. Keep holding your breath.

Recently, the bipartisan legislation was introduced again, this time in the Senate.

Should be easy peasy, right?

Well, let’s first talk about the IHRA definition of antisemitism, which is hotly contested for reasons I can only attribute to people not actually reading it.

There is nothing in the definition that says it is antisemitic to criticize Israel, its leadership, or the war. If it is, then I am antisemitic and so are you.

What it does say is that it is antisemitic to accuse Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel than to the interests of their own nations; deny the Jewish people their right to self-determination by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor; apply double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation; and hold Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.

And, guess what? Even if those things are technically considered antisemitic, they will still not be illegal to say, write, or feel. According to the Supreme Court, hate speech is still free speech.

IHRA was developed as a tool for defining hate speech. If someone yells, “you are committing genocide!” at a Jewish stranger and then punches them in the face, we can then define this as an antisemitic hate crime versus just a random act of violence. It’s really that simple.

The IHRA definition has been adopted by 43 countries, 37 U.S. states, and countless organizations, counties, and municipalities.

This interpretation would be helpful, for instance, in clearly naming the arson and attempted murder of Governor Shapiro as antisemitism, but Pennsylvania is one of the outliers that has not adopted this definition into law.

Another outlier is New Jersey.

The New Jersey “IHRA bill” is sponsored by more than half of the bipartisan New Jersey Assembly. But, due to pushback, it is stalled and will likely remain so forever.

Why is there so much pushback? Again, the belief that it would “make criticism of Israel illegal,” as I have heard many people say. This is nonsense. But, at this point, I feel like the IHRA bill has as much chance of passing in New Jersey as I have of passing the Air Force fighter pilot exam.

But back to our nation’s capital.

Ahead of the Senate committee vote this week, Senate Republicans added an amendment for Christian conservatives who want to protect those who preach that the Jews killed Jesus. Immediately, the bill went from providing bipartisan protection from both right and left-wing antisemitism into another cudgel for the nation’s oldest blood libel.

But, not to be outdone, the left swooped in the next day with amendments of their own! Running out the time limit, Democrats refused requests to waive the two-hour limit - essentially tanking the whole vote.

Bernie Sanders introduced a litany of amendments, including one stating that the legislation protects rights to distribute written material on campus or online; to carry out protests in adherence to schools’ time, place and manner restrictions; and to engage in “any speech that does not include true threats or incitement of violence, including such speech as communicated through guest speakers, materials used in a classroom or online, or classroom discussions or debates.”

Now, of course, this can be interpreted any which way. Does this give explicit permission to espouse this newly defined antisemitism? What is considered a threat or incitement?

The Act already includes language stating that it should not be construed to diminish or infringe upon any rights protected under the First Amendment.

The Antisemitism Awareness Act of 2025 explicitly includes a provision to safeguard First Amendment rights. Section 6(b) of the bill states: “Nothing in this Act shall be construed to diminish or infringe upon any right protected under the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.” This clause ensures that the Act does not limit constitutionally protected freedoms of speech, expression, or assembly. Similar language appears in earlier versions of the bill, such as the Antisemitism Awareness Act of 2023.

This was nothing but an attempt to weaken the legislation so it would not pass.

But the pièce de résistance goes to everyone’s favorite Libertarian Rand Paul.

The meeting also featured a series of speeches from Paul as he made the case that the IHRA definition’s contemporary examples would violate free speech. He argued, at various points, that it is racist to describe Israel as a Jewish state, that Jewish comedians routinely employ stereotypes about Jewish people, that comparisons between modern political figures or governments and the Nazis are mundane and not problematic, that the Department of Education would send armed police to college campuses to suppress speech and that some, if not all, Jews held responsibility for the death of Jesus.

I have no further comment on any of that.

Kenneth Martin, chairman and CEO of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and the former U.S. assistant secretary of education under two administrations, writes:

While victims are suffering from physical and emotional attacks, perpetrators are evading justice because of inaction.

If we want to help stop this wave of bigotry, we need to adopt one, universal, working definition of antisemitism — something we should have done years ago. Every state in the U.S. must adopt the same, universal definition of antisemitism.

Until we align on what antisemitism is, authorities and courts will not be able to hold perpetrators accountable. If we don’t, how can we expect to hold the real monsters accountable?

But it’s just another day, another disappointment, as forces from the far left and right handicap any attempts by moderates to protect Jewish civil liberties.