Sen. Tom Cotton
Tom Cotton (R-AK), a Trump-aligned hard-right two-term Senator (and make-believe Army Ranger), has obsessively smeared and threatened student demonstrations and encampments in opposition to genocide in Gaza.
Cotton has slandered student protestors as “pro-Hamas,” and called the student encampments “Little Gazas” (which, for him, constitutes an insult) that are “disgusting cesspools of antisemitic hate full of pro-Hamas sympathizers, fanatics, and freaks.” About one such encampment at George Washington University, Sen. Cotton referred to the students as a “pro-terrorist mob,” and argued that the Mayor’s refusal to use police force to remove the students is “why D.C. must never become a state.”
Cotton has repeatedly misrepresented student demonstrations as threats to Jewish students despite the large number of Jewish activists involved in the protest movement. He has called for students to be detained and foreign students involved in protests to be deported. Cotton has accused students of being anti-American and stated they have no place in our country. Moreover, he has called on employers not to hire pro-Palestinian students. In one tweet, Cotton put ‘Palestinian’ in quotes, parroting the Zionist lie that there is no such thing as a Palestinian people, and smeared the liberationist chants “from the river to the sea” and “globalize the intifada” as “eliminationist slogans.”
These Little Gazas are disgusting cesspools of antisemitic hate full of pro-Hamas sympathizers, fanatics, and freaks. Just look at what’s going in these Little Gazas:
— Tom Cotton (@SenTomCotton) May 1, 2024
More alarming are Cotton’s calls for vigilante violence against civil disobedience: “I encourage people who get stuck behind the pro-Hamas mobs blocking traffic: take matters into your own hands. It’s time to put an end to this nonsense.” He has also branded activists involved in traffic blockades — a common form of civil disobedience — as criminals.
Cotton has called for the National Guard to be used against students. His excitement around deploying military violence against civilian protestors is longstanding as the senator infamously called on then-Pres. Trump to “Send In the Troops” against 2020 Black Lives Matter demonstrations.
After Oct. 7, Cotton stated that “Israel can bounce the rubble in Gaza,” channeling arch-imperialist Winston Churchill’s pronouncement on military overkill.
Sen. Marco Rubio
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is one of Israel’s biggest backers on Capitol Hill. After his first Senate election victory, riding the Tea Party wave in 2020, Rubio immediately headed to Israel. As a senator, Rubio has consistently pushed a hard line of unconditional support for Israel. In 2019, Rubio successfully led his Senate colleagues in passing the Strengthening America’s Security in the Middle East Act of 2019, which included an anti-BDS provision permitting state and local governments “to divest [their] assets from entities using boycotts, divestments, or sanctions to influence Israel’s policies.” (Rubio is not opposed to all boycotts and sanctions in support of human rights, just those that pertain to Palestinians. For example, Rubio was also the lead sponsor of the UIGHUR Act of 2019, which passed both the House and Senate and “directs the President to impose sanctions and export restrictions related to China’s treatment of the Uyghurs.”).
In response to Rubio’s opposition to the freedom to boycott, the ACLU stated, “Senator Rubio suggested that not only should states be free to boycott the boycotters, they have the right to boycott them. That’s a troubling proposition, and one specifically prohibited under the Constitution.”
Akin to Cotton, Rubio has also turned his X (formerly Twitter) account into an endless stream of defamation and slander against pro-Palestine student demonstrations. In one post, he stated that students had been “brainwashed” by professors to believe in an “ideology of some imaginary struggle between victims & oppressors,” and as such universities were now “being overrun by mobs of antisemitic zombies who think they are battling colonialism & imperialism.” (One wonders if the right-wing Rubio, who’s of Cuban heritage, would call demonstrations against the authoritarian Cuban regime a fiction pitting non-victims against non-oppressors.)
Hundreds of thousands of American students are having their safety endangered and their education disrupted by violent antisemitic leftist mobs
Where is our President?
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) May 2, 2024
In other posts, he has deployed additional epithets: “violent antisemitic leftist mobs,” “pro-Hamas antisemitic freaks,” “threatening the safety of Jewish students,” and “violent and dangerous mobs of anti-semitic terror supporting freaks.”
Rubio has been rewarded for his extreme pro-Israel stance. This election cycle, Rubio’s top contributor is Pro-Israel America ($109,800) followed by the uber-Zionist Republican Jewish Coalition ($77,736). Rubio has also received $29,375 from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and the pro-Zionist Duty Free Americas ($23,200).
A 2015 New York Times profile also underlined the political and personal financial support Rubio has received from Norman Braman, a right-wing supporter of Israel. A billionaire, Braman was a key backer of Rubio’s 2016 presidential campaign, reportedly spending $10 million as the top donor. Moreover, the Times noted, Braman “employed [Rubio’s] wife to advise the Braman family’s philanthropic foundation; helped cover the cost of Mr. Rubio’s salary as an instructor at a Miami college; and gave Mr. Rubio access to his private plane.” In 2024, Braman Enterprises has contributed $28,200 to Rubio’s political fund. Rubio’s failed presidential campaign was also backed by right-wing Zionist and investor Paul Singer.
Rep. Ritchie Torres
Israel lobby Golden Boy Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) has made quite the name for himself in pro-Israel circles as a self-styled progressive champion of Israel and Zionism. To say that Torres is obsessed with parroting Israeli propaganda would be an understatement. No member of Congress spends more time cheering on the Israeli government and attacking its critics. Despite representing the poorest Congressional district in the country, Torres’s X account often appears to devote more space to Israeli interests than his constituents’ well-being. For his efforts, Torres has been handsomely rewarded by pro-Israel donors.
Despite being in Congress for less than 3 terms (he was first elected in 2018), Torres is already one of the Top 10 recipients of Israel lobby campaign donations in CONGRESSIONAL HISTORY. His total stands at $1,571,087. His top career contributor (2019-2024) is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee at $514,002. Moreover, behind AIPAC, his top 5 all-time contributors also include the pro-Israel NorPAC ($108,940) and Elliott Management rounding out the list, the super PAC helmed by pro-Israel financier and GOP mega-donor Paul Singer. In aggregate, pro-Israel donations are second only to Wall Street in padding Torres’s campaign war chest.
Needless to say, Torres has repeatedly engaged in hate speech demonizing students. In one post, he referred to Gaza solidarity encampments as the “pro-Hamas encampment movement, which has a deep rot of Anti-Americanism and AntiSemitism at its core.”
The cancellation of in-person classes at Columbia University is an admission of failure by President Minouche Shafik, who has chosen to surrender control of Columbia to an antisemitic fringe.
If you cannot ensure the safety of your students, then you have no business serving as…
— Ritchie Torres (@RitchieTorres) April 22, 2024
Sen. John Fetterman
Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) has a novel approach to politics: He has spent the last nearly seven months mocking, trolling, and attacking his very own Democratic constituents who have objected to Fetterman’s extreme, unconditional support for Israel’s collective punishment of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. But when informed that spurned and demeaned voters may stay home in November, Fetterman loudly protests that such voters would then own a Trump victory and not the public servants who alienated them. Silly.
I fully agree with the White House—these “protests” are antisemitic, unconscionable, and dangerous.
Add some tiki torches and it’s Charlottesville for these Jewish students.
To @Columbia President Minouche Shafik: do your job or resign so Columbia can find someone who will. pic.twitter.com/azqfpWE5fx
— Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) April 22, 2024
Portlandia for Hamas pic.twitter.com/uk3evJk5gF
— Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) April 27, 2024
