Key Takeaways:
- Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel is skipping her own party’s nominating convention, citing fear of antisemitic harassment from fellow party officials.
- The Michigan Democratic Party’s response deflected the issue (invoking Islamophobia instead of addressing Nessel’s safety) and major outlets — NYT, WaPo, WSJ, CNN, Politico — have largely ignored the story.
- This reflects an ongoing double standard where antisemitism draws far less media and institutional accountability than bigotry against other groups.
A few weeks ago, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced that she would skip the Michigan Democratic Party’s nominating convention later this month. Her reason is extraordinary – she is afraid to attend because she is a Jew.
Specifically, she said “I feel like my presence isn’t going to be welcome. I don’t want to get chased around. I don’t want to get harassed. I don’t want to get yelled and screamed at. I don’t want to get booed off the stage, irrespective of what I’m saying. And I believe that if I go, that is what will happen because it’s been happening to me.”
To put this in perspective, this is the highest law enforcement officer in the state of Michigan, afraid to attend the nominating convention of her own party because she is afraid of being targeted with antisemitic hate. Read that line a second time and let it sink in. In 2026, a statewide elected official is afraid to attend a party event, not because of a mob of protesters outside or because she holds views outside the mainstream. She’s afraid because convention delegates and party leaders, those inside the hall itself, will not accept her simply because she is a Jew.
This is disturbing on countless levels, but let’s focus on just two. The response of the Michigan Democratic Party, and the response of the media.
The Michigan Democratic Party’s Response
Derrick Honeyman, a spokesperson for the Michigan Democratic Party, responded that they are committed to “ensuring party-hosted events are safe and secure environments for all attendees. We reject antisemitism, Islamophobia, and all forms of hateful conduct.”
Where is any reassurance to AG Nessel that she herself will be protected, and where exactly did Islamophobia come from? This is a Jewish elected official, one of the most senior members of the party, expressing fear in being around other party leaders and delegates because she is Jewish, and somehow the party felt the need to include Islamophobia in a statement about antisemitism.
If Islamophobia were a problem in the Michigan Democratic Party, prominent Michigan Muslims like Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib and U.S. Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed would be skipping the convention out of fear of harassment, not Attorney General Nessel. If either Tlaib or El-Sayed have expressed any such concerns, they have not been made public. However, they do tend to focus far more energy on demonizing Jews and the Jewish state, and thus creating an environment of fear for Jews in the party, than expressing concern about any Islamophobia in the party.
The weak response from the Michigan Democratic Party was bad enough, but the problem is far broader than the statement or actions of a single state party.
The Media’s Response
An Attorney General being fearful of attending a party event, of any party of any state, because of fear of racist harassment should be one of the largest political and societal stories in the United States. Sadly, it has largely been ignored by some of the largest news outlets in the country.
The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, CNN, Politico. None of them has run a story featuring this topic.
Why?
We can only imagine the outrage if, while Mayor, Pete Buttigieg had feared being chased through a Democratic Party event in Indiana because he’s gay, or if then Senators Obama or Rubio were afraid to attend the Illinois Democratic or Florida Republican conventions because they would have been booed off the stage or screamed at for no reason other than being black and Latino, or if Mayor Mamdani feared harassment at the New York State Democratic Convention just because he’s Muslim.
We can only imagine because these things would never happen in 2026. If they did, they would trigger a tsunami of righteous rage in every newsroom in the country, guaranteeing the story would receive front page, above-the-fold coverage in every major newspaper and dominate the home pages of CNN, Politico, The Hill, etc. for days.
Why are Jews treated differently than every other minority group today? It is easy, and lazy, to blame Israel. But Attorney General Nessel has lived her entire life in Michigan. She’s never held any public office with a foreign policy mandate, so has never cast a vote in favor of foreign aid or related to the U.S.-Israel relationship. This has nothing to do with Israel or Israeli policy.
There is no reason she feels threatened attending the convention other than the fact that she is a Jew. And, if someone wants to claim Jews should be targeted based on Israeli government actions, please ask them if they similarly target any other ethnic group based on the actions of the government of their ancestral homeland. Unless they are talking about Japanese Americans over 80 years ago, you’ll likely find this is unique to Jews.
The exclusion of someone based on race or ethnicity goes against the very ideals of the United States. Many groups have faced discrimination over the country’s long history. However, in almost every case, discrimination is lower today than it has ever been. There is only one notable exception, and it isn’t limited to politics.
Whether it’s Jewish students intimidated on campus or Jewish authors discriminated against by publishing houses, there is an effort to exclude Jews from public life.
One common thread here is that the media is not doing its job reporting on the rising level of anti-Jewish hate and exclusion. To the extent the media does cover antisemitism, it often does exactly what the Michigan Democratic Party did: insert Islamophobia into the same story to make it sound like the issue is general xenophobia or universal religious intolerance rather than reporting clearly and honestly that the problem is rising bigotry directly specifically at Jews.
The media has played an admirable and leading role in highlighting discrimination against countless other groups. That attention is one of the reasons discrimination fell – hate dies in the light. Why are the leading publications in the U.S. allowing antisemitism to flourish in the darkness? They all need to answer that question – now.
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© Divuach Ne’eman R”A, 2025
