LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Conservatives are regrouping after a task force set up to fight antisemitism announced it was cutting ties with the influential conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation. The foundation's president is facing criticism for defending Tucker Carlson after he hosted far-right influencer, white nationalist and antisemite Nick Fuentes on his podcast. The antisemitism task force met publicly Tuesday for the first time since the split happened about two weeks ago. NPR political correspondent Sarah McCammon was there, and she joins me now in studio. Good morning.
SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Good morning.
FADEL: OK. So how did the antisemitism task force find itself separating from Heritage?
MCCAMMON: Yeah. Just to step back a little bit, Tucker Carlson's interview with Nick Fuentes triggered a backlash from some prominent Republicans because Fuentes has this long history of extreme remarks. He's praised Hitler, proudly called himself a racist. It rose to another level after The Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts defended Carlson. As a result, the National Task Force to Combat Antisemitism announced it was cutting ties with Heritage.
FADEL: OK. So now they're reformed independently. What's next?
MCCAMMON: Well, they say the events of the past few weeks have broadened their focus as a group. And one of the task force co-chairs, Luke Moon, says they had been focused on what they describe as left-wing antisemitism.
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LUKE MOON: The fight on the left is still happening. That is not done. That is a work that still has to go on. But we now have an emergent threat on the right.
MCCAMMON: And so, Leila, now, the task force wants to push back forcefully against rhetoric from people like Fuentes.
FADEL: Right. And he's an influential person. You were there. Who else was in the room?
MCCAMMON: Well, there were a lot of conservative Christian groups and some conservative-leaning Jewish leaders, and several prominent evangelical leaders were present too. Plus, President Trump's ambassador to Israel, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, spoke to the group through a video message.
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MIKE HUCKABEE: So, in Genesis, when the scripture says, God will bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse Israel, we don't argue with God about that.
MCCAMMON: So Huckabee tried to make the case for Israel from the Bible and told the group that Christians should have respect for Judaism because their faith comes from it.
FADEL: What was he trying to accomplish with this messaging to this room?
MCCAMMON: Yeah. Evangelical Christians, for the most part, ground their support for Israel in their interpretation of the Bible, and they have historically been the group most likely to support the Jewish state, even more than Jewish Americans in some polls. But other broadly pro-Israel groups warned that invoking religion only heightens tensions around the conflict in the Middle East. Jeremy Ben-Ami is president of J Street, which describes itself as a liberal, pro-Israel Jewish group.
JEREMY BEN-AMI: When any side, whether it is Muslims, Christians or Jews, begin to introduce the idea that God somehow gave only one people a piece of land, you make it a conflict that can't be resolved.
MCCAMMON: But some of the Jewish leaders involved in this task force are willing to work with Christian groups who share their position on Israel.
FADEL: Now, this is coming at a time when President Trump's supporters are divided on a number of issues. What does this debate over how to fight antisemitism mean for conservative activists going forward?
MCCAMMON: Well, a Heritage spokesperson pointed to a past statement from their president, Kevin Roberts, that called for fighting antisemitism across the political spectrum. The task force co-chair Luke Moon told me that he would not rule out the possibility of the group returning to Heritage one day, but he says this is a good time right after the off-year elections and well before the midterms for the conservative movement to be having this conversation.
FADEL: That's NPR national political correspondent Sarah McCammon. Thank you, Sarah.
MCCAMMON: Thanks. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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