Congressman Dan Goldman Calls on Weaponization Subcommittee Republican Majority to Disinvite Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from Testifying

Request Follows Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Spreading Antisemitic and Anti-Asian Conspiracy Theories

Kennedy’s Appearance Before the Congress Legitimizes His Pernicious Antisemitic and Anti-Asian Statements

Read Letter Here

Washington D.C. - Congressman Dan Goldman (NY-10) joined Congressman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL-25) and Congresswoman Judy Chu (CA-28) in leading democratic members of the Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government in sending a letter to Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Chairman Jim Jordan requesting they rescind Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s invitation to testify before the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has a long history of spreading racist and antisemitic comments and conspiracy theories. Just last week, Kennedy continued to disseminate rhetoric targeting both Jews and the AAPI community by claiming that COVID-19 was bioengineered to spare “Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese .”

“Mr. Kennedy has repeatedly attacked two groups that have long been subject to deadly discrimination. His own credibility as a witness is nonexistent. Allowing Mr. Kennedy to serve as a witness before the Select Subcommittee only services to legitimize his antisemitic and anti- Asian views. We therefore request that Mr. Kennedy be removed from the witness list for the upcoming hearing on July 20, 2023. We further call on Congressional leadership and all the members of Congress to condemn Mr. Kennedy’s preposterous, bigoted, and harmful comments,” the Members wrote.

Read the full letter hereand below–

The Honorable Kevin McCarthy Speaker
House of Representatives H-232, U.S. Capitol Washington, D.C. 20515

The Honorable Jim Jordan Chairman, Judiciary Committee 2138 Rayburn House Building Washington, DC 20515

July 17, 2023

Dear Speaker McCarthy andChairmanJordan:

We request that you rescind your invitation for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to testify as a witness before the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on Thursday, July 20, 2023. Mr. Kennedy has repeatedlyand recentlyspread vile and dangerous antisemitic and anti-Asian conspiracy theories thattarnish his credibility as a witness and must not be legitimized with his appearance beforethe U.S. Congress nor given the platform of an official committee hearing to spread his baseless and discriminatory views.

Just last week, a video recording was released in which Mr. Kennedy asserted that COVID-19 was bioengineered to target certain races. Specifically, Mr. Kennedy floated the conspiracy theory that the coronavirus was purposely bioengineered in a lab to target Caucasians and Black people—but to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people. These false claims echo centuries of Jews being scapegoated and held collectively responsible for illnesses like the Black Plague— often as a precursor for massacres and pogroms, and Chinese immigrants being blamed for plague outbreaks since the mid-1800s.

By promoting the unfounded notion that scientists are developing bioweapons that can target certain races and exempt others, while referring to Jews as a separate race, Mr. Kennedy is employing apernicious form of antisemitism that has been used for centuries. This technique was used by Hitlerclaiming that there are biological differences between ethnic or racial groupsto portray Jews as a lesser form of humanity, a steppingstone to justifying the annihilation of the Jews during the Holocaust. Additionally, by referring to Jews as a separate race, Mr. Kennedy promoted a conspiracy theory that asserts that Jews have the ability to cause or avoid harm that is inflicted on other people.

Mr. Kennedy’s recent antisemitic statements are not new. He has a history of making statements minimizing the plight of the Jews during the Holocaust. In January of 2022, he suggested that life was more difficult today than it was for Anne Frank and those attempting to flee Nazi Germany. A few years before that, Mr. Kennedy compared mask mandates during the pandemic to Nazi medical experimentation on Jews in concentration camps by saying that “'Nazis did that in the camps in World War Two – they tested vaccines on gypsies and Jews.” Even last week, he referred to the “de-Nazification” of Ukraine, which is currently fighting a Russian invasion under the leadership of a Jewish president.

As you no doubt know, the Anti-Defamation League recently determined in its annual audit that antisemitic incidents rose by 36 percent last year to the largest number ever recorded by this audit. In a time of rising violent antisemitism in the United States and around the world, the failure to call out Mr. Kennedy’s antisemitic rhetoric is unacceptable and dangerous.

Equally important, Mr. Kennedy’s remarks further incite violence against members of Asian and Asian American communities. We have seen a rise in anti-Asian violence over the last few years, which builds on a long history of anti-Asian discrimination in our country. Since the onset of COVID-19 in early 2020, there has been a more than 300 percent increase in anti-Asian hate incidents. In fact, according to Stop AAPI Hate, there have been over 11,000 anti-Asian hate crimes and incidents reported since March 2020.

Additionally, heightened US-China tensions have resulted in sharp increases in Sinophobia, further fueling the xenophobia, hate, and violence against people of Asian descent across the country. Alarmingly, 1 in 4 Americans believe that Asian Americans are more loyal to countries other than the United States and 1 in 5 Americans still believe Asian Americans are partly responsible for COVID-19. Scapegoating Chinese people as Mr. Kennedy has done will only inflame xenophobia and violence against Asian American communities. Given this history, we cannot allow Mr. Kennedy’s inflammatory and racist discrimination against Asians to go unchecked.

Mr. Kennedy has repeatedly attacked two groups that have long been subject to deadly discrimination. His own credibility as a witness is nonexistent. Allowing Mr. Kennedy to serve as a witness before the Select Subcommittee only services to legitimize his antisemitic and anti- Asian views. We therefore request that Mr. Kennedy be removed from the witness list for the upcoming hearing on July 20, 2023. We further call on Congressional leadership and all the members of Congress to condemn Mr. Kennedy’s preposterous, bigoted, and harmful comments.

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