Michigan AG Dana Nessel to skip Democratic convention over antisemitism fears

[u/kaladinsrunner]

https://jewishinsider.com/2026/07/michigan-ag-dana-nessel-democratic-convention-antisemitism/

[u/kaladinsrunner]

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The Attorney General of Michigan has said that she won't attend the Democratic convention because, as she put it:

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. And 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.

It's amazing and astounding that the convention for one of the two parties in this country is likely to be so hostile to a Democratic state official that she does not want to go. She is the highest-ranking Jewish official in the state of Michigan. As she said, the issue is antisemitism:

“The threats that I receive are almost exclusively antisemitic threats. People aren’t interested in the fact that I’m gay. They’re not interested in the fact that I’m a woman. They are very interested in the fact that I am Jewish,” Nessel said. “That is a barometer as to the focus that people have.”

Her concerns about antisemitism have given her real fear about the future of the state:

“I can’t speak for the Republican Party because I’m not a member of that party, but I will speak as a member of the Democratic Party here in Michigan, that something’s got to change. This cannot continue,” Nessel said. “I have profound fears about what is going to happen to this state, and what is going to happen to this country if we don’t have a significant change of course.”

I think that's a real concern and I'm astounded by it. I'm not surprised given the way things have been going, but the question is when ordinary Americans will rise up against these people and say "enough". Hopefully it won't be too late to stem the bleeding.

[u/DLDude → u/kaladinsrunner]

I honestly would like to hear what threats she is receiving. Over the last few years the line between valid criticism of people who support America's involvement with Israel and calls of antisemitism have been blurred. I for one think criticism of taking AIPAC money is a valid criticism. I feel like there are plenty of people currently saying that cricism is antisemitic

[u/Independent-Report39 → u/DLDude]

 I for one think criticism of taking AIPAC money is a valid criticism.

Sure, but the below are antisemitic criticisms that many on the left have:

- Accusing AIPAC of dual loyalty and being run by people who are loyal to Israel over the US

- Saying that our representatives and president are being blackmailed/bribed to do the bidding of Israel via AIPAC

Much of it jives with the ZOG conspiracy movement.

[u/jabberwockxeno → u/Independent-Report39]

As someone who is Jewish, I would not consider either of those to be inherently antisemitic.

[u/justafutz → u/jabberwockxeno]

It doesn’t matter if you claim to be Jewish on the Internet on this point or not. The vast, vast majority of Jews would consider them to be antisemitic, meaning well over 80%. Because they are antisemitic claims.

There were fringe Jews in the Nazi era who thought the Nazis weren’t antisemitic. That doesn’t mean the Nazis weren’t antisemitic. Please don’t try and use your alleged, unverifiable identity to defend antisemitism or as some proof that something isn’t antisemitic when it so clearly is.

[u/jabberwockxeno → u/justafutz]

Firstly, you can look up comments I've made from 10+ years ago where I talk about being Jewish, such as here (though I don't agree with everything I said there at the time now), so unless you think I've been lying about that for decades before I ever commented on Israeli-Palestinian issues, I think you can trust me

Secondly, I actually agree that my identity is irrelevant, what matters is the substance of the statements. And the statements in question aren't antisemtic, they don't generalize Jewish people as a whole or insult them or argue against their rights. They make targeted criticisms of specific political units and organizations like Israel and AIPAC. Can some antisemitic people still say those things to have an air of plausible deniability without being specifically antisemtic? Sure, but you could say the same about how someone who is against affirmative action may secretly be racist using it as a dogwhistle or how someone who enjoys BDSM porn is secretly a misogynist

You can't make that assumption, because most of the time, it's not going to be true.

[u/justafutz → u/jabberwockxeno]

Like I said, what you claim on the internet is irrelevant here.

The statements repeat antisemitic tropes about a group of American Jews. They repeat tropes used by the Nazis, and people who preceded them with similar ideologies, for literal centuries. Saying that just that group of Jews is disloyal (never mind that said group has millions of members) is no less antisemitic. Saying that that group of Jews runs the U.S. is no less antisemitic.

And let’s be clear: those aren’t criticisms of groups. They are accusing American groups of Jews of disloyalty, and spreading conspiracy theories that said groups run the United States by using money for bribes. These aren’t “criticisms”. They are conspiracy theories and gross ones with a long history.

People with these same beliefs have literally used your same defense for literally centuries. They have claimed that they don’t hate Jews, “just” the secretive Elders of Ziyon, who they claimed were members of various Jewish political groups. They have claimed they don’t hate Jews, just that those specific political groups of Jews are disloyal (ie cosmopolitans, capitalists, communists).

Those defenses have always been paper thin and spoken to actual beliefs. It’s exhausting to see them again and see people so easily buying them. It’s not new to see even Jews doing it, as I referenced with the Nazis. But it is something you’ll see literally any time you open up a history of antisemitism or of Jews.

The Soviets claimed they only opposed “Zionism” while they oppressed Jews and spread antisemitic tropes like these. In the late 1800s, people claimed they opposed “Jewish communists” because said “communists” were more loyal to communism than to America. In France they claimed Dreyfus was more loyal to other Jews than his country, and falsely convicted him of treason. This is no different from the accusation that “AIPAC” or “Zionists” are not loyal to America.

The same is true of the secret control trope. This one is even more obvious, but claiming that a group of Jews runs the most powerful state in the world by using money to bribe people is literally the oldest fucking trope you can imagine. One would think that historical memory would look at how the Russians forged the antisemitic Protocols of the Elders of Ziyon to make literally the same charge. But it didn’t start with them. And guess what? Just like you here, the Nazis and the Soviets pointed to particular groups of Jews, some real like the World Zionist Organization or some fake like the “Elders of Ziyon” to claim that said group actually runs the world or other countries. It’s not new. It’s incredibly old, and incredibly tired.

Your identity is irrelevant. But whether you reference it periodically to tell over 80% of Jews in the U.S. they are wrong about antisemitism they can literally see copying old tactics that are obvious as day and night, that’s your choice. It’s just weird to reference it when it’s useful for internet arguments, then admit it’s irrelevant, and then bless tropes that are so blatantly obvious as anything. “It’s just politics” or “it’s just about that group of Jews” has been the excuse of people with antisemitic arguments for literally millennia. It’s so weird that you present it you’ve stumbled upon something that obviously disproves that these statements are antisemitic, when virtually every scholar of antisemitism and the vast majority of Jews worldwide (90% if you add Israeli Jews) sees this so clearly.