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Friends,

"I take full responsibility. It's not my fault." That's not edited. That's exactly what Trump said at Thursday's debate about the COVID pandemic that his incompetence and dishonesty failed to check, and that sums up his approach to governing. Read Trump's COVID plan for yourself.

When Trump denied he was a racist, Joe Biden said "his dogwhistle is as big as a foghorn." Not everyone who votes for Trump is a racist. But anyone voting for Trump is voting for a racist, and that's not something to be particularly proud of either.

About 75% of Jewish voters will vote for Joe Biden, including in crucial swing states. That's better than most demographics, but not enough considering that Republican Jewish Coalition Chairman Norm Coleman said in 2016 that Trump was "A bigot. A misogynist. A fraud. A bully."

Trump has proven him right, but the rationalization I hear most often from Jewish Republicans is yeah, but Trump is good for Israel, as if Joe Biden is someone they never heard of rather than a man who has proven his support and friendship for Israel and the Jewish community for five decades.

Even on its own terms, as Eric Lynn and Dan Shapiro prove, the argument fails--Trump has not been Israel's friend. Eric and Dan outline Trump's policy failures on Iran, Syria, the Kurds, ISIS, the Palestinians, as well as the risk Trump poses to bipartisan support for Israel, which has long been a cornerstone of U.S. policy.

They conclude that "Trump has worked to divide Americans over Israel. He calls the 70 percent of Jewish Americans who vote for Democrats 'disloyal,' cynically cracking the broad, bipartisan foundation of American support for Israel. Amazingly, he has done so while indulging neo-Nazis marching in Charlottesville, failing to condemn white supremacists and feeding the growth of anti-Semitism on his watch.

"In this election, Joe Biden is the candidate who will end the cynical politicization of Israel, avoid undermining Israel’s security, keep the two-state solution alive and oppose anti-Semitism wherever it appears. For those who care about Israel, the U.S.-Israel relationship and fighting anti-Semitism, Biden is the president we need."

Did Trump's dad kill JFK? Rare is the week when we don't learn something about Trump that, before 2016, would cause even members of his own party to abandon him. This week was no exception: We learned that the U.S. government cannot find the parents of at least 545 children detained at the border and we learned about Trump's undisclosed Chinese bank account.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pointed out that Trump’s Chinese bank account was yet another example of Trump being vulnerable on issues that he uses to attack his political enemies.

Ben Schwartz nails it: "Trump's biggest tell is when he accuses someone of something. You know he's the one who did it. Given what he's said about Rafael Cruz and JFK, we really need to look into Fred Trump's whereabouts on November 22, 1963." (In case you forgot.)

Shai Franklin observed that as Trump gets more desperate, the pace accelerates, as if Trump is holding a Fire Sale--Everything Must Go! approach to policy and rhetoric, trying to get it all out before the American people evict him from office.

Trump's fire sale extends to the Middle East. Trump rushed to push Sudan into normalizing relations with Israel with another quid pro quo even though, as Yonatan Touval explains, Trump's approach risks "undermining the country's delicate process to democratic rule, strengthening its military over the civilian stakeholders, enhancing the appeal of Islamist groups, and, ultimately, dooming any relationship between Israel and Sudan to a premature and precipitous end." But none of that matters to Trump. He wanted election coverage before November 3.

We now know that Israel has been conducting undercover diplomacy in Bahrain for more than a decade through a front company listed as a commercial consulting firm--what Trump wants us to believe was a breakthrough is nothing more than changing a sign on the door. But it got him some positive news coverage, so it was worth it to him.

The good news on the UAE deal is that Israel has relaxed its opposition to the sale of F-35s to the UAE. The bad news is that this episode revealed significant daylight between the U.S. and Israel. The Trump administration should have consulted with Israel and privately addressed Israel's concerns before publicly announcing the sale without Israel's agreement. Instead, Bibi publicly opposed the sale, denied it was part of the UAE agreement, and this disagreement about Israel's security played out in public. But doing it right might have delayed the ceremony; Trump's ass-backwards approach got him the photo-op he wanted when he wanted it.

Indeed, as Halie Soifer wrote, "with Trump, politics is purely transactional: Any support for his re-election or of him personally supersedes all other considerations, including national security, electoral security and homeland security. Trump has repeatedly demonstrated that he’s willing to use many forms of hatred — including racism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism — for political purposes, including to get elected and re-elected."

How many times will Republican Jews say "yes sir, may I have another?" before they realize that voting for an anti-Semite might not be a good idea? Last week, Trump again engaged in anti-Semitic rhetoric, and last week, not one Republican called him. Trump called Joe Biden a "servant of the globalists," a term viewed by the ADL as a code word used by anti-Semites, in several events over past week.

This comes on the heels of Trump refusing to condemn white supremacists at the first debate and instead giving a shout out to the Proud Boys, an anti-Semitic white supremacy group that loved it. Trump's entire presidency has been marred by anti-Semitic rhetoric and support for white nationalism.

If you are concerned about anti-Semitism from the left, you should vote for the party that condemns and marginalizes left-wing anti-Semitism from within its ranks, not the party that elects right-wing anti-Semites to positions of leadership. Not only is Donald Trump the leader of the GOP, but as Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) pointed out last week, the #1 and and #2 Republicans in the House, Reps. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Steve Scalise (R-LA), have also engaged unapologetically in anti-Semitism.

The Republican Party is incapable of reforming itself--Trump, McCarthy, and Scalise are the tip of the iceberg, and if we want our country to avoid the fate of the Titanic, we need to defeat Trump on November 3 and elect a Democratic Senate.

Last week's newsletter.

ICYMI. For further reading, reflection, and sharing:

Tweet of the Week. Lisa Gilroy.

Facebook Post of the Week. Elissa Wald.

Political Ad of the Week. Mandy Patinkin.

Political Debates of the Week. JDCA's Halie Soifer eviscerates RJC's Matt Brooks and JDCA's Michael Rosenzweig schools RJC's Chuck Berk. If you want a crash course on how to talk to your right-wing friends and relatives about this election, check these out. Fun fact--you won't find these videos in any RJC newsletters, and when you watch them, you'll see why.

Video Clip of the Week. The full Rudy Giuliani clip from Borat.

Upcoming Event: Dana Gordon and I are among those co-hosting a pre-election summit on Friday, October 30, at 8:30am CT featuring Sen. Dick Durbin, Sen. Tammy Duckworth, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, IL-13 congressional candidate Betsy Dirksen Londrigan, and Geoff Garin, president of Hart Research.

Proceeds from this event will support the final media buys and GOTV efforts for Betsy Dirksen Londrigan and Senator Dick Durbin. RSVP here.

If you think that Abraham Lincoln, Paul Simon, or Barack Obama were Illinois's best orators, watch this speech from Dick Durbin.

I guess this is a good problem to have: This list is now so large that while many people are local, even more live outside the Chicago area and have no interest in local news. If you want to be on a list that will receive infrequent newsletters about local issues and events, reply to this email and I'll add you.

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The Fine Print: This newsletter usually runs on Sunday mornings. Unless stated otherwise, my views do not necessarily reflect the views of any candidates or organizations that I support or am associated with. I reserve the right to change my mind as I learn more. Intelligent, well-informed people may disagree with me; read opposing views and decide for yourself. A link to an article doesn't mean that I agree with everything its author has ever said or that I even agree with everything in the article; it means that the article supports or elaborates on the point I was making. I take pride in accurately reporting the facts on which I base my opinions. Tell me if you spot any inaccuracies, typos, or other mistakes so that I can correct them in the next newsletter (and give you credit if you want it). Advertisements reflect the views of the advertisers, not necessarily of me, and advertisers are solely responsible for the content of their advertisements. I read, value, and encourage replies to my newsletters, but I don't always have time to acknowledge replies or to engage in one-on-one discussion. Don't expect a reply if your message is uncivil or if it's clear from your message that you haven't read the newsletter or clicked on the relevant links. © 2020 Steve Sheffey. All rights reserved.