Former Prince Andrew — yes, former, because when your brand becomes Jeffrey Epstein’s BFF, the palace revokes the title — was arrested and then released yesterday.

Consider him royally screwed.

He’s the first senior royal arrested in nearly 400 years, which is quite the achievement in a family tree that has seen their share of shenanigans.

Police are reviewing whether he shared sensitive info with Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew denies everything, of course. But we’ve all seen that photo of him on all fours over a redacted girl on the floor.

Vatican Will Not Join the Board of Peace

The Vatican has officially RSVP’d “no ❤️” to Trump’s self-appointed “Board of Peace,” which he plans to chair indefinitely.

Pope Leo XIV, the first American pontiff, declined, suggesting that maybe the United Nations should handle international crises like it’s literally designed to do.

Are We Going to War with Iran?

Amidst the Iranian protests in which roughly 30,000 civilians have been killed by the regime, Trump has said he’ll decide on military action within “10 to 15 days.” That is the diplomatic equivalent of “lemme circle back.” Meanwhile, sources say the US could strike as early as right now.

Love the suspense!

South Korea’s Ex-Prez Gets Life for 2024 Martial Law Stunt

Former South Korean president Yoon Suk Yeol just got life in prison for the martial law stunt he pulled in December 2024 when he tried to override his political opponents by sending soldiers in helicopters to storm parliament. It lasted six chaotic hours.

Turns out “I was just trying to make a point” doesn’t really fly when the point involves an insurrection.

It’s wild how in some countries, that comes with prison time, and in ours it comes with a reelection and a $70m vanity documentary of your wife produced by Amazon.

Maybe you’ve heard there’s a new Wuthering Heights movie. It debuted at #1 at the box office last weekend, proving once again that people will always pay to watch hot people ruin their own lives on the big screen.

I was one of them. Naturally, I saw it opening night in IMAX. Because if I’m going to see a toxic meltdown, I want to watch it in surround sound on the biggest screen possible.

Apparently, this is a tale as old as time, because there’s been over 25 major adaptations, including:

• 1920 (silent)

• 1939 (the Laurence Olivier one)

• Multiple Indian adaptations (1950, 1951, 1966, etc.)

• 1992 (Ralph Fiennes / Juliette Binoche)

• 2009 (TV version with Tom Hardy)

• 2011 (Andrea Arnold)

• 2026 (And now Emerald Fennell’s film starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi)

It’s based on the 1847 novel by Emily Brontë, which many people call “the greatest love story of all time.” That is a lie. It’s like calling Jaws a beach comedy.

In this version, Margot Robbie plays Catherine Earnshaw, who in the book is 17. Robbie is 35, which in Hollywood years apparently still qualifies as an emotionally immature teen.

If you’re cool with me spoiling most of the plot, please continue. (I’ll spare you just the ending).

Basically, it’s about this dusty, wind-slapped house on a hill in 1800s England called Wuthering Heights. It’s a gothic estate on the Yorkshire moors where everyone looks like they bathe in mud.

One day, Mr. Earnshaw, who is an abrasive alcoholic, brings home a random orphan boy from Liverpool and announces he’s Cathy’s “pet.”

This is not even the first WTF moment. The movie starts with a town hanging.

Cathy immediately becomes possessive and names him Heathcliff.

Heathcliff does not speak. He barely emotes.

Over time, he opens up, though. Catherine teaches him to read and talk and they grow up running around the moors like wild Victorian children.

I suppose this is the part people call romantic. Which is already sus since they’re more like siblings at this point. But it’s technically kosher.

Catherine loves Heathcliff. Heathcliff loves Catherine. But also they kind of hate each other for no reason whatsoever. There is lingering resentment Heathcliff has for Cathy’s family because the dad, despite taking him off the streets, treats him like literal dog shit.

As they grow up, Cathy realizes she should probably level up and get married.
Running barefoot across the moors with your emotionally stunted step-brother is thrilling at 16, but it does not scream stable long-term plan.

Enter Edgar Linton, who is basically a Disney prince with generational wealth. He lives in a lush palace called Thrushcross Grange, which you can kind of see from the gigantic hillside Cathy goes to masturbate (yes, really).

Edgar is handsome, polite, and everything Heathcliff is not in British society. He offers Catherine things she’s never had before, like silk gowns, stability, and indoor plumbing.

The bar is on the literal barn floor and he clears it easily.

So naturally, she marries him for status and comfort, and tea that doesn’t taste like barn dust.

BUT before she does, she confesses to the housekeeper, Nelly, played by the always excellent Hong Chau, that marrying Heathcliff would “degrade” her because he is broke AF. Then, in the same breath, she’s like, but also our souls are literally the same being.

Girl. Pick a lane.

Instead of just going to therapy, which didn’t exist, or writing in a journal, she says, like a literal sociopath, “I am Heathcliff.”

Ma’am. You are not Heathcliff. You are barely functioning as Catherine.

Meanwhile, Heathcliff has been lurking outside and overhears only the first half. He does not stay for nuance. He immediately leaves on horseback in a fit of wounded masculinity. Men selectively listening since the 18th century, smh.

And yet. Despite Edgar being handsome, polite, rich, emotionally available, and not actively plotting revenge in a barn somewhere… it’s still not enough for her. Nothing ever is for Cathy.

When she moves into the palace, she brings Nelly with her (have we mentioned that the new husband is a SAINT). And Nelly is like, “This is good.” Yeah, no shit, Nelly. Compared to Wuthering Heights, which looked like it was one gust away from collapse, this place is Versailles. Edgar’s place has doors that actually close. A treehouse would be better than that haunted shit-box you called a home for 2 decades.

Any way.

Remember how I mentioned that Heathcliff stole the family horse and galloped away?

Well, five years later he returns and comes back mysteriously rich. And instead of the feral Jesus look he was going for earlier, he’s now clean-shaven. He kept the mutton-chops, tho.

He immediately buys Wuthering Heights and, more importantly, buys revenge.

He then spends the rest of the story psychologically terrorizing everyone within a ten-mile radius.

Reminder: this is the “greatest love story of all time.”

We do get some intimacy, though.

The new movie leans into the sex in a way the book only hinted at. There’s a lot more grabbing, gasping, and intense eye contact. Jacob Elordi constantly has his finger down Margot Robbie’s throat and in other places, too.

Also, because I was curious, I decided to check out the original source material. Can we discuss how in the book, people are constantly described as “ejaculating” when they mean “exclaiming”? Like: “Heathcliff ejaculated at the dinner table.” Olde English was brutal.

Anyway, I won’t ruin the final scene in case you actually want to see this movie. This version only covers the first half of the book, by the way.

I still think trying to reframe emotional instability, infidelity, and grotesque abuse as epic romance is an odd choice, but somehow this IP has been a banger for centuries, so who am I to judge?

Goldman Sachs’ top lawyer resigns after Epstein files drop

Kathy Ruemmler, Goldman Sachs’ top lawyer and former Obama White House counsel, resigned on Feb 12th after the Justice Department released millions of pages of Epstein files showing she called him “sweetie,” “Uncle Jeffrey,” and wrote “Well, I adore him. It’s like having another older brother!” Way to degrade your older brother.

She’s now joining a fun club: Brad Karp, chairman of Paul Weiss (one of the most prestigious law firms in the world), stepped down Feb 4th over his Epstein emails, and Britain’s ambassador to the US got fired in September for the same reason. At least half a dozen top Trump officials are also in the files.

Totally normal stuff.

Netanyahu met with Trump while annexing the West Bank

Before arriving in DC, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s security cabinet approved measures to expand Israeli settlements in the West Bank and buy Palestinian land. His Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said the quiet part out loud, bragging they're working to "extinguish the idea of a Palestinian state."

Back home, Netanyahu's got a corruption trial hanging over him and elections coming by October. His coalition might collapse by March 31st if he can't pass a budget because the ultra-Orthodox parties want to keep their military draft exemption. Trump also called Israel's president "disgraceful" for not pardoning Netanyahu.

Nothing weird about that.

Japan's heavy metal biker grandma just became the most powerful conservative on the planet

Japan elected its first female Prime Minister, Sanae Takaichi, in its biggest landslide since 1955, which sounds like progress until you read literally anything else about her.

Her platform includes opposing same-sex marriage, forcing women to surrender their maiden names, and installing patriotic education in schools (aka nationalistic propaganda).

She plans to meet with Trump in March, presumably to compare notes.

Thanks for reading. I’m experimenting with making this a weekly series.

I have a feeling I’m not the only one who woke up early Monday to the miraculous news of the final 20 living hostages returning safely home to Israel. I was up at 4 AM, light as a feather. It’s like my body knew.

Somehow, against all odds, Donald Trump brokered a ceasefire and hostage release deal. The same man who once stared directly at a solar eclipse and suggested bleach could fight COVID has now freed the 20 remaining living hostages from two years in Hamas captivity. You honestly can’t make this stuff up.

We often hear the phrase, “You don’t negotiate with terrorists.” Well, tell that to Jared Kushner. How in the actual hell did he negotiate face-to-face with Hamas to pull this off? Like, did he and Steve Witkoff show up with laminated charts and PowerPoint slides? Did he open with an icebreaker? Did he bring snacks? #Respect

There was an Instagram post I saw from Amanda Markowitz that stopped me in my tracks. It said:

Today is Day 738.

7+3+8 = 18

18. The number that means chai, life, in Judaism. A number that embodies life, blessing, and hope.

The poetic arc can be felt.

Divine timing was also on the side of Noa Argamani, whose birthday fell on the day of the release. She reunited with her partner Avinatan Or, who spent two full years in total isolation, never meeting any other hostages until his return.

There are so many things I’m thinking about.

I’m thinking again about Rachel Goldberg-Polin, who manages to keep showing up for the hostages, despite her son, Hersh, being murdered last year in the tunnels. In her latest speech, she said, “There is a time to sob, and there is a time to dance, and we have to do both right now.”

I think about how strong these people are. How their survival defies every law of reason. Think back to your lowest moments. Now magnify that times infinity. It was hard enough for most people to stay sane during COVID lockdowns. People started going stir-crazy after months of banana bread and taking Zoom calls in isolation. We were all largely confined to our homes for two years, and that was pretty bad. Now those problems are a luxury compared to being confined to a Hamas terror dungeon for two years. How does one survive two years with no external stimulation, communication, or food other than a stale piece of Pita a day? I truly don’t comprehend how it’s possible to not only survive being in the Hamas tunnels for two years with decrepit living conditions but also the mental fortitude needed to not lose your sanity.

I have so many questions.

What is it like to spend two years of your life in a tunnel 150 ft underground?

What happens to your body when you barely move for two years? Do your legs forget they belong to you? Do you start to feel like you’re floating outside of yourself, watching a body that no longer feels like your own?

I can’t begin to fathom the kind of strength it takes to endure that. To breathe the same putrid air every day. To live without sunlight, without sanitation, without any certainty that you’ll ever make it out. No space to stretch your arms without hitting a wall.

How do you measure time when the days all blur into one endless night?

How do you know when to sleep when all there is is darkness? Or do you constantly sleep just to make time disappear faster and numb the pain? Then again, it must be hard to sleep when the air feels wet and the ground is alive with worms and sewage creatures.

At a certain point, do you start hallucinating?

What happens when you go two years without real conversation? When you finally speak again, does your own voice sound strange to you?

It must’ve smelled like the most rancid swamp down there. The human waste, mold, dirt floors and walls. No real showering in two years.

I could go on. It sounds like the most deranged nightmare.

***

We’re still waiting for Hamas to return the remains of the 24 murdered hostages because of course, they’ve already violated the terms of the agreement. That’s who they are.

Back in the U.S., the “Ceasefire Now” crowd is suddenly quiet. You’d think they’d be celebrating, right? They got exactly what they asked for. But I guess when your whole worldview is Team Palestine vs. Team Israel, it kinda ruins the vibe to admit the ceasefire wasn’t inspired by protest signs, but by Israelis marching for peace and the release of hostages. None of this is surprising.

Meanwhile, Hamas is back to their bull-sh*t, killing 33 of their own people accused of treason—but hey, at least it’s not Israel doing it, right? Priorities! Gaza could receive a billion-dollar aid package, and the internet would still call it “Western imperialist crumbs.” And, of course, this crowd is extra salty that the whole deal was brokered by Trump. Life is messy that way.

On the side of the hostages, though, there’s gratitude and joy. If these past few years have taught us anything, it’s to embrace the complexity of life and not overthink a good thing.

For two years, the world has lived in the long shadow of October 7. Now, for the first time, we’re waking up in a post–October 7 world. And it’s a beautiful feeling.

Two years since the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust—and the ongoing devastation in Gaza— I’ve run out of meaningful things to say. Consuming non-stop horror on our screens, every day, for two years will do that to you. It has definitely snapped something in our brains.

There are still 48 hostages in Hamas captivity. Their families who speak out have a strength that humbles anyone paying attention.

You have Rachel Goldberg-Polin, who still continues to speak out for the hostages even after her own son, Hersh, was murdered in the tunnels along with five others known as the “Beautiful 6.”

I’m in awe of all the hostages and their families who have the strength and emotional fortitude to share their stories after all they’ve suffered and lost.

Eli Sharabi (53) survived 491 days in Hamas captivity — chained underground, starved, and beaten in Gaza’s tunnels. He lost over 66 pounds, dropping to just 97 pounds, and spent months in near-total darkness, shackled to other hostages, including while using the toilet. Surviving that is hard enough. To be freed and learn his wife Lian and daughters Noya (16) and Yahel (13) were murdered on October 7, along with his brother Yossi, who was killed in captivity, is a cruel welcome home. Yet, somehow, he’s standing tall again — publishing a memoir, Hostage, which is out in the U.S. today.

“I’m very positive the life I’m going to rebuild,” Sharabi told CBS News. “I love life.”

It’s almost impossible to understand how someone who endured what he did could say those words.

While a hostage, he had his ribs broken, leaving him unable to breathe properly for two or three months.

His interview feels almost supernatural to watch — a man who has lived through the worst hell imaginable, expressing something close to grace. Where his inner resolve comes from, I don’t know. He’s clearly built differently.

Peace Deal In the Making?

Somehow, against all odds, Donald Trump might be able to broker a ceasefire and hostage release deal. The same man who once stared directly at a solar eclipse and suggested drinking bleach could fight COVID is now, in his own words, “pretty sure” he’s going to end the war. And he just might.

If he can bring a close to this horribly painful chapter in human history, he may even win a Nobel Peace Prize. For real. The Hostages and Missing Families Forum sent a letter to the Nobel nominating committee urging them to award him. If the vanity of a Nobel Prize is the motivation Trump needs to pressure Hamas and Netanyahu to strike a deal, then by all means.

Trump says Hamas has been “fine” to work with, which in Trump-speak is one adjective away from “great guys, tremendous people.”

If you ignore his incoherent nonsense, like him saying “They’ve been trying to have a deal with Gaza literally for centuries”(sir… are we talking about Moses??), there might be a sliver of hope.

If Trump is successful, it might just be because of what a bully he is. Yair Rosenberg in The Atlantic writes:

In short, Trump successfully bullied Netanyahu—and if this latest round of talks is going to get results, he’ll need to do more of it. That’s because despite the president’s confident proclamations of peace for our time, a deal is far from assured. Hamas can easily blow up the fragile process by refusing to release all of the hostages, or otherwise reneging on its hazy commitments to Trump and the mediating states. The terrorist group is reportedly divided between its leaders abroad who want to agree to Trump’s terms and its leaders in Gaza who do not. At the same time, Netanyahu is already facing a mutiny among the far-right members of his coalition, who want to ethnically cleanse and resettle Gaza, and are threatening to bring down his government if the war ends. Today, Trump is the only actor who can provide a counterweight to these radicals and compel Netanyahu to make different choices by changing his incentives. As he showed this weekend, the president holds incredible leverage over the Israeli leader—he just needs to use it.

Here is Trump’s 20 Point Plan for Gaza. Honestly, it seems very reasonable, even aspirational. It’s been embraced by Qatar—which hosts Hamas’ top leadership—and the Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank, among several other countries in the Middle East. Judge for yourself.

1. Gaza will be a deradicalized terror-free zone that does not pose a threat to its neighbors.

2. Gaza will be redeveloped for the benefit of the people of Gaza, who have suffered more than enough.

3. If both sides agree to this proposal, the war will immediately end. Israeli forces will withdraw to the agreed upon line to prepare for a hostage release. During this time, all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, will be suspended, and battle lines will remain frozen until conditions are met for the complete staged withdrawal.

4. Within 72 hours of Israel publicly accepting this agreement, all hostages, alive and deceased, will be returned.

5. Once all hostages are released, Israel will release 250 life sentence prisoners plus 1700 Gazans who were detained after October 7th 2023, including all women and children detained in that context. For every Israeli hostage whose remains are released, Israel will release the remains of 15 deceased Gazans.

6. Once all hostages are returned, Hamas members who commit to peaceful co-existence and to decommission their weapons will be given amnesty. Members of Hamas who wish to leave Gaza will be provided safe passage to receiving countries.

7. Upon acceptance of this agreement, full aid will be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip. At a minimum, aid quantities will be consistent with what was included in the January 19, 2025, agreement regarding humanitarian aid, including rehabilitation of infrastructure (water, electricity, sewage), rehabilitation of hospitals and bakeries, and entry of necessary equipment to remove rubble and open roads.

8. Entry of distribution and aid in the Gaza Strip will proceed without interference from the two parties through the United Nations and its agencies, and the Red Crescent, in addition to other international institutions not associated in any manner with either party. Opening the Rafah crossing in both directions will be subject to the same mechanism implemented under the January 19, 2025 agreement.

9. Gaza will be governed under the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee, responsible for delivering the day-to-day running of public services and municipalities for the people in Gaza. This committee will be made up of qualified Palestinians and international experts, with oversight and supervision by a new international transitional body, the “Board of Peace,” which will be headed and chaired by President Donald J. Trump, with other members and heads of State to be announced, including Former Prime Minister Tony Blair. This body will set the framework and handle the funding for the redevelopment of Gaza until such time as the Palestinian Authority has completed its reform program, as outlined in various proposals, including President Trump’s peace plan in 2020 and the Saudi-French proposal, and can securely and effectively take back control of Gaza. This body will call on best international standards to create modern and efficient governance that serves the people of Gaza and is conducive to attracting investment.

10. A Trump economic development plan to rebuild and energize Gaza will be created by convening a panel of experts who have helped birth some of the thriving modern miracle cities in the Middle East. Many thoughtful investment proposals and exciting development ideas have been crafted by well-meaning international groups, and will be considered to synthesize the security and governance frameworks to attract and facilitate these investments that will create jobs, opportunity, and hope for future Gaza.

11. A special economic zone will be established with preferred tariff and access rates to be negotiated with participating countries.

12. No one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return. We will encourage people to stay and offer them the opportunity to build a better Gaza.

13. Hamas and other factions agree to not have any role in the governance of Gaza, directly, indirectly, or in any form. All military, terror, and offensive infrastructure, including tunnels and weapon production facilities, will be destroyed and not rebuilt. There will be a process of demilitarization of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors, which will include placing weapons permanently beyond use through an agreed process of decommissioning, and supported by an internationally funded buy back and reintegration program all verified by the independent monitors. New Gaza will be fully committed to building a prosperous economy and to peaceful coexistence with their neighbors.

14. A guarantee will be provided by regional partners to ensure that Hamas, and the factions, comply with their obligations and that New Gaza poses no threat to its neighbors or its people.

15. The United States will work with Arab and international partners to develop a temporary International Stabilization Force (ISF) to immediately deploy in Gaza. The ISF will train and provide support to vetted Palestinian police forces in Gaza, and will consult with Jordan and Egypt who have extensive experience in this field. This force will be the long-term internal security solution. The ISF will work with Israel and Egypt to help secure border areas, along with newly trained Palestinian police forces. It is critical to prevent munitions from entering Gaza and to facilitate the rapid and secure flow of goods to rebuild and revitalize Gaza. A deconfliction mechanism will be agreed upon by the parties.

16. Israel will not occupy or annex Gaza. As the ISF establishes control and stability, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) will withdraw based on standards, milestones, and timeframes linked to demilitarization that will be agreed upon between the IDF, ISF, the guarantors, and the Unites States, with the objective of a secure Gaza that no longer poses a threat to Israel, Egypt, or its citizens. Practically, the IDF will progressively hand over the Gaza territory it occupies to the ISF according to an agreement they will make with the transitional authority until they are withdrawn completely from Gaza, save for a security perimeter presence that will remain until Gaza is properly secure from any resurgent terror threat.

17. In the event Hamas delays or rejects this proposal, the above, including the scaled-up aid operation, will proceed in the terror-free areas handed over from the IDF to the ISF.

18. An interfaith dialogue process will be established based on the values of tolerance and peaceful co-existence to try and change mindsets and narratives of Palestinians and Israelis by emphasizing the benefits that can be derived from peace.

19. While Gaza re-development advances and when the PA reform program is faithfully carried out, the conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood, which we recognize as the aspiration of the Palestinian people.

20. The United States will establish a dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians to agree on a political horizon for peaceful and prosperous co-existence.

It’s hard to see Hamas agreeing to surrender and hand over control of Gaza after two decades of terror, but this roadmap is the kind of aspiration worth believing in.

I’ve written on this topic twice before, first in 2021 for Newsweek, where I wrote that “Yom Kippur is the Antidote to Cancel Culture.”

At its core, Yom Kippur teaches that you are more than the worst thing you’ve ever done, if you accept the call for change.

It’s a message that’s sadly missing from much of America today, which can be deeply unforgiving; all too often, the importance of self-growth and personal development is dismissed in favor of a slash and burn mentality.

The current social climate is sometimes described in religious terminology; our reflexive tribalism makes us evangelize some as “good faith” and demonize others as “bad faith.” We’re quick to dig into shame, but much less willing to extend the same grace toward those seeking redemption or forgiveness, or creating a culture of positive reinforcement that gives meaning to our failures.

I came to this understanding from a personal point of view. In 2019, I was formally diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum at 25 just a few weeks shy of Yom Kippur. The diagnosis helped me understand why I so often feel like a walking social blunder, and why I so often misjudge where irreverence fits within social codes. It’s also made me keenly aware of the dangers of transgressing in a world that places little value in forgiveness.

The intense experience of Yom Kippur the year I was diagnosed brought clarity to my many foibles. It gave me the headspace to contextualize some challenging aspects of myself more graciously.

It was then I realized Yom Kippur is a holiday about seeking resolve and renewal; at its best, it’s about transcending pain.

In 2023, I took that theme a step forward, spending a weekend at the country’s longest-running western-led silent meditation center, Insight Meditation Society. I wrote about my experience for The Forward and interviewed two of the founders, authors, and meditation teachers, Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein.

As these themes marinated in my mind, heightened by two years of a global pandemic, I drew a connection to another group that shares the cherished tradition of focusing on suffering: Buddhists.

At the Insight Meditation Society, mornings started at 5:30 a.m., which was surprisingly not difficult — It’s amazing how refreshed you can feel when you haven’t fried your brain with bright screens all day.

In the meditation hall, we were led in the Metta practice of ‘lovingkindness’ in which we silently repeated phrases like “May I be happy, may I be healthy, may I be free.” You start with offering these words to yourself, then to another person in your mind, and ultimately to all beings.

This practice isn’t all too different from the Mi Sheberach, the Jewish prayer for healing an individual or group of people.

Much like the retreat, Yom Kippur is a day for adjusting our relationship with the past to be a better version of ourselves in the present. Just like in meditation, this change in perspective is achieved through cultivating a more compassionate mindset.

If Yom Kippur is a time you’re typically zoning out on auto-pilot, maybe this reframing of the day can activate your sense of purpose. It’s not called the “days of awe” for nothing.

Gmar Chatima Tova — May you be sealed for good [in the Book of Life].

The murder of Charlie Kirk is disturbing for several reasons.

Not just because someone was killed in broad daylight at a political event from 200 yards away (!!)—which is insane—but because it reveals the state of American dissent.

You don’t have to agree with Kirk or even like him to see this for what it is: a literal attack on free speech, open debate, and the idea that we settle differences with words, not weapons.

His murder has shaken me in a way I didn’t expect—not because of who he was, but because of what he represents: a public villain.

What’s unsettling about the murder of Charlie Kirk is how clear it is that if you’re branded a villain for having the wrong views, you’re no longer just annoying or problematic or even a menace to society; you’re a target for murder.

Political violence isn’t new, but this one feels different because Kirk wasn’t a politician. He was best known as an influencer who people either adored or abhorred. For over a decade, people developed a parasocial relationship with him through his vast online presence.

Political violence has ramped up over the last decade. And it has no allegiance.
Let me lay it out for you like the world’s worst CVS receipt:

• Shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords (2011)

• Shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise (2017)

• Plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (2020)

• Pipe bombs at the DNC and RNC (2021)

• Jan 6 (2021)

• Attack on Paul Pelosi (2022)

• Attempted assassinations of Donald Trump (2024)

• Murder of Brian Thompson, UnitedHealthcare CEO by Luigi Mangione (2024) (people celebrated this bc Luigi is hot and big pharma is not)

• Arson attack on Gov. Josh Shapiro’s residence, on the 1st night of Passover, dubbed “genocide josh” because he’s a pro-Israel Jew (April 2025)

• D.C. Jewish Museum shooting of Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky (May 2025)

• Assassination of Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, and shooting of state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife (Jun 2025)

This is obviously an incomplete list, but you get the gist. Like, WHAT the actual 🦊 America? Are we okay? (No. No, we are not.) This is not the behavior of a stable nation.

In my neighborhood, this has been up for months ↓↓↓

History is a cruel teacher, and we seem determined to ignore its lessons.

Once you legitimize violence against those with the “wrong” views, it never stops with just them. The definition of “wrong” keeps expanding.

The Death of Debate

The test of a healthy society isn’t whether it protects the people you like. It’s whether it protects the people you don’t.

That’s why Kirk’s murder is so shocking. If your opponent deserves to be killed for their convictions, then it is only a matter of time before someone decides you do too.

Label someone a villain, and suddenly the morality becomes easy: if they disappear, the world improves.

The First Amendment wasn’t written to protect bland, agreeable speech; it was written to protect the sh*t that makes you want to throw your laptop across the room.

We often hear about people being “silenced” or “canceled.” But in Charlie Kirk’s case, that rhetorical abstraction became reality. He was permanently silenced for holding views that someone found objectionable.

The erosion of dissent

America’s culture of pluralism is eroding. And it’s eroding from both sides.

On the right, violence is dressed up in the distorted name of patriotism: storming the Capitol, attacking lawmakers, plotting kidnappings.

On the left, violence is rationalized in the name of justice and liberation: supporting intifadas, excusing murder as “resistance,” framing terrorism as freedom-fighting, and targeting anyone deemed complicit in the vast web of capitalism, imperialism, or settler colonialism—however loosely defined.

Both are corrosive. Both are dangerous. Both are tearing at the fabric of democracy.

We can keep going down this road. Or we can make a different choice.

For decades, Jeff Ross has been best known as the “Roastmaster General,” for his gift of turning celebrity insult comedy into an art form. His Comedy Central roasts became cultural events, and in 2024, he roasted Tom Brady so hard it became Netflix’s most-watched live broadcast. Part of his appeal is that he’s got the charm of a teddy bear with claws that leave a mark.

So, when I was gifted comp tickets to see his Broadway debut solo show, I was both intrigued and a little puzzled.

I’ll admit: my expectations were low walking into the theater. It sounded like a gimmick for a stand-up set dressed up with Broadway marketing. Fun, sure. Groundbreaking? Probably not.

But I was wrong. “Take a Banana for the Ride” isn’t just a comedy show. It’s 80 minutes of tightly-crafted transformation that earns its Broadway spectacle. Ross offers a raw meditation on love, loss, and the resilience that comes with surviving more than your share of tsuris. What emerges is deeply moving, surprisingly tender, and yes, very funny.

***

For my full review, read it here on Unpacked, where I’ll be covering more Jewish arts and culture pieces.

(I also have this fun author bio now. Maybe I should tack this on to all my Substacks.)

If you’ve opened the internet this week, you’re probably losing your mind a little bit.

I certainly am. No matter how many articles I read on the crisis in Gaza, every post seems to contradict the one before it. Never in my life have I seen more contradictory information dumped into the discourse blender.

Something is off. Like, eating sushi from a gas station off.

Gaza is facing a famine, this much we know. But why did it get to this? Most of the news would have you think Israel is hoarding humanitarian aid like it’s Beanie Babies circa 1997. We know now that’s not true because nearly 1,000 trucks of aid are literally sitting in Gaza.

The aid is there. It’s just not being delivered. It’s like the food is on the shelf, but nobody’s able to take it to check out.

So… what’s going on?

Here’s how aid delivery worked up until two months ago:

1. Aid trucks get cleared through Israel.

2. Aid gets passed to UN agencies like UNRWA or WFP.

3. UNRWA hands it to local actors (who may or may not moonlight as members of Hamas).

4. Hamas may or may not intercept the aid and resell flour and baby formula at black market prices.

5. Civilians get whatever scraps are left over.

It was a broken system, sure. But at least it was a semi-functioning broken system.

The problem seems to stem from political infighting within Gaza over a new aid group formed in May between Israel and the U.S.

Back in May, Israel rolled out a brand-new system that replaced the U.N. with a U.S.-backed private contractor called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), led by a former CIA officer. Because if there’s one thing the region was missing, it was a startup NGO with a black-ops origin story.

Key Problems with the New System:

• The GHF replaced 400 UN‑run distribution points with just 4 GHF hubs, forcing people into militarized zones to receive aid

• The UN has decades of experience coordinating humanitarian aid in war zones. GHF started 2 months ago.

• Israel’s new system forces civilians to walk through dangerous militarized zones to access food as if they’re contestants on Squid Game.

• The UN says Israel is obstructing aid with red tape and unsafe routes.

• Israel says the UN is inefficient and complicit with Hamas.

• Meanwhile, people are starving.

The idea behind GHF, in theory, wasn’t terrible. The goal may have been to cut Hamas out of the process and force a ceasefire hostage-release deal. But the result is a collapsing aid system that has neither legitimacy nor coordination.

Since the change:

• According to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, around 1,000 people have been killed near these aid sites. Take that number with a grain of salt—this is the same source that’s been caught inflating stats before—but even if it’s a tiny bit true, it’s horrific.

• Aid convoys are sitting idle, not because they can't enter Gaza, but because no one will safely deliver them.

We’re watching a famine unfold not because there isn’t food, but because of political infighting within Gaza.

GHF is like, "We’ve got trucks. We’ve got partners. Can we maybe feed people now?
And the UN is like, “Nah, we only do warlord delivery.”

Well.

Instead of adapting to this new operation, the UN has just stopped doing its job.
UNRWA can’t secure convoys. WFP convoys sometimes get looted.
So instead of working together, everyone’s just pointing fingers at Israel while aid literally sits inside Gaza.

If you're confused, you're not alone.
I’m confused too.

This isn’t just about who lets aid in. It’s about who gets to deliver it, distribute it, and control the narrative around it.

Add to the pile of contradictions:

• Israel says Hamas steals UN aid.

• Israeli military now says: actually, they didn’t. Not routinely. (via The NY Times)

• Hamas did steal from smaller NGOs, but there’s apparently no conclusive proof they raided the UN pipeline. “Routinely,” that is. Maybe just sometimes.

• Meanwhile, the Israeli government blocked aid for 2 months based on that assumption.

• And now the people are starving.

Why is the U.N. Refusing to Deliver Aid?

In a July 25th Wall Street Journal op-ed, the exec chairman of GHF, Rev Johnnie Moore, makes clear his organization has repeatedly called for the U.N. and its affiliate agencies to combine efforts to feed the people of Gaza. Instead, he says, they’ve been met with silence and “smears.”

He says

Rather than acknowledging the broader systemic failures affecting all aid groups, U.N. spokespeople and U.N.-aligned organizations have attacked the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation for its association with Israel.

He goes on to say

It is unacceptable that these thousands of tons of aid remain undistributed or delayed while civilians continue to go without food. This wasn’t an inevitable outcome, it resulted from a lack of adaptability and an unwillingness to collaborate.

To not distribute what is already there is outrageous and a tragedy.

Read more

Naturally, the posts were deleted, but the internet never forgets.

In a statement that was written a WHOLE TWO DAYS later by a team of probably twelve lawyers, Sesame Street says the account was hacked and called the posts “abhorrent.”

Notably, Sesame Street’s statement never uses the word “sorry” or “apologize.” Now, I don’t mean to be a petty b, but last I checked, it’s not an apology unless you say ‘sorry.’ That seems like something Elmo would probably teach on the show.

Because this is the internet, dozens of people chimed in to tell me I’m wrong lol.

Here’s the thing: I don’t personally care that Elmo went on an antisemitic bender because obviously that wasn’t Elmo. Duh.

But what does piss me off is how weak the response was.

Had Elmo called for the death of literally anyone else, there would likely be a stronger demand for more affirmative language taking a stand with said community.

When it comes to Jews, though, the best they can do is point a finger and say, “it wasn’t us.” Like, yeah. no shit. We know it wasn’t you. But that’s it? That’s the best you can do? The resposne could’ve been a little more loving and practice what they preach on the show.

Sesame Street taught generations of kids how to be kind, brave, and inclusive. So maybe try living up to your own values when someone uses your brand to spread hate.

Here’s how Sesame Street should’ve apologized:

On Sunday night, Elmo’s X account was hacked by a malicious actor. We are appalled that someone would take a beloved children's character to spread a message of hate.

To our Jewish viewers, families, friends, and colleagues: we are sorry for the hurt and confusion this has caused. The fact that these abhorrent words came through a character meant to bring joy and safety to children makes it all the more appalling.

At a time when antisemitism is rising, this is all the more disturbing and unnaceptable. Know that we stand with you

Jewish children, families, and communities have always had a home on Sesame Street. And you always will.

The. fucking. End. (not that hard)

(p.s. I am available for hire for your communications needs ;)

Like, I get that lawyers (many of whom were probably Jewish themselves tbh) went full lawyer here, but couldn’t they infuse some love, creativity, and empathy? It all just feels so cold.

Anyway, this cyber-nightmare comes right after Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok ALSO went full Mein Kampf this, spewing praise for Hitler and parroting white nationalist talking points because apparently the algorithm is just a Nazi now?

All of this is unfolding while real-world antisemitism is on the rise—like, actual Jews being firebombed, shot, and killed in the U.S.—and somehow it’s the puppets and robots making headlines.

Somebody please unplug us from this simulation.

***

If you’ve ever attended a gay wedding in America, you have, in large part, Evan Wolfson to thank. Not for the party, of course. But for the fact that the marriage is legal at all.

It’s been exactly ten years since the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges made marriage equality the law of the land in all 50 states.

It was a victory so historic and generationally defining that it can be easy to forget it wasn’t always inevitable. It had to be imagined into existence. And Evan Wolfson is one of the pivotal lawyers who did exactly that. (Or, as the kids say, he manifested it.)

In 1983, Wolfson wrote his Harvard Law thesis on the legal case for marriage equality. It was a document so wildly ahead of its time that it wasn’t so much viewed as controversial as it was simply unthinkable.

That thesis would become the blueprint for a decades-long civil rights battle, culminating in the Supreme Court’s landmark Obergefell v. Hodges ruling in 2015.

Along the way, he argued before the Supreme Court in Boy Scouts of America v. Dale (2000) and later expanded his thesis into the 2004 book, Why Marriage Matters, being named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world.

Wolfson founded the non-profit Freedom to Marry and led it until its goal was achieved in 2015 and the group voluntarily shut down.

In January of this year, President Biden awarded him the Presidential Citizens Medal, one of the highest civilian honors in the United States.

Not too shabby.

But Evan is not a look-at-me guy. He’s more of a look-at-what-we-built kind of humble mensch.

Earlier this month, we sat down over Zoom for an hour to discuss the milestone anniversary.

The following is our conversation, lightly edited for clarity, length, and narrative cohesion with bolded sections for ease of reading.

Peter Fox: In 2022, President Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act. Was that more of a symbolic gesture, or did it actually repeal DOMA in full?

Evan Wolfson: Yeah. So the Respect for Marriage Act that was passed by a bipartisan vote of Congress in 2022, and signed by President Biden on the White House lawn, actually is not just symbolic. It is actually very important and meaningful. Because it, among other things—as you said—repealed the so-called Defense of Marriage Act. So it repudiated that discrimination officially with a bipartisan vote, including some who had voted for DOMA originally. But even more important, it provides that any couple that gets lawfully married in any state—or really anywhere—must be respected as married in all 50 states, as well as in the federal government, for federal protections and responsibilities, and so on. So, in other words, it embodies in law essentially a 90% protection against even the worst-case scenario where, as some people worry, if the Supreme Court were to overturn our marriage victory of 10 years ago, thereby removing the guarantee of the freedom to marry in all 50 states, we would still have legal protection for our marriages in all 50 states. So it's not just symbolic. It is a substantive protection and a guarantee that the worst that people are fearing—which I think is unlikely, anyway—but even if the worst were to happen and the Supreme Court ruling were overturned, even if you couldn’t get married in a state, for example Alabama, Alabama would still have to legally honor the lawful marriages of people who leave Alabama, go to California or New York or New Jersey or Colorado, and get married and come back home.

So we’re in a stronger position now because of the Respect for Marriage Act than we were even in the lead-up to our win, because we succeeded in passing that legislation that now mandates federal and interstate protection for marriages.

Peter Fox: It's a very refreshing response, because it's optimistic, and it's a lot more optimistic than you'll hear from certain activists online. I think among LGBTQ activists, there’s a real fear that like this is going to be overturned the way Roe was, and if it's overturned, like they'll lose rights. But it sounds like what you're saying is, even if that happens, there's a way to make it work.

Evan Wolfson: Yeah, well, I mean, you know, of course, people are right to be concerned about the terrible climate in our country and the bad politics and the dangers and the attacks that some—in a minority, but a minority wielding disproportionate power—would like to inflict on gay people, on trans people, on all kinds of other groups of Americans. So people are right to be worried about that, and to be frustrated and angry and disgusted and embarrassed by the toxicity of some of the politics. But people should not just sit around worrying, and should not sit around cataloging all the ways in which things might even still get worse. Things are bad enough already, and we should get to work. And we should get to work meaning taking back political power and getting our country on the right track—not just sitting and stewing and assuming that all kinds of bad things that the right wing might like to do have already happened. That’s not true, and we are in a stronger position than people may think, even though we also face very serious threats that we need to fight. And if we fight those threats successfully, we will protect ourselves against further threats.

And on the question of optimism—I generally don’t describe myself as optimistic. I generally describe myself as hopeful. And I absolutely believe there’s always going to be a pathway forward, and we can do the work, and we can overcome terrible things, including, you know, the AIDS epidemic, the rise of the religious right, not to mention, of course, race discrimination, the oppression of women, etc. So I always believe we can work and find a pathway forward, and the best way to do that is to begin with hope rather than to begin by making things even worse than they are and spending all our time worrying.

The Respect for Marriage Act was a bill that we wrote as part of our campaign to win marriage. I think we actually wrote it back in 2009, 2010—give or take—and I’m the one that actually came up with the name, Respect for Marriage Act, back then.

Peter Fox: Didn’t know that.

Evan Wolfson: And it was introduced by Jerry Nadler and later Dianne Feinstein in the Congress, and we pursued that as one tool in our campaign to win, building toward the Supreme Court. We actually did not intend to pass it. We didn't really believe it was likely that we would be able to get it to pass through Congress because of how divided the politics were at the time. We saw it as one methodology, one tactic in our organizing effort to build support for the freedom to marry in a way that would shape the climate so that we could win in the Supreme Court, which was our strategy. We did not think it was likely to pass. But many years later, after we won—after our campaign succeeded and we won 10 years ago in the Supreme Court—support continued building. The bipartisan support continued growing, and we found ourselves with the cumulative momentum of what we had done at a moment when we actually might be able to pass the bill. And so, thanks to the strong leadership of President Biden, but also Senator Tammy Baldwin, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and others, we seized the moment, including the threat that Clarence Thomas and Alito were pushing out at that time in the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade.

Peter Fox: Was your strategy from the start, always about taking it to the courts versus getting it on ballots?

Evan Wolfson: Yeah. So the strategy was to create a climate in which we could win in the Supreme Court. We looked at—what did we want? We wanted to affirm the freedom to marry nationwide and make sure marriages are respected throughout the country. That was the goal. From goal, you go to strategy—so how are you going to make that happen? Well, in our system there are basically two actors that can bring the country to national resolution: either the Congress or the Supreme Court. The other way would have been, as you just said, to just go state by state by state by state, plotting through, you know, Mississippi in the year 2080. But we didn’t want to wait that long. So we looked at which of those two actors that can bring the country to national resolution is the most likely for us to succeed. And Congress, for the reasons I mentioned earlier—was divided and sometimes dysfunctional—and it didn’t seem likely we were going to be able to get it through Congress.

It was also not legally clear that Congress has the power to require marriage in all 50 states. Marriage is, in the first instance, governed by the states. It’s the states that issue marriage licenses, not Congress. So it wasn't 100% clear that Congress could pass a national marriage law. Congress can regulate interstate relations, which is where the Respect for Marriage Act comes in, but the affirmative granting of licenses is something that the Constitution most likely leaves to the states. So, for all those reasons, we decided that the strategy would be we would aim to win in the Supreme Court. The problem with that was we had already lost in the Supreme Court [Baker v. Nelson (1972)].

I wasn’t the first one to think of the idea of gay people getting married. In that 1983 paper as a law student, I was writing about the first wave of marriage litigation that had begun in our movement immediately after Stonewall. Stonewall was 1969, and in the early seventies, couples began going to court seeking the freedom to marry. And one of those cases reached the Supreme Court, which in 1972, like all the other courts in that first wave, threw the case out—basically said, there’s no claim here. The couples have no right. There is no such thing as gay people being able to marry. The freedom to marry doesn’t protect these couples against the denial. And those cases all lost. I was writing about those cases 10 or so years later, saying, let’s not take that no for an answer. Here’s a way to move it forward.

And so the rest of the strategy became creating the climate that would enable us to win in the Supreme Court. But one of the methods we used to create a climate to win in the Supreme Court was to try to win marriage in multiple states, to build a critical mass of states. That was track one of the strategy. Track two of the strategy, synergistically, was to build a critical mass of public support—to grow, to grow, to grow support. We were at 11% when I wrote my paper in 1983. That’s not a critical mass. So we wanted to get a higher number of support. Ultimately, we wanted to get to majority support—and even beyond. And so one of the methods we used, among many, was, for example, to introduce this bill in Congress. Not because we actually thought we could pass it, but because we thought it would help build discussion and give us a vehicle for engaging Beltway influencers, including members of Congress and ultimately the courts, so that they would be ready to rule in our favor when the case came at the right time, and the Respect for Marriage Act was initially created as a tool, not as an actual legislative tool, legislative vehicle for actual passage, as as we built momentum and as we did the work, and as we change hearts and minds and as we seized opportunities, and as we also use threats against us as a call to action. There came an opportunity to pass the Respect for Marriage Act, and that's what we did in 2022 seven years after we had already won the freedom to marry.

Peter Fox: Not to make you sound super old, but how were you becoming an expert on marriage laws in the ‘80s. Not just the question of gay rights, but understanding that marriage touches a thousand different federal benefits and legal protections. How were you figuring all that out, as someone still in your twenties?

Evan Wolfson: Yeah. Well, you know, back before the internet, we read books. We went to these giant buildings called libraries. We read law journals, which were actually published in print, and you would go to either the libraries or get them in the mail. There were giant books that collected Supreme Court cases, and that's what lawyers and law students did. They actually went through all these vast materials. And there were also services that did some research and also published serials.

Peter Fox: Were you surprised when you were doing your research that there was a 1972 case for marriage equality?

Evan Wolfson: I can't remember now exactly, but I vaguely think I had known about that. I mean, there was obviously a lot of national discussion. And, you know, back in the day, we had newspapers.

Peter Fox: Yeah, I grew up without internet for like, three years too. I only really ask because, you know, people always talk about with homophobia, it's because there was so much ignorance, because there was a lack of access to information, so you really had to go out of your way to find it, so you were someone who was able to find it in not the easiest places.

Evan Wolfson: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's true that the Internet gives us all just this extraordinary access to information at, you know, at the tap of a finger. And that is one of the great powers and great opportunities that we have in our current moment. The downside of the internet is it also floods us all with so much information, so much noise, and so much disinformation, that it becomes harder to even pay attention, it becomes harder to find the truth, and it becomes harder to engage in discussion in a way that will on the basis of shared facts and to really be able to find your way to truth and persuading people.

You know, it gives you a great tool, but it also has some disadvantage, and so that one of the lessons of that is learn how to use the tool and don't be a prisoner of the tool, you know, find other ways of gaining information, of validating information.

Peter Fox: Yeah, at the same time, the internet was so instrumental in normalizing acceptance and even, like, celebration of gay people. It almost seems like not a random coincidence that the marriage movement took off right as social media was really taking off in the 2010s.

Evan Wolfson: I want to quibble with how you phrased that. The internet didn’t do that. People did that using the internet as a tool.

Peter Fox: Right. But people were changing their profile pictures to having a rainbow gradient over their face. “Love is Love” went viral. That was kind of a phenomenon.

Evan Wolfson: They were doing that because other people were reaching them with a call to action, with stories, with an environment of opportunity. It didn't just happen. You know, there's no internet button for let's make the world better for gay people, right?

Peter Fox: Yeah, I actually wanted to ask you something: when you created the Freedom to Marry organization, were you ever hoping that you would argue before the Supreme Court for one of the marriage cases?

Evan Wolfson: No, not at that point. I mean, I had, as you know, already argued in the Supreme Court in the Boy Scouts case. It was a thrilling, scary, incredible experience—and I absolutely would’ve welcomed the chance to do it again.

But at the same time, when I left Lambda [Legal], where I’d been one of the key litigators in the movement, and one of the early litigators on marriage, alongside my co-counsel—we had already won the world’s first-ever ruling in favor of the freedom to marry in Hawaii in 1996. When I left Lambda to start Freedom to Marry, I made a decision: I wasn’t going to litigate anymore.

I stepped back from being a litigator—not because I didn’t love it, but because I knew there were other truly great litigators who could take on that piece of the strategy. And the strategy needed more than just litigation.

What I saw was a huge need for someone to step out and galvanize everything else that needed to happen—the public education, the messaging, the organizing, the political work. And that’s what I committed myself to with Freedom to Marry, trusting that the litigation side was in very good hands.

Peter Fox: How instrumental was your organization, Freedom to Marry in getting the marriage movement started and mobilized? Would we have this 2015 Supreme Court decision if Freedom to Marry wasn't part of it?

Evan Wolfson: Freedom to Marry was instrumental but it was not the only contributor and not the only factor, but it was an an instrumental factor. And I don't think we would have gotten there as soon as we did without Freedom to Marry.

And the reason for that is, I think that in order to win, we needed four things.

Number one, we needed the Constitution and the guarantees of liberty, ie the freedom to marry, equal protection and what the constitutional system embodies, the right to protest, the right to petition elected officials and courts for the redress of our grievances, as the Constitution says, we needed an independent judiciary, a robust free press, the right to protest, et cetera. We needed all of that constitutional system that we could leverage to get to end this discrimination and our exclusion from marriage. But as we all know from our history and as we know from our daily perusal of the internet today, those that constitutional system doesn't enforce itself. It doesn't it doesn't self execute, and it's fragile and it can be damaged and ignored.

So in order to invoke that constitutional power, we needed three other things: we needed a movement. We needed a strategy, and we needed a campaign.

There are many organizations, many players, many methodologies of change, litigation, legislation, public education, direct action, electoral work, fundraising. There are many egos, there are many battles, there are many states, there are many years, there are many pieces that were going to be necessary in order to change the hearts and minds and the law in order to win marriage. No one person, no one organization, no one methodology did it all. Even though our strategy was litigation-centered, we needed to do all the other things in order to create the climate in which litigation could succeed in a way that it hadn't back in 1972 so we needed a movement. We needed this multiplicity. But if you only have a movement, you have this swirl of random activity and actions, and some people think this, and some people think that, and this happens. And then so we needed the two other things as well. We needed a strategy. And I already mentioned that earlier. I can talk more about what our strategy was, but we we had a strategy. Now, not everyone had the same strategy, but you don't need every you need enough. That's one of my rules of activism. And so what we needed to do was to bring together a critical mass of action around a winning strategy, even if some people didn't agree, even if some people were contributing to that strategy without knowing it.

Peter Fox: And what constitutes a critical mass is that the majority of the states or just a dozen?

Evan Wolfson: We didn't know exactly what a critical mass would be, but it was more than zero, which is what it was when I started. The second track of the strategy was to have a critical mass of public support. We didn't know what that was, but it was more than 11% which is what it was when I started. It's more than 27% which is what it was when my co-counsel and I did the Hawaii case [in 1996] and won the first ruling, but ultimately didn't cross the finish line at that point, because we didn't yet have that critical mass. And the third track of the strategy was to tackle and end the federal discrimination, the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, that was added on top of the state discrimination that we were challenging. So we needed a strategy, and we had a strategy, and it was on freedom to marry’s website. It was called the roadmap to victory. You can still see it if you go to the website.

Peter Fox: It’s interesting how The Defense of Marriage Act was signed into law as a direct response to the case you argued in Hawaii [in 1996]. But even without DOMA, there still wouldn’t have been marriage for gay couples without these lawsuits moving forward. So, how much harder did DOMA actually make it? The 2015 Supreme Court ruling came after part of DOMA was struck down.

Evan Wolfson: So, the discrimination we were challenging, and by we I mean decades of couples and lawyers and activists and gay people generally, over 40 years, was the denial of marriage. In other words, our exclusion from marriage. In the first instance, you are denied marriage by a state. States in our system, the American system is pretty unusual in this regard compared to most countries. But in the United States, marriage licenses are issued by states. There is no marriage law at the national level. It's all state by state by state. So the discrimination that people were encountering when they went to court in the early 70s, when they went to court in the 90s, when they went to court was discrimination by the states. If you live in New York, you go to the New York City Clerk and you ask for a marriage license; New York would have said no at one point. So that was the discrimination when we began mounting the turning point challenges.

In other words, there was that first wave of marriage litigation back in the early 70s. They all lost, the couple that went to the clerk in Minnesota, and were denied a license. And then they went to court in Minnesota, and that case went all the way to the Supreme Court. Other couples went the clerk in Washington. There was a case in Maryland, etc. They were all denied, and then they lost in court. They were denied at the state level. In Hawaii [1996], [gay] couples went to the clerk's office and asked for a marriage license. They were denied. We then organized the effort and eventually had the world's first ever trial, and for the first time ever won in court. The court said these couples must be given a marriage license. While that was happening, literally, while Dan Foley and I, my non gay co counsel, and I were in court in Hawaii, fighting in the courtroom to win the freedom to marry Congress, spurred by the Republican presidential campaign, actually jumped into the action and decided to pass another law at the federal level, saying that even if those couples win in Hawaii, the federal government will not honor their marriages. So even before we had won marriage anywhere, politicians in Washington were passing a discriminatory law, a new discriminatory law called the Defense of Marriage Act, to say that even if we succeed in winning someday in some state, they will not respect that marriage at the federal level. And they also ostensibly gave permission to the other states to not honor the marriages either. So, when DOMA was passed in 1996 by, you know, Republicans in Congress, but with an overwhelming bipartisan vote, and signed into law by Bill Clinton during a presidential campaign, and when that was passed, it was hypothetical, because we didn't have the freedom to marry anywhere. And what I said at the time was, this is, you know, this is disgusting, it's discriminatory, it's unconstitutional, it's wrong, but it won't stop us, because what they didn't do was say states may not issue marriage licenses. What they did say was, we're going to discriminate, even if a state does so. Our first step had still had to be to win marriage in some state, and that's what we launched this campaign to do.

Peter Fox: Yeah, I wonder why they didn't make it even broader.

Evan Wolfson: Arguably, because it's not clear that Congress has the authority to regulate marriage in the sense of saying what a marriage is or isn't. What Congress may have the authority to do is to say how the federal government will treat the marriages that are celebrated by the states, and it does have the ability to regulate the interstate relationships under the Full Faith and Credit Clause, but it arguably doesn't have the power to directly regulate marriage itself. That is a matter initially left to the states under the guarantees of the federal constitution.

Peter Fox: After the Hawaii case and the passage of DOMA, as you were launching Freedom to Marry, what was the climate like within the broader gay rights movement? I’ve heard different things. Some say marriage wasn’t really the priority at the time—that the focus should be on things like housing, workplace discrimination, and other immediate protections. But you believed marriage should be the focus. And in the end, you were proven right, that by winning marriage, so many of those other barriers and forms of discrimination would collapse underneath it.

Evan Wolfson: Well, you may know some gay people, and you therefore may have discovered that gay people don't always agree, right?

When I first started making the case for marriage—first as a law student, and then as a volunteer attorney at Lambda Legal while working my day job as a prosecutor—the movement itself was divided. Not just the public, but even within the LGBTQ community.

After moving to New York from law school, I spent my nights and weekends volunteering at Lambda, doing pro bono legal work, and pushing the idea that we needed a marriage strategy. But like the broader public, Lambda—and really, all the other LGBTQ organizations at the time—was deeply divided on whether marriage was the right fight.

There were really two kinds of resistance within the community.

First, the ideological camp. These were people who believed marriage was a flawed institution—patriarchal, oppressive, outdated—or that as gay people, we shouldn’t be fighting to assimilate. We should be changing the system entirely, not trying to join it. We should be outlaws or revolutionaries, not people asking for inclusion into traditional structures.

This was especially common among the activist circles that made up most of the movement’s leadership at the time. And remember, back then, the movement was much smaller than it is today.

The second camp was strategic. These were people who may or may not have agreed with marriage in principle but felt it wasn’t the right fight at the time. They were worried it would be too far, too fast—a distraction from more urgent battles like fighting AIDS, housing discrimination, workplace protections, and custody rights.

I understood that perspective. I didn’t agree with it, but I understood where it came from.

I wish I could say it was my brilliant, tenacious arguments that changed everyone’s mind. But that wouldn’t be true.

What really changed things—what transformed the conversation—was AIDS.

AIDS shattered the silence around gay lives. It shattered the illusion that we could just be left alone and be okay. Suddenly, it was clear how vulnerable we were to discrimination, to exclusion, to being cut out of our own families and relationships.

People were dying, and their partners—people they had built their lives with—were denied hospital visits, health care, inheritance, even access to their own homes when families swooped in and took everything. You couldn’t ignore it.

AIDS shifted the movement from one that had largely been about “let us be” to one that said, “let us in.”

Peter Fox: I’ve heard that said before, but didn’t AIDS also deepen homophobia? Because now that people realized that gays were everywhere, if you were already homophobic, then it sort of validated the fear that these scary people are everywhere.

Evan Wolfson: Yes, it absolutely got worse before it got better, and not first and foremost in the matter of death and illness and suffering that you know so many of us had to endure, but also in the fear and the stigma and the exploitation by the religious right and by the Republican Party to try to demonize gay people and demonize people with HIV, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah. I mean, absolutely, it got worse before it get better. And one of the lessons for today is as we deal with the current challenges of discrimination and stigma and the assault on democracy and the lawlessness and the corruption of the Trump and Republican regime is it will get worse before it gets better, but as it gets worse, it also shakes people's conscience. It awakens people. It educates people. It gives us the opportunity, if we do our work, to transform the situation. And just as we had to in the face of AIDS and discrimination back in the 80s and 90s, so we now are called to do today.

Peter Fox: What are the current legal challenges that you think we should focus on? A few years ago, the author, Jamie Kirkchick, wrote an article in The Atlantic on how gay rights have been won, which maybe was controversial to the prevailing view in movements in regards to gay right, not the various transgender rights litigations. But what are the challenges that you think need to be focused on, or that there could be pushback in the future? Or are you focusing on legal challenges in a completely different area?

Evan Wolfson: Well, as you know, I’m not on the front lines of the movement anymore. I don’t run an organization, and I’m not working inside any of the legal groups. But I still stay close with the friends and colleagues I worked with, and I get asked for advice sometimes.

I’ve written amicus briefs in recent Supreme Court cases on transgender rights and on pushing back against efforts to carve out religious exemptions for discrimination. But most of my work now focuses on supporting democracy and helping other causes—women’s rights, gun control, climate, healthcare, education. I try to share the lessons that worked in the fight for marriage and help others apply them to whatever frontline work they’re leading.

That said, even though we’ve transformed the place of gay people in American life—and in many countries around the world—there’s still a long way to go.

The full set of legal protections hasn’t been achieved. We still need:

• A federal civil rights law, like the Equality Act, which has passed the House but never made it through Congress.

• Stronger state laws protecting against discrimination—not just in employment, where the Bostock Supreme Court ruling was a major win, but also in public accommodations, housing, and credit.

• Protection not just at large companies but across industries, small businesses, and all the places where discrimination still happens.

There’s a lot of legal work left to do—both defensive and affirmative.

But the goal isn’t just good laws. The goal is good lives.

Our work isn’t finished until every person—gay, trans, non-gay—can live fully and openly without fear of being denied opportunities or facing discrimination. Even the fear of discrimination pushes people into the closet. It cramps lives. It creates depression. It makes people less able to pursue happiness, which is supposed to be part of the American promise.

So the work has to happen on many levels: legal, cultural, familial, spiritual. It’s all the work of a movement.

Peter Fox: Well, thanks so much. Evan, this was so comprehensive and always really enlightening hearing from you.

Just a few months ago, almost no one had heard the name Zohran Mamdani. In February, he was polling at 1%. Last night, he won in a landslide so decisive, so biblical that Andrew Cuomo conceded before the night was over.

Even the polls that got it right still got it wrong.

The assumption was that Cuomo would hold a commanding lead in the first round of voting, with Mamdani narrowly overtaking him deep into ranked-choice voting, somewhere around round seven or eight. Yeah… no.

That is not what happened.

Instead, Mamdani delivered a mandate. A very loud message from the voters of New York that they were done with the old guard. The young people of New York SHOWED UP in record-breaking numbers for their charismatic, sexy, socialist heartthrob. He’s now the unofficial Fresh Prince of progressive socialist politics for a politically conscious youth movement hungry for a model of new leadership.

It’s all the more remarkable considering the 33-year-old Zohran Mamdani is a figure so controversial that both The New York Post and The New York Times editorial boards found themselves on the same side of an issue, telling voters, in no uncertain terms, do not vote for Zohran Mamdani. Even the Chicago Tribune wrote an editorial essentially saying, “New York, don’t become Chicago.”

And well, New York did it anyway.

This is a historic shake-up that will be studied for years much the same way Trump has transformed politics. If Zohran’s elected in November, you will FEEL the change.

Much of Zohran’s success further points to old media’s growing irrelevance compared to podcasts and other forms of New Media, where Mamdani found a massive audience.

how did mamdani pull this off?

Well, for starters, he built a literal, on-the-ground, door-knocking army of more than 50,000 volunteers—many of whom wore shirts that said “Hot Girls/Guys for Zohran.” Together, they knocked on 1.5 million doors.

Cuomo’s ground game, on the other hand, was basically nonexistent until a few weeks ago.

Still, though. How does someone with virtually no experience rise form obscurity to winning the primary?

Let’s take the politics out of it for a second.

Pretend this is a job interview.

Some guy walks into the room. He’s mid-career, early-30s, and says, “Hey, I’d like to be the CEO of one of the biggest companies on earth.” And you’re like, “Oh wow, cool, where’d you work before?” And he’s like, “Oh, I’ve been at this place for a couple years... I don’t really show up, though. I actually have the worst attendance record of anyone on staff and have never managed anyone. BUT. I have a lot of thoughts about how this place should run. Also, whatever you do, don’t even consider the other guy who knows this place inside and out. He sucks.”

Everyone agrees. So, you listen.

He doesn’t have a great resume, but he has the type of charm that makes you forget what the original question was that you were asking.

And somehow, not only does he get past the recruiter and initial interview, but the hiring board made up of young people is like, “You know what? That’s our guy.”

The lesson here is simple. Politics isn’t really about qualifications. It’s not even always about reality. It’s about narrative. It’s about who can tell the best story and make you believe it’s yours, too. And Zohran sold a story like the showman he is. Like a guy who’s been waiting his whole life for the spotlight. If you didn’t know, his mom, Mira Nair, is one of India’s most acclaimed filmmakers. Of course, he understood the assignment for this moment.

And the assignment wasn’t “Who would make the best mayor?” That was the test for Cuomo and Brad Lander. The real assignment was “Who can run the best campaign? Who can make enough people feel something so strongly they show up and vote?” Zohran completely changed the game with his hilarious Instagram Reels. He made field organizing look cool and sexy.

How are most Jews Feeling?

Oh, the Jews are not well. The WhatsApp notifications haven’t stopped since last night.

So yeah, a lot of people are having a lot of FEELINGS right now. Shock. Rage. Denial. Existential dread. (Deep breath in. Hold. Release. You’re doing great.)

Is he antisemitic?

One of the biggest mistakes the Jewish community has made in recent years is allowing antisemitism to be defined as “Jew-hate.” (Which… can we pause for a second to ask how we managed to turn ‘Jew’ into an adjective? Who approved that? Deeply unsettling. But okay.)

The problem isn’t just the wording. The problem is the framing. Because most antisemitism today doesn’t look like hate. As if the only way to qualify as antisemitic is to openly declare hatred of Jews.

Zohran’s antisemitism is a more invisible, structural kind of bigotry that manifests as exclusion, erasure, minimization, and a casual disregard so normalized that most people don’t even notice it—except the Jewish people dealing with it.

This is not a phenomenon entirely unique to Jews. For years, Black Americans had to explain that racism isn’t just about someone calling you a slur. It’s about a system designed to make you invisible unless you’re willing to contort yourself into the version the dominant culture is willing to accept. That framework was dismissed as too academic until, seemingly overnight, in 2020, it wasn’t.

Jews could learn from that framing, because what we’re seeing today, especially in certain activist circles, isn’t always straight-up hatred. (though plenty of that exists, too: Exhibit A being the Capital Jewish Museum murders). It’s more often about a kind of sneering disrespect. A worldview where Jews aren’t seen as a vulnerable minority with a valuable voice, but as the privileged ones who are simply being difficult.

And that’s the thing with Mamdani. Is he a “raging antisemite”? No. I don’t think he hates Jews. But it’s also clear he doesn’t hold that much respect for most Jews either.

Zohran’s type of antisemitism reframes pro-Israel Jews (aka most of us) as the unreasonable ones. Because everyone else—every cool person, and right-thinking progressive—can clearly see how brilliant and fun and morally flawless Zohran is.

Zohran has such little respect for Jews that when the Holocaust Museum and virtually every major Jewish organization condemned his recent remarks comparing the word “intifada” to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, he not only never apologized or clarified, he simply didn’t address the issue. He ignored the Jewish community entirely. He didn’t even bother typing out one of those half-assed Notes app apologies. Because with the coalition he’s built, he doesn’t have to care what the Jewish community thinks. Our approval means nothing to him.

This is the kind of antisemitism Mamdani has mastered. He has built a coalition so large and powerful that he can afford to alienate most of the city’s 1 million Jews.

And it’s hard not to imagine what a Mayor Mamdani administration would look like in this context. Will he take meetings with the ADL, AJC, UJA, JCRC—the whole Jewish alphabet soup? Maybe. But it’ll be tense. The energy won’t be a friendly partnership. It’ll be more like diplomatic talks between two separate nations. Jewish institutions will function as their own little state, forced to negotiate its place in a city their community helped build for generations.

Did he win because of antisemitism?

No, I don’t think so. Palesitnian activism is core to his political origins, but he won because he’s an incredible showman. He won because the Democratic establishment did what it does best—completely failed to offer voters anyone remotely inspiring.

Instead, the front-runner spot was assumed by a credibly accused sexual harasser. A guy backed by Republican billionaires. A guy who lied about nursing home deaths during COVID. A guy who became the walking, talking embodiment of everything broken about the system.

Shockingly, that’s not what most voters wanted.

Zohran won because he actually talked about the things real people in this city care about. He told a better story. And that’s how you win. He’s also hot AF.

I couldn’t tell you a single thing Cuomo campaigned on because I never once saw him campaign. I never saw a single poster for him in the last 6 months. No rallies. No flyers. No emails. No sad little subway ad. Where the hell was he? Did he think osmosis was gonna do the job?

Meanwhile, Zohran’s bright, punchy blue-and-orange posters were everywhere.

He looked like the future. And like it or not, in politics, showing up is half the battle

Let’s break down some of the demographic shifts, bc this is where things gets really fascinating.

Cuomo won big with Black + lower income voters

Despite running on a “tax the rich” message, Mamdani won with… the rich.

Mamdani ironically cleaned up in the most gentrified parts of the city. It starts to make sense when you look a little closer. He appealed to a very specific kind of privileged New Yorker—the young, highly-educated, very online contingent for whom voting socialist is the ultimate virtue signal. The kind where you get all the moral satisfaction of supporting the revolution without actually having to suffer the consequences of the policies.

Mamdani won with everyone except Black + Jewish voters

If you take a look at the map below, you’ll see that Cuomo performed best in neighborhoods that were furthest away from Manhattan’s spotlight. Eastern Queens, South Brooklyn, The Bronx, and Staten Island. And in Manhattan virtually the only real pockets of support came from exactly where you’d expect if you’ve spent five minutes understanding New York’s Jewish community: the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side.

Now let’s look at a section of Williamsburg, Brooklyn as a case study.

Here you’ll find expensive East River waterfront property where a one bedroom apartment can go for $5k-$7k. These are not scrappy revolutionaries. These are finance bros with Patagonia vests and $300 sneakers. They went for Zohran.

The results by borough tell story

Cuomo’s sad little island of support was in the Bronx and Staten Island—the two remaining boroughs that have mostly resisted the wave of gentrication and the $19 avocado toast that comes with it. Cuomo-land doesn’t come with influencers or matcha latte coffe shops. Just actual New Yorkers who’ve lived there forever. Mamdani made a huge impression on young people who live in the closest proximity to Manhattan and the fun, trendy parts of the city.

One of NYC’s most Jewish neighborhoods, the Upper West Side gives a picture of just how divided people were. This is one of the few areas with a near even distribution.

Any way, I could keep ranting all day. Thank you for reading. More to come.

Trump assured the world on Live TV last night at 10 PM that, “We’re not at war with Iran, we're at war with Iran's nuclear program,” which is kind of like saying, “I didn’t hit you, I just gently disassembled your ribcage.”

I’m not a foreign policy expert (lol), but I do know this: the Iranian regime is a brutal, theocratic death cult with nuclear ambitions. And while I’m deeply unsettled by Trump’s decision-making process, I’m also not about to pretend Fordow was some utopian yoga retreat in the mountains.

Read more

Early voting is underway in NYC and this mayor’s race is proving to be a chaotic, high-stakes clusterfuck on the Democratic establishment, the housing apocalypse, and the cost of living in the world’s most expensive city.

The race has become a showdown between disgraced handsy nepo baby pandemic daddy former governor Andrew Cuomo and charismatic socialist heartthrob (and other nepo baby) Zohran Mamdani.

And then there’s Brad Lander, a nice jewish dad, stuck in a distant third place. He’s the current city comptroller, a nerdy policy wonk with the vibe of a guy who’s read every page of the city budget and enjoys it.

There’s 8 other candidates on the ballot, too, but only the top 3 stand a real chance.

Cuomo has held a steady lead in most polls, though, Mamdani has something Cuomo doesn’t: horny Gen Z canvassers, viral Instagram Reels that slap, and an actual base that’s FIRED UP.

This race is absolutely unhinged. we’re headed straight for a ranked-choice election so convoluted it could end with Zohran Mamdani in Gracie Mansion even if he loses the primary.

Here’s how New York could get its first socialist mayor (with insights via Olivia Reingold at The Free Press)

• Scenario 1: Zohran wins the primary by sneaking up the ranked-choice ladder while everyone else eats each other alive. Only 26.5% of voters turned out for the 2021 mayoral primary. Mamdani’s base is young and EXTREMELY online. These kids will crawl through broken glass if it means free buses and cheaper rent. And they’re following orders: “Don’t. Rank. Cuomo.”

• Scenario 2: Cuomo wins the primary, but Zohran runs on the Working Families Party line and still wins the general when Eric Adams (running as an independent) and Cuomo + Republican Curtis Sliwa split the “please not the socialist” vote.

Whoever wins this clown car derby is gonna have the keys to a $100 billion city budget, a housing crisis, and more rats than people. So yeah. It’s worth paying attention, even if you don’t live in New York.

Here’s where things stand, via the Peter Fox Polling Summary™

• Cuomo — Toxic ex, but experienced AF. Might win. Definitely needs therapy.

• Mamdani — Sexy socialist cult leader. Could win. Condemned by the literal Holocaust Museum.

• Lander — Boring Budget daddy. The least offensive person running. Could be the surprise upset winner of ranked-choice voting.

• Adams — Church aunt energy. Qualified grown-up who is getting drowned out.

• Stringer — qualified, tired, policy king with a questionable MeToo allegation.

• Myrie — The one guy everyone respects, but not enough to be mayor. Young with bright future.

• Ramos — Public meltdown in progress. Still on the ballot. No idea why.

• Tilson — Sweet, rich dad. Running for Mayor of LinkedIn.

Who’s Voting for Who? 👵🙋🏾‍♀️👶🙋‍♀️✡️🗳️

According to an Emerson Poll, Cuomo is polling best with Black voters (74%), women (58%), and voters over 50 (66%)—aka Boomers who are traumatized by the ‘80s, still use an AOL email address, and are most likely to vote in a primary.

Mamdani, on the other hand, owns the under-50 white progressive vote (61%)—the oat milk latte, queer-normcore, tax-the-rich crowd whose political education came entirely from carousel posts on Instagram.

As of last week, he’s beating Andrew Cuomo in a major new poll, leading 35% to Cuomo’s 31%. That’s not just a fluke. He has momentum and could absolutely win.

And the Jewish vote? It’s a scattered mess. Mamdani’s Free Palestine, arrest Bibi vibe is not exactly resonating in synagogue basements across Flatbush. Cuomo, despite everything, is pulling 31% of the Jewish vote—mostly from older, more conservative Jews—but with 37% of Orthodox voters still undecided and Mamdani polling at an ice-cold 0% with them, there’s room to move the needle.

In a twist that would’ve seemed unimaginable a few years ago, 25 Hasidic sects in Borough Park threw their support behind City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams—yes, a Black woman from southeast Queens who’s become the unlikely standard-bearer for an Orthodox political movement that once leaned heavily toward Cuomo. Also, two major Hasidic groups — one in Williamsburg and one in Borough Park — have thrown their support behind Zellnor Myrie, a state senator from Crown Heights born to Costa Rican parents. The 38-year-old Myrie isn’t exactly a household name citywide, but he’s quietly building relationships in Orthodox communities by focusing on hyper-local issues of affordable housing, education, taxes, and public safety.

It's a literal circus. no really. One candidate, Paperboy Love Prince, is running in full Joker face paint. It’s part performance art, part political protest, and 100% the most unhinged way to cast your ballot.

I won’t tell you who to vote for — I’m not your mother.

But please choose wisely.

Here’s a basic-ass summary of the top candidates.

Cuomo 2.0: The Comeback No One Asked For But Might Actually Happen

Andrew Cuomo is back like your toxic ex who suddenly says he’s changed. He hasn’t. But maybe that’s not terrible. For all his sins, Cuomo got remarkable shit done.

• Passed Marriage Equality in NY (2011)
  Cuomo aggressively pushed through one of the first state-level same-sex marriage laws—before national support crossed 50%. When most Democrats were still “evolving,” he rallied bipartisan support and treated it like a legacy-defining civil rights issue.

• Gun Control: SAFE Act (2013)
  Enacted one of the strictest gun laws in the country after Sandy Hook—banning assault weapons, requiring mental health reporting, and expanding background checks

• Infrastructure & Economic Projects
  Oversaw completion of the Mario Cuomo Bridge, LaGuardia Airport’s overhaul, and the Moynihan Train Hall. You have to admit: he knows how to pour concrete and cut a ribbon.

• #MeToo Laws (2019)
  This one’s rich: Cuomo signed landmark laws strengthening protections for sexual harassment victims and extending the statute of limitations on rape cases.
  Irony alert: these very laws helped fuel his eventual political undoing.

Cuomo is, by every credible account, a world-class bully and a nightmare boss. Yes, Andrew Cuomo is a known asshole. But he’s also a known leader, which is why he’s still expected to squeak through a victory.

Zohran Mamdani: The Socialist Zaddy Who Might Actually Run This City

Zohran Mamdaddy— I mean Mamdani— is the socialist hunky zaddy who like it or not, is running the best campaign. To some, he’s a political visionary. To others, he’s a walking red flag who could wreak havoc on this city. But no one can say he’s boring. He has more energy than the rest of the field combined

The 33-year-old is winning the internet. Well, except for the Jewish internet where literally every major Jewish organization, including the LITERAL HOLOCAUST MUSEUM, denounced his remarks the other day for comparing “globalize the intifada” to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Even aside from his antisemitic bullshit, there’s no reason to believe he’s up for this job when he barely does his current one. He’s the only NY assemblymember who’s skipped over half of Albany’s roll-call votes this year—a stunning 231 absences, the most of anyone. If he’s not doing his literal job, WTF is he doing? Oh yeah, making social content.

Also, his actual policy proposals are pie-in-the-sky fantasies.

His platform includes free grocery stores and buses (the latter the governor controls fyi) paid by taxing millionaires, $30/hour minimum wage, rent freezes, and a whole lot of anti-Israel stuff, including an order to arrest Netanyahu on sight if he ever enters Times Square. You know—municipal stuff.

The son of Columbia anti-colonial studies professor Mahmood Mamdani and award-winning director Mira Nair, Zohran grew up on Riverside Drive but insists he’s a man of the people.

His campaign feels like Obama 2008 Hope™ energy but unlike Fox News claimed then, this one is actually socialist.

"He’s so pretty,” one voter told The Free Press.
“He’s dangerous,” said another.
“He’s both,” said me, writing this.

He’s quickly won over the obsessive devotion of the extremely online Left where he is practically worshiped.

Why Most Jews will not rank Zohran (an incomplete list)

• He refused to Co-Sponsor a Holocaust Remembrance Resolution: In 2024, he was one of only a handful of lawmakers who refused to back a symbolic bill honoring Holocaust victims. The resolution passed nearly unanimously.

• Supports academic boycotts of Israeli institutions: he called for Cornell Tech to cut ties with Israel’s Technion. Because what New York City really needs is fewer partnerships with world-class science institutions. Sure.

• He sponsors legislation that threatens Jewish nonprofits. His support for the “Not on Our Dime” bill would open up Jewish charities—like UJA-Federation or Magen David Adom—to criminal investigation if they so much as fund humanitarian work involving Israeli security. That’s right: donate to an ambulance in Tel Aviv, and you might be under state review.

• He shows up to rallies with Hamas-adjacent groups. Mamdani has marched with “Within Our Lifetime,” a group with open support for terrorism and slogans like “Globalize the Intifada.” When asked, Mamdani clarified that intifada just means “uprising.” Right. And a Molotov cocktail is just a warm, festive drink.

• He refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. In a now-viral debate moment, Mamdani said Israel should exist—as a state with equal rights, which of course it already is. But when you build your whole platform on slogans over substance, that distinction doesn’t matter. Nuance is hard when you’re building your brand off a single conflict you have no connection to.

• Denounced by the literal Holocaust museum: On The Bulwark podcast this week, Mamdani defended the chant “Globalize the Intifada,” brushing it off as simply Arabic for “uprising,” and likening it to how museums translate the Warsaw Ghetto uprising in Arabic. The historical distortion was so obscene that the literal Holocaust Museum, along with every major Jewish nonprofit publicly condemned his remarks. When virtually every Jew agrees you’ve crossed a line—a feat in itself— you probably have.

Brad Lander: The Human Spreadsheet

For the anyone-but-Cuomo crowd, Brad Lander has become the #1 for a solid chunk of younger Jews and the #2 for everyone who morally objects to voting for a credibly accused harasser but who also don’t want a full-blown anti-Israel socialist either. He’s perhaps the most popular #2 through #5 choice on many ballots, which, in a ranked-choice election, could end up mattering a lot.

The nerdy policy wonk is self-aware of his lack of charisma. To be fair, though, Brad’s whole brand is being boring on purpose. He’s a bureaucratic beige crayon in a box of neon ideologues.

He’s a coalition builder you could actually imagine uniting a room full of developers, activists, Orthodox Jews, and drag queens. And that’s just Brooklyn Heights

Lander is also a card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), but unlike others in that orbit, he generally plays well with the establishment.

Still, moderates have raised eyebrows over his cross-endorsement with Zohran Mamdani and his friendly ties to the far left.

That said, those who’ve worked with him over his decades-long career vouch for his integrity, calling him a principled consensus-builder and a mayor for everyone. It’s largely why he earned the endorsement of the New York Times Opinion panel.

He also made headlines this week after getting arrested by ICE agents at an immigration courthouse. Video shows him calmly demanding a judicial warrant and physically refusing to let go of a migrant before federal officers pulled him away in cuffs. His campaign insists it wasn’t a stunt.

Why Brad Might Actually Be the Guy:

• He’s Qualified!
  Currently NYC Comptroller, formerly a City Council member for over a decade. Has actually written laws, passed budgets, and understands things like fiscal oversight and infrastructure maintenance. Hot stuff.

• Won Comptroller Running on Transparency
  Actually made good on it. His office publishes readable data about where your taxes go and how the city spends money. Sexy? No. Responsible? Deeply.

• Coalition Builder
  One of the few progressives who hasn't burned every bridge on the way to internet clout. You could actually imagine him uniting a room full of developers, activists, Orthodox Jews, and drag queens. And that’s just Brooklyn Heights.

• Hot Dog Content
  Seriously, if you haven’t seen it: Brad Lander eating a hot dog while riding the Cyclone is either brilliant anti-charisma or comedy genius. Either way, the man commits to the bit.

Scott Stringer: The Ghost of Mayors Past

The guy your mother wanted you to vote for—ten years ago. Former comptroller with solid housing policy, a little #MeToo baggage, and a big Upper West Side base. Unfortunately, the city moved on without him.

Scott Stringer is the nice Jewish boy turned public finance wonk who’s been running for something since dial-up internet was a thing. Former City Comptroller, Manhattan Borough President, and the guy your mom always thought was “respectable.” He’s got real policy chops—especially on housing—but somehow still feels like the political version of a landline: sturdy, familiar, and mostly ignored in 2025.

He ran for mayor in 2021 with progressive cred and institutional backing, until a sexual harassment allegation from a former campaign volunteer in the 2000s tanked his chances.

Pros:

• Housing Policy OG
  One of the earliest proponents of social housing and community land trusts. Actually read zoning maps for fun.

• Budget Veteran
  Served as NYC Comptroller (2014–2021). Knows how to track money, identify waste, and scream “fiscal responsibility” in PowerPoint form.

• Environmental & Ethical Governance
  Pushed for fossil fuel divestment, gender parity in city contracts, and ESG accountability before it was trending on LinkedIn.

• Experienced AF
  More years in New York politics than some of his rivals have been alive.

Verdict: Scott Stringer is a qualified, policy-savvy grown-up with a legitimate record—and baggage. If the city wants calm competence, he’s a contender. If it wants fireworks, he’s background noise.

Zellnor Myrie: The One Guy No One Hates, (the better ZM in this race)

Zellnor Myrie is a state senator with a legislative record thicker than your bubbe’s brisket.

He doesn’t give “main character” energy, which is great for running a city, but not great for the political Olympics we call NYC. If this were SNL, he’d 100% be played by Kenan

Everyone says they respect Zellnor. But sadly, respect doesn’t win elections.

He’s the anti-ego candidate. Soft-spoken, well-prepared, competent. The kind of guy who brings his own pens to the meeting, gives thoughtful hugs, and responds to criticism with “That’s fair.” He’s quietly building a strong resume for future runs.

And yet... he's polling in sixth. Sixth! Because being good at your job and not tweeting through it isn’t sexy in this city. But maybe it should be.

The man has never gone viral for calling someone a fascist or causing a scandal. So, what is he even doing in Albany? Oh right—his job.

What Zellnor Has Going For Him:

• He’s Actually Passed Real Laws
  Over 60 bills and counting, including the Clean Slate Act, the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act, and legislation creating an Office of Gun Violence Prevention. The man is out here legislating while his opponents are filming TikToks on the F train.

• Housing Is His Whole Personality
  Wants to build one million homes. Yes, one million. Even supports replacing community gardens with affordable units when needed. Urbanist Twitter, start your engines.

• Son of Immigrants, Raised on Rent Stabilization
  He’s lived the classic NYC immigrant story. He’s not pretending to understand the struggle—he’s lived the struggle. His mom ran a daycare. His dad worked in a factory and became a teacher. He is literally the American Dream.

• Actually Evolved a Bit Politically
  He admits he used to think business was evil. Now he’s like: wait, no, we need tax revenue or we’re screwed. Growth!

Adrienne Adams: The Adult in the Room Nobody’s Listening To

Adrienne Adams is the Speaker of the New York City Council, a mom of four, a Queens native, and—oh yeah—the only Black woman to ever hold that position. While the rest of the mayoral field is out here trying to burn the city down with viral clips, Adrienne is balancing a $115 billion budget and reminding people that governance actually matters.

She’s not here for drama. She’s here for grown-up shit.

But in a race dominated by men with mess and memes, that’s not enough.

Verdict: Adrienne Adams is the competent, drama-free grown-up the city keeps claiming it wants—until it gets distracted by someone shinier. If she has a breakout moment, she’s in. If not, she’ll go down as the right choice at the wrong time.

There’s other candidates running too, but these are the only real ones making noise. If you live in NYC, PLEASE vote if you haven’t already. Do not put this off. This is ELECTION DAY not LAUNDRY DAY. You really don’t want to forget about it. Early voting continues until sunday and then Tuesday is the primary day.

Regardless of who you vote for tho, the important thing is to subscribe to my substack. Most of It’s free!

On Sunday, 12 Jews—ages 52 to 88—were LIT ON FIRE outside the Pearl Street mall in Boulder, Colorado, during a small rally calling for the release of 58 Israeli hostages held in Gaza. One of the victims was a Holocaust survivor. The metaphors, unfortunately, are writing themselves. Apparently, irony got tired of being subtle.

The rally was part of a weekly event organized by a group called Run For Their Lives, which, yeah… that name aged like milk.

This isn’t exactly an isolated incident, either.

Just 11 days before this attack, Sarah Milgram and Yaron Lischinsky were gunned down outside the capital jewish museum in D.C., where they attended a panel on humanitarian aid for Gaza. Not an Israeli convention. Not even a political fundraiser. AID. You know, the thing that helps people not die. The very thing they keep talking about.

Apparently being a visible jew anywhere in public puts a target on your back now.

Just a few months ago, we saw another domestic terrorist (this time a random white guy) firebomb Governor Josh Shapiro’s PA residence on the first night of Passover, leaving the entire first floor torched. He did that in the name of Gaza, also.

I’m sensing a pattern. Are you?

Colorado has violent antisemites, too

Enter: Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45.
Shirtless. Giving full Dollar Store Putin energy.
Except instead of riding a horse, he showed up to a mall to barbecue your bubbie.

He had 18 Molotov cocktails on hand but only threw two into a crowd of about 20 people because he got scared.

According to CNN, Soliman had been previously denied a U.S. visa and had overstayed a tourist visa in California, which expired in Feb 2023. Great start all around. Investigators say he’d been planning this attack for over a year.

He reportedly yelled "Free Palestine!" before hurling Molotov cocktails and attacking with a makeshift flamethrower.

Other things he shouted:

• “How many children have you killed?”

• “We need to end Zionists.”

• Pointing to victims: “They are killers.”

• he told cops he wanted to “kill all zionist people.” At least he sees us as people.

Weird. His talking points sound like an average day at Columbia University.

Except this isn’t some academic debate in a Columbia courtyard about postcolonial epistemologies.

It’s almost like all this violent language about Israel has violent consequences for Jews who live everywhere else.

And this isn’t taken seriously by the pro-Palestinian crowd. At all.

Some of y’all are still out here doing olympic-level backflips trying to explain why it’s actually not that bad.

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It’s been 600 days since Hamas carried out the deadliest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, and that sentence still doesn’t feel real—even after typing it a hundred times and hearing it in speeches and press releases.

AND YET.

Here we are.

I have these number seared into my brain:

• 1,200 Israelis murdered.

• Over 360 slaughtered at a music festival—a peace festival, by the way.

• 250 taken hostage.

• 58 still held in Hamas captivity. Less than half of whom are believed to be alive.

These numbers should have shattered the world’s conscience. Instead, they kicked off the world’s grossest pissing contest of who has it worse.

Somehow, the world’s reaction went from “This is horrific!” to “Actually this was anti-colonial liberation, you Zionist pigs.”

Like, what?! Blink twice if you’ve been radicalized by an infographic.

Some of y’all really read the news of women being raped beside the corpses of their best friends and thought, “But let’s talk about the IDF checkpoints.” That’s like walking past a burning building and asking what they charge for rent.

Look, I get it. The history of Israel and Palestine is complicated.
So are my taxes, but I don’t go around burning IRS agents and their families over it.

What happened on Oct 7 isn’t complicated.

It was mass murder. It was rape. It was terror.
These guys literally live-streamed their horrors and bragged about it.

F*ck those guys.

Where we stand 600 days later, though, unfortunately is complicated.

How do we get the remaining 58 hostages released from Hamas captivity?

Neither Hamas nor Bibi seem particularly interested in ending the war, because why solve something when you can just prolong human suffering forever and stay in power?

Also how do you even end a war that leaves Hamas in power? There’s really no good answers.

600 days ago I was naively optimistic that the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust (said it again) would inspire the world’s leaders to take action and help Israelis and Palestinians remove Hamas from power. That didn’t happen. And now I am more cynical that things are just in a perpetual stand-still.

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For some time now, being visibly Jewish in America has come with a sense of risk. You feel it walking into synagogues guarded by armed officers. Maybe you feel it before RSVPing to a Jewish event that got too much traction online. Most of the time, you tell yourself you’re being paranoid.

But not last night.

Last night, in Washington, D.C., the American Jewish Committee (AJC) hosted a small reception at the Capital Jewish Museum for young professionals on interfaith dialogue. It was the kind of thing you’d only hear about if you’re on their mailing list. I’m on the AJC ACCESS board in NY, so I know these kinds of events well. One of the panel discussions that night focused on humanitarian aid for Gaza.

Among those in attendance were a young couple: Sarah Milgrim, 26, and Yaron Lischinsky, 30, who worked for the Israeli embassy.

By 9 p.m., they were gunned down outside the building. Murdered after attending an event meant to build bridges and strengthen multi-faith pluralism.

That’s America in 2025.

They showed up to promote peace and left in body bags.

They were targeted not for anything they did, but for who they were.

Let me ruin your day even more: Yaron had just bought an engagement ring; he was going to propose to Sarah next week in Jerusalem.

Sarah’s parents didn’t know that part yet. They found out after learning from the Israeli ambassador their daughter was killed.

my friend was there

In the Jewish world, we’re all two degrees of separation from each other—and last night was no exception. A friend of mine who works for AJC in D.C. was at the event.

He said it took a moment to register what was happening. At first he thought it was just a random shooting because DC do be like that.

The shooting happened outside the museum where there was no security, then the shooter ditched his gun and entered the museum in a sort of panicked frenzy before giving himself up to security.

At first people thought he was a witness and needed protection and comfort. Apparently it wasn’t clear what was going on until he pulled out a keffiyeh and started chanting “Free Palestine.” Thankfully, he left the gun outside, or it could have been so much worse.

According to my friend, the event was not particularly focused on Israel or well publicized, so investigation is needed as to how the shooter knew of this programming. You wouldn’t have known it was happening unless you were deep in the AJC young professionals email chain.

D.C. police identified the shooter, Elias Rodriguez, as a 30-year-old man from Chicago, raising even more questions.

Sarah and Yaron were as idealistic as they come.

I don’t usually find myself digging into the personal lives of victims after a tragedy like this. But seeing that I have several mutuals with the couple from years of mingling in the Jewish professional world I was curious to learn more.

Reader: these two were extraordinary. Sarah and Yaron were true peaceniks.

Sarah Milgrim was the kind of person who didn’t just talk about peace. She fully lived it. Her LinkedIn reads like a syllabus for how to save the world. She held two master’s degrees—one in International Affairs from American University, the other in Natural Resources and Sustainable Development from a school LITERALLY called the University for Peace—a United Nations–mandated program in Costa Rica. She researched environmental policy in Central America, facilitated Jewish education on Israeli-Palestinian relations, and held a certification in Religious Engagement in Peacebuilding. In Israel, she worked for an organization that connected young Israelis and Palestinians, her father said, according to The New York Times.

She cared about sustainability, diplomacy, and actual coexistence. Not the “coexist” bumper sticker people slap on their car while retweeting Hamas apologia. The real thing. She truly seemed to embody the best of the best. For someone so young, she already made an enormous impact.

Yaron Lischinsky was born in Nuremberg, Germany and moved to Israel at sixteen. He held a master’s in Government, Diplomacy, and Strategy from Reichman University, and a bachelor’s in International Relations and Asian Studies from Hebrew University. He was fluent in English, Hebrew, and German, with a working knowledge of Japanese. Despite some misreporting on social media, he was a practicing Christian, raised in a mixed Jewish and Christian family, who had tied his fate to the people of Israel because he believed in the mission and the country.

sadly this kind of thing isn’t that surprising.

This didn’t happen in a vacuum. It happened in the climate we’ve created, where ancient blood libel has been modernized into shareable graphics, and where the phrase “globalize the intifada” is printed on T-shirts and where genocidal sloganeering is mistaken for edgy activism.

The shooting also comes just days after the UN spread a lie that went viral online that 14,000 babies would die In Gaza within 48 hours without aid. Except it was a misreading of a report stating that 14,000 children are at risk of malnutrition over the next year

But the blood libel already did what blood libels do: it spread. It dehumanized. It primed the world to see Jews as villains. And in that climate, murder becomes easier to justify.

If you’re shocked by all this, I envy your ignorance.

If you’ve been paying attention for the last several years, then this doesn’t feel surprising at all. It feels inevitable.

Just a month ago, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro—a Jewish Democrat who’s never said an inflammatory word in his public life—had his house firebombed on the first night of Passover. The arsonist said he did so in solidarity with Gaza.

Interestingly, the DC shooter posted a manifesto to X with the header “Escalate for Gaza, Bring The War Home” in a screenshotted notes app (because 2025).

In the manifesto, he wrote: “Those of us against the genocide take satisfaction in arguing that the perpetrators and abettors have forfeited their humanity.” Lovely. He decided Jews aren’t people anymore.

And yet, somehow, we keep being asked to contextualize this when it comes in the form of a protest. To make room for it in our analysis. To talk about “root causes” and “power structures” and “discomfort.” The shooter brought the war home, sure—but he also brought home the proof: that mainstreaming hate speech eventually becomes deadly hate crimes, and that antisemitism isn’t some abstract nuisance of the internet age—it’s a bullet waiting for a Jewish body.

You don't have to believe in everything the Israeli government does to think killing random Jews is not a good thing to do. You don’t even have to love the idea of Zionism, which is funny considering it's literally the only ideology that says Jews deserve safety and sovereignty. But you do have to know the difference between politics and hate.

And if you can’t tell the difference anymore, that’s not an accident. That’s the point.

The slogans we were told were symbolic? “Globalize the Intifada.” “From the river to the sea.” They’re not metaphors. They’re instructions.

We’re witnessing a disturbing trend: public expressions of Jewish life are increasingly under attack. To an antisemite, every expression of Jewish life becomes a projection of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. All Jewish life is seen as geo-political. All seen as provocation.

In case it needs to be made clear, there is no cause that justifies this kind of violence.

If your worldview can’t condemn this without caveats, you don’t need a better argument. You need a better conscience.

Sarah and Yaron should be alive.

May their memories be a blessing.
And may the rest of us decide what kind of world we want to live in.

The last living American hostage held by Hamas has finally been released from captivity after surviving 584 days underground in unthinkable conditions.

That’s a miracle. And also… if Qatar can get one hostage out, they can get the rest of the 58 out too.

It’s the kind of fuckery that compounds the sadness of the whole situation.

This isn’t a ceasefire breakthrough.
This isn’t even really diplomacy.

It’s theater.

It was essentially a trade. A PR stunt for Trump and Qatar.

Any life saved is worth celebrating. But behind the scenes? Shit is wacky.

Let’s keep score:

• Trump negotiated directly with Hamas.
  Not with Israel.

• Edan’s release came hours before Trump’s big Middle East trip.
  Timing? Not coincidental.
  The PR machine is PR-ing.

• Hamas gave up nothing else.
  No prisoner swap. No ceasefire.

  Enter Qatar

  Qatar is out here playing all sides like it’s poker night and they’re the dealer and the house.

  • They just gifted Trump a $400M jet.
    Which, hi, might violate the Emoluments Clause a.k.a. “you can’t take foreign sugar daddy gifts if you’re president unless Congress says ‘yes,’” and they didn’t say yes.

  • In exchange, Qatar got a seat in Trump’s inner circle. They get to rebrand themselves as peace mediators while continuing to fund Hamas behind the scenes.

This isn’t generosity. It’s pay-to-play.

Somehow, Donald Trump ends up looking like the hero of the hostage crisis while Israel stands there like the last kid picked on the playground.

Trump made this deal behind Israel’s back, while Qatar played matchmaker and the rest of us played “guess who’s being manipulated again!”

Edan Alexander should be in Israel on his own terms. Instead, he’s rumored to be flying to Qatar in the coming days for a photo op with Trump.

Yes. QATAR.
The same country that funded, sheltered, cheered, and negotiated the exact terms of his suffering. It’s like going from one kind of hostage situation to another.

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Most of the books I consume as audiobooks from the library via the Libby app (Life changing discovery btw).

This month I listened to 6 books and watched 8 films, but I’ll just be recommending 1 of each here.

Paper Doll: Notes from a Late Bloomer ★★★★★

By Dylan Mulvaney, published March 11, 2025

If you’ve spent more than four minutes on the internet, you’ve probably come across a Dylan Mulvaney video. She’s a trans influencer and (former?) Broadway actor who became famous for documenting her transition on TikTok.

I’ll be honest—I wasn’t sure what to expect from her memoir. Like a lot of influencer content, her videos can lean a little… much. But I was pleasantly surprised.

This audiobook was genuinely delightful. Dylan’s vocal intonations and character impressions had me dying. Her comedy chops are way sharper than her usual TikTok cringe suggests. Honestly, she slayed this book and narration.

Sinners ★★★★½

Directed by Ryan Coogler

The first four months of 2025 has been a trash heap for movies.

That is until Sinners came along.

I went in with zero expectations. The trailers gave me absolutely nothing But the movie is something else.

Sinners is a genre-bending, blood-drenched 2 hours and 18 minutes of historical fiction, Black mysticism, juke-joint soul, and Southern gothic horror — with a side of vampires and lots of tits. (yes, this movie is very horny, and I respect that). Imagine Get Out raw-dogged Let the Right One In behind a blues club while Ray watched and took notes. That’s this film, shot on 70mm.

This is not a film for prudes. I repeat: do not bring your church group unless your church group is freaky.

Set in 1932 Mississippi, two Black twin brothers (both played by Michael B. Jordan) return home from a lucrative life of crime in Chicago to open a juke joint and reclaim their roots—and then accidentally summon a bunch of literal and metaphorical bloodsuckers to the party.

The vampires here aren’t just about the undead; they’re allegorical. The whole film asks: what does it mean to choose life in a country trying to bleed you dry?

It’s marketed as a horror movie but it’s also tender and very effective as a satire — one that surprises you with actual ideas, not just stylish gore. I’m still processing what it all means, but it’s clear this movie is rich in theme.

The music is extraordinary. The visuals are stunning. The performances from the entire cast are unforgettable. This is going to get Oscar nominations, or at the very least be talked about for the next year.

I really admire how gutsy this film is—no pun intended.

Seeing Sinners in a packed IMAX theater was one of the best moviegoing experiences I’ve had in years.

Can’t wait to see what May has in store.

It sounds fake. Like a QAnon conspiracy theory, right up there with Jewish space lasers. Like something Mel Gibson would shout from the back of a cop car.

And yet.

It’s real.

Very real.

It’s been around since 1897, real.

And guess what? I’m running in it.

Which means, technically, I could be elected to vote on how FIVE BILLION DOLLARS gets spent in the name of the Jewish people.

That’s right. Me. The same guy who used to eat chocolate hummus on purpose. The same guy who, when Trader Joe’s discontinued it, thought fine, I’ll make my own. Which, by the way, don’t.

What Even Is This Thing?

The World Zionist Congress is basically the Jewish People’s Parliament. It happens every five years. The elected delegates meet in Jerusalem to decide how $1 billion in annual Jewish communal funding gets spent.

This money funds everything from Jewish education, youth movements, Israel programs, and much more.

In the last election, ultra-Orthodox slates gained major power — and suddenly funding started looking a little… 1890’s shtetl-core. So, if you’d prefer a Jewish future that doesn’t turn Israel into a halachic Handmaid’s Tale, now’s your chance.

Why I'm Running (Besides My Need for Validation)

I’m part of a slate called The Jewish Future — Slate #20 — which sounds like a Sci-Fi space mission, I know, but is actually a centrist big-tent group that believes in things like:

• Teaching kids Hebrew they can actually use (not just for fumbling through their bar/bat mitzvah.

• Rebuilding communities devastated after October 7.

• Defending Israel and democracy

• Combatting antisemitism (duh)

• Funding Jewish youth, education, and travel

• Improving public relations so that the world will understand what Zionism actually is — a national liberation movement, not a villain origin story

• Strengthening Jewish youth movements so the next generation doesn’t grow up thinking Zionism is just a slur they saw on TikTok.

• Investing in a modern, proud, pluralistic, inclusive, Israel

• Rejecting extremism — left, right, or whatever weird shape it comes in next

• Keeping things out of the hands of fundamentalists

• Building a Jewish future that feels like you actually belong in it

Basically, we want a Jewish future that doesn’t suck.

One that’s inclusive, compassionate, and not a total pain in the ass.

We believe in the dignity of Jewish peoplehood.
We believe that the alternative to Jewish sovereignty is Jewish powerlessness — and history has already shown us what that looks like.

Who Can Vote?

Probably you, if you’re:

✔️ Jewish
✔️ 18+
✔️ A U.S. resident
✔️ Haven’t voted in Israeli elections
✔️ Willing to spend $5 that couldn’t even get you an oat milk latte.
✔️ Still reading this, which means you care more than you want to admit

Go to zionistelection.org, click a few buttons, pay your five bucks, and bam — you’re officially part of global Jewish democracy. Mazel tov.

Voting is open through May 4.

If you don’t vote, that’s fine. But then you don’t have the right to complain about how Jewish institutions don’t reflect you (you will any way).

You don’t get to opt out and act surprised when the results aren’t in your favor.

The Jewish world is being built right now. Whether you’re part of it or not.

So vote. Even if it’s not for me. (But also… vote for me.)

Billions will be spent in your name either way.

And wouldn’t it be nice if one of those people who took action was you?

—

Peter Fox
Writer. Candidate. Chocolate hummus survivor.