Republicans have, by complete coincidence, come up with the same image for ads about Democratic candidates who happen to be Jewish in races large and small across the country.
No. It’s not exactly that image. But it’s something remarkable similar. In ad after ad, Jewish candidates have been Photoshopped to show them clutching wads of money, or surrounded by stacks of bills often while grinning maniacally. It’s a sad, sickly familiar image that plays off centuries of hate and builds on stereotypes that have proven to be genuinely deadly.
As the Washington Post reports, a little thing like eleven people killed over false allegations that Jewish progressives were funding a “caravan” of immigrants, or bombs being mailed to a Jewish supporter of Democratic candidates, has not slowed down the Republican use of this incredibly recurring image.
… the mailer from a local Republican group attacking Jewish state Senate candidate Jesse Kiehl with the image of a man stuffing a fat stack of hundred dollar bills into his suit. …
In North Carolina, the state Republican Party depicted Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) with what appeared to be a stack of bills in his hand. …
In a hotly contested race outside Seattle, Republicans illustrated Kim Schrier, a Democratic candidate for Congress who is Jewish, with a wad of $20 bills fanned out in her hands. …
In California, a Republican state assembly candidate tinted his Jewish challenger a shade of green in an ad, adding $100 bills into his grip for good measure.
And that list is far from complete. Again and again, when Republicans generate an attack ad against Jewish candidates, the first place they go—is right to more of that good, “old-fashioned nationalism.”
Stereotypes don’t become stereotypes because they’re true. They become stereotypes because they’re handy. They’re useful in putting a label on a group that allows them to be demeaned, berated, and dehumanized.
“What’s stunning is that these are old images that are very similar to those from other eras and other places,” said Pamela Nadell, a history professor at American University and the director of its Jewish Studies program. “But I will say I have not seen images like this in 21st-century America before.”
The Republicans’ insistence on continuing to portray Jewish candidates as money-grubbers literally bug-eyed with greed, is particularly handy because it combines the power of a racist attack with plain old jealousy. And portraying these candidates with fistfuls of cash is useful in diverting attention away from the real monetary threat to our democracy. Just three families now hold more wealth than half the population, and those three families have seen that wealth go up by billions over the last two years thanks to the polices that the Republicans have installed. It’s an acceleration of a trend that has seen these families increase their wealth by 6,000 percent over the last four decades.
As the Guardian reports, these wealthy families are the result of multi-generational riches, preserved, like the wealth of Donald Trump, against the inheritance taxes that were first put in place in 1797 in express hopes that the nation would not be dominated by moneyed dynasties.
The three wealthiest US families are the Waltons of Walmart, the Mars candy family and the Koch brothers, heirs to the country’s second largest private company, the energy conglomerate Koch Industries. These are all enterprises built by the grandparents and parents of today’s wealthy heirs and heiresses.
All three of those families are major Republican donors. They’re the ones who provide the actual stacks of cash to make the ads—that show Jewish candidates holding stacks of cash.