History of LGBTQ+ Progress in the Montgomery County MD Public Schools (MCPS), 2002-2025

In 2015, PFLAG National published on its website a monograph entitled Curriculum Victory in Montgomery County, Maryland: A Case Study and Handbook for Action.  It is now housed on the Metro DC PFLAG website in the Resources and Advocacy Work sections.  The Curriculum Victory monograph has now been amended to include information through June 24, 2025 and may be found directly here and here.

As noted at the end of the amended monograph, at this writing, we are awaiting a decision from the United States Supreme Court challenging one of MCPS’s recent initiatives to foster respect for and understanding of LGBTQ+ people and their families. PFLAG responses to the decision will be handled by PFLAG National. 

The amended monograph is provided as a resource to foster awareness of the background to help in moving forward, whatever the Supreme Court decides. 

The Supreme Court's terrible 6-3 decision in United States v. Skrmetti

We need to work toward a society in which people are not so afraid, or ignorant, of differences that they will countenance cruelty to families and children.

Today the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Skrmetti.  The 6-3 decision written by Chief Justice Roberts permits the State of Tennessee to ban the use of medical treatments for transgender adolescents diagnosed with gender dysphoria.  This decision essentially tells families of transgender minors (and their physicians) that they must either (1) condemn their children to dangers that have all-to-often led to extreme distress and even suicide or (2) choose exile to states that do not have such laws.  And it opens the possibility that if the Republican MAGA majority in the House continues and if the Republican MAGA majority in the Senate dispenses with the filibuster, then such laws could be enacted by the Congress and signed by the President, meaning that such families would have to leave their homes in the United States altogether in order to do right by their children.

This is cruel and unacceptable, as Justice Sotomayor (joined by Justices Jackson and Kagan) explained in her dissent:

Transgender adolescents’ access to hormones and pu-

berty blockers (known as gender-affirming care) is not a

matter of mere cosmetic preference. To the contrary, access

to care can be a question of life or death. Some transgender

adolescents suffer from gender dysphoria, a medical condi-

tion characterized by clinically significant and persistent

distress resulting from incongruence between a person’s

gender identity and sex identified at birth. App. to Pet. for

Cert. 251a–252a. If left untreated, gender dysphoria can

lead to severe anxiety, depression, eating disorders, sub-

stance abuse, self-harm, and suicidality. See, e.g., Cole-

man, 23 Int’l J. Transgender Health, at S62. Suicide, in

particular, is a major concern for parents of transgender

teenagers, as the lifetime prevalence of suicide attempts

among transgender individuals may be as high as 40%.

App. to Pet. for Cert. 264a. Tragically, studies suggest that

as many as one-third of transgender high school students

attempt suicide in any given year.

When provided in appropriate cases, gender-affirming

medical care can meaningfully improve the health and well-

being of transgender adolescents, reducing anxiety, depres-

sion, suicidal ideation, and (for some patients) the need for

more invasive surgical treatments later in life.4 That is why

the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical As-

sociation, American Psychiatric Association, American Psy-

chological Association, and American Academy of Child Ad-

olescent Psychiatry all agree that hormones and puberty

blockers are “appropriate and medically necessary” to treat

gender dysphoria when clinically indicated. Id., at 285a.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24pdf/23-477_2cp3.pdf (pp. 88-89 of the PDF, pp. 4-5 of Justice Sotomayor's dissent)

Justice Sotomayor also criticizes the linguistic gymnastics used by the majority to reach its right-wing ideological result.  But I will leave that to others to discuss.

It is important for the general public to understand how cruel such statutes are.  May the one-third of the electorate which has chosen to opt out of voting altogether understand this cruelty and join the other one-third who oppose the MAGA agenda to elect representatives who will reject this cruelty.   Parents should not have to choose exile to protect their children.  We need to work toward a society in which people are not so afraid, or ignorant, of differences that they will countenance cruelty to families and children.

“Say Their Names” and “Thinking about the Unthinkable”

 “Say Their Names” and “Thinking about the Unthinkable”

 

1.  The murders of Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky

 

Extremists on all sides target the innocents. And in so doing seek to set in motion more extremism.  The 1995 assassination of Rabin by a right-wing Israeli set in motion the events which led to the Second Intifada, which led to more extremism among both Israelis and Palestinians. The barbarous Hamas attack on October 7 set in motion the Israeli killing of thousands of Palestinian children in Gaza and more attacks by settlers on the West Bank. Our challenge is how to stop this downward spiral. 

 

Unlike in earlier eras, now there are people, in our name, doing unspeakable things on a mass level. We - and still I say we - never before had such power. As Albert Einstein (a Zionist himself) noted in 1936, “I believe that the unique durability of the Jewish community is to a large degree based on our geographical dispersion, and the fact that we consequently do not possess instruments of power that will allow us to commit great stupidities out of national fanaticism.”  Now “we” have such power, and are abusing it, as Einstein feared.  

 

Of course, none of this justifies the murders of Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky.  We should say their names.  But no one is able to similarly say the names of the thousands of children killed in Gaza.  As Stalin is reputed to have said, “One death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.”  But if we are to adhere to the admonition in our tradition that “whoever destroys a single life is considered to have destroyed a world”, we must grapple with the implications of the destruction of thousands of worlds.  We must not fall into the trap of the Stalins of this planet. 

 

 

2.  Thinking about the unthinkable

 

On May 12, 2025, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, President of the Union for Reform Judaism, the largest denomination of Judaism in North America, published an op-ed in the Washington Post entitled I'm a rabbi. Starving Gaza is immoral: A just war must be fought by just means.  Here is his bottom line:

 

"I have said on numerous occasions since Oct. 8, I cannot be silent in the face of the immense suffering of civilians in Gaza, including hundreds of thousands of children. Hamas is willing to sacrifice thousands of Palestinians by hoarding humanitarian aid; Israel must not. Depriving Gazans of food and water will not make Israel safer or hasten the return of the hostages. Each of us who loves Israel must say so — and urge Israel to change this policy."

 

After reading it, I immediately thought about the agonizing question of what we do if the Israeli government does not change this morally suicidal course.  

 

Shortly after publication, Rabbi Jacobs did a fine job on MSNBC discussing his op-ed. I was thrilled that he was getting air-time before thousands, hopefully millions, of people to explain how this major leader of the Reform Jewish Movement is approaching the crises. The more we are able to do this, the better off we will be.

 

Professor Eddie Glaude, the other guest on the segment, praised Rabbi Jacobs’ wisdom and courage. At 4:44, Professor Glaude then "ask[ed] a basic question. How many dead Palestinians are needed for the State of Israel? What level of mass death is required to satiate your revenge, to feel safe? How many dead babies and children? We have to ask that moral question as we bear witness to what we are seeing."

 

The segment then went on to a different topic.  But Professor Glaude asked the uncomfortable question that came into my mind earlier in the day.  An uncomfortable question, but every question involving the current crises is uncomfortable.

 

I believe that for most of us in the Reform Movement, the question of revenge is not part of the calculus. But the question of how "to feel safe" is. Or, to put it another way, how we weigh our sense of safety alongside our sense of morality. As I thought about this I noticed the picture of James Baldwin in Professor Glaude’s office and remembered Baldwin’s famous statement: "Not everything that is faced can be fixed. But nothing can be fixed if it is not faced."

 

The apparent green light that the Trump Administration has given the Netanyahu/Ben-Gvir/Smotrich Administration to lay waste to Gaza makes it even more imperative that we face Professor Glaude’s question.

 

P.S.  After writing the last paragraph, I saw the NY Times news analysis from Patrick Kinsley.  So now even Trump thinks (or says he thinks) the Netanyahu/Ben-Gvi/Smotrich Administration has become too brutal.  When even Trump says that Israel’s government is going too far, we surely need to be unambiguous in our condemnation of its tactics and strategy.  Israel needs to reconsider its approach – and not just in a way to put a fig-leaf over what the Netanyahu/Ben-Gvir/Smotrich has made clear is their intent.

P.P.S.  And then this on May 28:

Thomas Friedman's piece on Israel and the United States is an absolute must-read for anyone concerned about the survival of both nations. It is long. Maybe best read aloud. But it is essential. We must face the present crises squarely, and not simply hope that the dangers will pass.

And this in Haaretz from former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Omert, concluding that the Netanyahu/Ben-Gvir/Smotrich regime is committing “war crimes.”  It is painful to read, but we cannot bury our heads in the sand.

************************************************************************

 

Related blogposts:

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2025/05/on-matt-bais-column-graduates-speak.html

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2025/03/thoughts-on-watching-todays-senate.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2024/05/congressman-nadler-is-right-about.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2023/12/chanukah-2023.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2023/01/dont-let-light-go-out-chanukah-in-time.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2022/12/dont-let-light-go-out-is-it-becoming.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2020/07/thoughts-on-peter-beinarts-new.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2018/07/has-dream-died-in-israel-dont-let-light.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2020/07/thoughts-on-peter-beinarts-new.html

 

https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2015/07/bringing-together-israelis-and.html

Attachments area

Preview YouTube video 'How many dead Palestinians are needed?': Professor reacts to crisis in Gaza

'How many dead Palestinians are needed?': Professor reacts to crisis in Gaza

On Matt Bai's column, Graduates speak their minds. Universities freak out. In punishing students who make pro-Palestinian commencement speeches, schools lose their way.

 Matt Bai got this right. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/05/22/higher-education-gaza-universities-graduation/  If you are blocked by the Post paywall, his column may be read here.  As GW's 1969 commencement speaker, my wife and I wrote to the university's president last week making the same point:

 

Dear President Granberg:

 

As alumni of The George Washington University (David - BA ’69; Barbara - BA ’71 and MS in Forensic Science ‘75), we are writing to express our disappointment in the statement issued by the University’s Office of Communications and Marketing, apologizing for Cecilia Culver’s student commencement speech and banning her from all GW campuses and events. See https://mediarelations.gwu.edu/statement-ccas-school-ceremony-disruption and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE6wK3gB9XM

 

Both of us have been and continue to be active members of our Jewish community: Barbara is a past president of our synagogue’s sisterhood, and both of us have served on our synagogue’s board of trustees.  David is an active member of Jews United for Justice and a recipient of JUFJ’s Heschel Vision Award. https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2015/12/heschel-vision-award-jews-united-for.html  And David is a member of the Commission on Social Action of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism.  (This letter is written solely in our personal capacities.)

 

In 1969, David was selected to be student speaker at the GW graduation ceremony. https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2015/12/student-commencement-speeches-1969.html

Like Ms. Culver, he was given this opportunity because he was respected by University officials. https://economics.columbian.gwu.edu/gw-economics-statistics-double-major-receives-ccas-distinguished-scholar-award

 

1969 was as fraught a period as the present day.  David does not recall whether his speech was pre-cleared or not, but the speech included harsh condemnations of the War in Vietnam and American racism.  Specifically, he does vividly recall an incident in the days before the ceremony, when some students, protesting the Vietnam War, had a “grovel-in” in a University office.  The protest so offended University officials that they threatened to bar one of the protesters from graduating.  David quietly let it be known that, if the protester were barred from graduating, he would refuse to be the commencement speaker.  Cooler heads prevailed, and the protester graduated.

 

With respect to Ms. Culver, the University’s statement makes much of the assertion that Ms. Culver presented a text of her speech for University approval, but then, instead, proceeded to present the discussion of the tragedy in Gaza.  We think this misses the point entirely.  We looked at the University’s discussions of the Columbian College decision to select Ms. Culver and saw that the University was continuing the tradition of selecting an outstanding scholar and member of the community to be commencement speaker.  See https://economics.columbian.gwu.edu/gw-economics-statistics-double-major-receives-ccas-distinguished-scholar-award Having made that selection, it was insulting that the University then felt it needed to “vet” her speech.  We are not at all surprised that Ms. Culver determined that showing the speech she intended to give was not a good idea, when, in the past year and a half, the University had shown so much hostility to those who disagreed with the nature and extent of Israel’s military response to Hamas’ barbarism of October 7, 2023. 

 

We, in great sadness, have come to the conclusion that the choices made by the Israeli government have played into the hands of Hamas.  While Ms. Culver’s speech was not the speech we would have given, it was within the realm of legitimate discourse in this time of crisis. Whether the killing of tens of thousands of people in the Gaza War comes within the legal definition of “genocide” is not ultimately the point; the amount of death is there for all to see.   Indeed, the University official who presided over the ceremony, Associate Dean Kavita Daiya, motioned Ms. Culver back to the podium at the conclusion of the speech and said the following: “Thank you, Cecilia. Here at Columbian College, we represent a variety of views, and we thank you for sharing your words and views.”   https://economics.columbian.gwu.edu/gw-economics-statistics-double-major-receives-ccas-distinguished-scholar-award at 3:08.

And that is where it should have ended.

 

Great universities in open societies do not shrink from discourse on difficult, contentious issues. Dean Daiya provided the opportunity for GW to show itself to be a great university.  But the actions described in the Office of Communications and Marketing’s statement squandered that opportunity.  We are saddened that our alma mater has chosen mediocrity over greatness.

 

In the hope that you can do better in the future,

 

Barbara and David Fishback

"Finding Fellowship" -- Now More Than Ever

 

https://www.pbs.org/video/finding-fellowship-3bz18O/

A few hours ago, we learned of the passing of Ida Pearl Green at the age of 106.  Bobbi and I first met Pearl in 1998, when she and our friend Bill Phillips spoke, and their Fairhaven Methodist Church Choir sang, at Temple Emanuel’s annual Martin Luther King, Jr., Commemorative Shabbat Service.  The Fairhaven story -- the merger, in 1968, of three small churches, two White and one Black -- was fascinating and uplifting.

 

Fifteen years later, Bill’s wife Jane excitedly called to tell us about Rob and Reece Scheer and their four adopted children who had joined the Church.  Soon after we were invited to volunteer at Fairhaven for the early production and assembly of backpacks for children in foster care – the origin of Comfort Cases, which over the years has become a major force in helping and advocating for children in foster care. 

 

And then, in February 2020, we were thrilled to attend the premier of the film Finding Fellowship, produced by Pearl’s grandson Jason Green and granddaughter Kisha Davis, featuring Pearl and her amazing family, friends, and community at Fairhaven.  I wrote about the experience then, concluding that “[now] more than ever, we need to experience this story of belonging.” 

 

With the passing of the matriarch, I was moved to watch the film again.  I am even more inspired now than I was five years ago.  And we all need it now even more than we did then.

Thank you, Pearl, for your life and your legacy.

 

More Gaslighting

So President Trump says he is serious about using a loophole in the Constitution to continue as President after Jan. 20, 2029.

How would that work? Trump cannot be elected as Vance’s Vice President because, as pointed out in the Associated Press report, the 12th Amendment to the Constitution specifically states that “no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of president shall be eligible to that of vice-president of the United States.” So Vance could not resign and step aside for a Vice President Donald Trump. 

Now Trump World may fantasize as follows: The House of Representatives could elect Trump as its Speaker (remember, the Speaker need not be a member of the House) making him third in line to the presidency as “Acting President” under the Presidential Succession Act, 3 U.S.C Sec. 19, if both the President and Vice President die or resign. So supposedly both Vance and his VP could resign, leaving the presidency to Trump. 

But here is the rub. Section 19(e) of the Presidential Succession Act specifically provides that someone in the statutory line of succession may only become Acting President if they “are eligible to the office of President under the Constitution.” Since Trump is no longer eligible because he would have had two terms already, being Speaker would not permit him to become Acting President. And even if the Presidential Succession Act were amended to remove that phrase, it would not be constitutional. Any ruling to the contrary would mean that a 34-year old Speaker who was born, say, in Kenya to non-American parents could become president – violating the Constitutional requirement in Article 2, Section 1 that to be President one must be a natural born citizen at least 30 years of age.

I have no idea whether Trump's statement is yet another gaslighting of the American People, or simply another element of the firehose of lies and misrepresentations intended to numb us all and render us helpless and compliant to anything he wants.  I have no idea whether Trump is a "useful idiot" for Putin, or an actual agent.  But I do know that each of us must do whatever we can to resist.

Kulanu/Pride Services at Temple Emanuel, 2000 through 2024

Kulanu/Pride  Services at Temple Emanuel, 2000 through 2024

 

June 14, 2024:  Guest Speaker, Anne Kaiser, Member of the Maryland House of Delegates, Sixteen Years of Success on LGBTQ+ Rights in Annapolis -- What We have Accomplished, and the Challenges Ahead

June 9, 2023:  Guest Speaker, Rev. Joey Heath-Mason, Associate Pastor at St. Paul's United Methodist Church in Kensington

June 10, 2022:  Guest Speaker, Marc Tannen, creator of documentary-in-progress Broken Chains about the lives of Orthodox Jews. https://www.facebook.com/groups/33502840417/search/?q=Annual%20Pride%20Shabbat

June 11, 2021: Kulanu Shabbat (Guest Speaker, Evan Glass, Member-at-Large, Montgomery County Council: My Journey, Our Journeys, and Using the Political Process to Achieve Progress.) https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2021/05/evan-glass-to-speak-at-temple-emanuel.html

June 12, 2020: Kulanu Shabbat (Guest Speaker, Nicolle Campa, President, Metro DC Chapter of PFLAG: The Importance of Family in the Struggle for Equal Rights and Community Embrace and presentations by Youth Advisor Devorah Stavisky and Students Eli Herman, Quinn Spence, Kayden Reff, and Autumn Cook)  https://www.facebook.com/groups/33502840417/search/?q=campa

June 7, 2019: Kulanu Shabbat (Guest Speaker, Ellen Kahn, Director of the Human Rights Campaign’s Children, Youth, and Families Program: Where are we now, where are we going?)   https://www.facebook.com/groups/33502840417/permalink/10156338406045418/

Sept. 16, 2016: Kulanu Shabbat (with Temple Community Social Action Commission) Comfort Cases for Children in Foster Care: Rob Scheer, founder of Comfort Cases. 

April 15, 2016: Kulanu Shabbat Mike Fishback, Intent and Impact) https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2016/04/intent-and-impact.html, https://sites.google.com/site/mikefishback/on-race/intent-and-impact?authuser=0

March 27, 2015: Kulanu Shabbat Building Community by Sharing Our Stories: David Fishback, Sara Cytron, Glenn Northern, Nat Rasmussen, Marti Teitlebaum & Tim Zwerdling 

Oct. 4, 2013: Kulanu Shabbat Dr. Dana Beyer, Executive Director, Gender Rights Maryland, Jewish Values and Transgender Equality 

Jan. 2013: Co-Sponsor MLK Service Jonathan Jayes-Green (speaking about the Maryland Dream Act and the Maryland Civil Marriage Equality Act) 

Oct. 26, 2012: Kulanu Shabbat Jewish Values and Civil Marriage Equality, guest speaker State Senator Richard Madaleno 

Feb. 10, 2012: Kulanu Shabbat Celebrating Our Temple’s Rich Diversity: Sara Cytron, Lisa Feldman, Glenn Northern, and Tim Zwerdling 

April 1, 2011: Kulanu Shabbat Captain Michael Rankin (USN, Ret.), Retired Navy psychiatrist and openly gay advocate for the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and Board Member, Union for Reform Judaism 

June 11, 2010: Kulanu Shabbat Delegate Heather Mizeur 

June 12, 2009: Kulanu Shabbat Rabbi Sarah Meytin, Jewish Community Relations Council, Issues of Human Rights 

Feb. 8, 2008: Kulanu Shabbat Delegate Anne Kaiser: Civil Marriage Is A Civil Right: A Gay Jewish View in Annapolis 

Jan. 2007: Co-Sponsor of MLK Service Patricia Corbett, Community Outreach Director, Metro DC PFLAG 

Sept. 15, 2006: Kulanu Shabbat Dan Furmansky, Executive Director of Equality Maryland, Equal Rights for Gays and Lesbians: A Jewish Perspective 

May 22, 2005 Temple Emanuel Celebrates Lag B’Omer: A Celebration of Life and Jewish Survival GLBT in the Family: Response & Embrace 

Feb. 27, 2004: Kulanu Shabbat Rabbi Leila Gal Berner, Values, Tradition and Challenges: A Jewish Approach to Sexual Ethics.  Also presentations from Temple members Ellen Mann (Karch), Bobbi Fishback, and Mike Fishback 

Nov. 16, 2001: Shabbat Service A Vital Part of Our Jewish Community: Embracing a Diversity of Sexual and Gender Identities, Ken Carroll and Stephanie Handel of Bet Mishpachah 

Oct. 18, 2001 Lee Walzer, Homophobia and Anti-Semitism, Temple Social Issues Committee co-sponsored with Bet Mishpacha Social Action Committee and Jews United for Justice 

May 19, 2000: Shabbat Service Gay and Jewish: Issues and Reflections. Rabbi Stone and Catherine Tuerk, Past President of PFLAG and PFLAG Member Hannah Lipman

Thoughts on watching today's Senate Committee hearing on Antisemitism on campuses

Just finished watching the Senate Committee hearing on antisemitism on campuses. https://www.senate.gov/isvp/?auto_play=false&comm=help&filename=help032725&poster=https://www.help.senate.gov/assets/images/video-poster.png

Much was said by Republican Senators and the three witnesses they called about what they saw as effective actions taken by the Trump Administration regarding antisemitism.  To put the Trump team into perspective, Senator Sanders (at the 1:08:09 point) asked all five of the witnesses if the image on the right in the above picture from the Trump campaign was antisemitic.  They ALL agreed it was. (Note: The parallel image on the left, provided by the U.S. Holocaust Museum, was from Hungary in the time leading up to the Holocaust.)  This recognition of the Trump team's embrace of antisemitic tropes was utterly ignored by the Republican senators on the Committee.  

 

The testimony of Director-Emeritus of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism David Saperstein (beginning at Minute 47) and Director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate Kenneth Stern (beginning at 53:30) was excellent. They eloquently supported freedom of speech, explaining that that disagreement with the policies of the Israeli government was not itself antisemitism.  It was noted that the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism specifically admonished that it not be codified into law.  Yet, that admonition is being disregarded by the current Administration and other proponents of the Antisemitism Awareness Act; that proposal not only would enshrine the IHRA definition in law, but would require its use to the exclusion of any other definition of antisemitism.  And Mr. Stern -- who was a principal author of the IHRA definition -- also referred to the definition’s misuse, as he has done for years.

 

In 2021, the Reform Movement recognized the danger that the IHRA definition could be used to shut down free speech.  Sadly, these dangers are now being realized.  See, for example, this 2022 discussion of a dispute over the definition in Montgomery County MD, citing Mr. Stern’s concerns and describing a dispute over the definition in Montgomery County MD.  This dispute resulted in a County Council resolution using the definition – but only with the sorts of caveats many of us in Montgomery County sought.  See here.   It is this misuse of the IHRA definition by President Trump and others which have caused so much angst recently. 

 

One of the excellent points that came out of the discussion was the disconnect between slashing federal offices charged with enforcing antidiscrimination laws while at the same time insisting that enforcement of charges of antisemitism increase. The Administration plan is clear: Limit investigations to antisemitism and thereby divide the Jewish community from all the other progressive groups whose constituencies will be ignored. This is a divide and conquer strategy. We should vigorously call it out for what it is.

 

Some thoughts on the ADL

           The storied Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has come a long way from the days when Abe Foxman was its executive director.  See https://www.adl.org/resources/press-release/adl-condemns-donald-trumps-hate-speech-and-stereotyping  While the ADL staff still apparently does good work, cooperation with, and respect for, the ADL has become increasingly problematic due to the public actions of its present executive director, Jonathan Greenblatt.                   

          In the last few years, we have seen Mr. Greenblatt cozy up to and seek to explain away the antisemitism displayed as the highest levels of Donald Trump’s operation.  See most recently, for example, https://forward.com/news/700072/adl-tesla-jlens-meta-amazon-musk/ (2/27/25) (“Why the ADL is encouraging Jews to invest [Elon Musk’s] Tesla”)  This was published the same day the Union for Reform Judaism and other progressive Jewish organizations announced that they  would stop engaging on Musk’s X/Twitter:  https://urj.org/press-room/statement-ending-engagement-xtwitter (“As Jewish groups committed to healing what is broken in our world, we aim to do our work through means that similarly foster repair. In study after study, as well as our lived experiences, X has become a platform that promotes hate, antisemitism, and societal division. Under the leadership of Elon Musk, X has reduced content moderation, promoted white supremacists, and re-platformed purveyors of conspiracy theories. Musk himself has re-posted content that is antisemitic and xenophobic, promoting it to his millions of followers.”  See also https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/elon-musk-x-twitter-antisemitism-hashtags-trending-hate-rcna151945 (June 4, 2024) (“Elon Musk's X app ran ads on #whitepower and other hateful hashtags. A review by NBC News found X running ads on 20 racist and antisemitic hashtags more than 18 months after Musk said that he would demonetize hate posts.”)

Just a month earlier, the ADL, per Mr. Greenblatt, sought to excuse or minimize Musk’s public Nazi salute. See https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2025/01/elon-musk-nazi-salute-trump-inauguration-adl-antidefamation-league.html?#rzzz5jix90nlvdauag01begldekr0898(1/21/25) (“It’s Clear Enough What Elon Musk Did. The ADL’s Response Is Pathetic.”) and https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/20/us/politics/elon-musk-hand-gesture-speech.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare (1/20/25) (“The Anti-Defamation League, which has tangled with Mr. Musk in the past, later said on X that Mr. Musk had ‘made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm’ and that it was ‘not a Nazi salute.’ The organization added that ‘all sides should give one another a bit of grace.’”)

             And this outrage was only ninety days after Mr. Greenblatt sought to minimize the October 24, 2024, Madison Square Garden event that so closely tracked the infamous Nazi at Madison Square Garden in 1939.  See https://newrepublic.com/article/187695/anti-defamation-league-running-cover-trump (11/1/24) (“Why is the Anti-Defamation League Running Cover for Trump? Yes, it’s fair to compare Trump’s Madison Square Garden spectacle to the Nazi rally of 1939.”)  and https://www.jta.org/2024/10/30/united-states/former-adl-chief-abe-foxman-slams-group-for-muted-response-to-trumps-msg-rally (10/30/24, “Former ADL chief Abe Foxman slams group for muted response to Trump’s MSG rally”)

           This was just months after Greenblatt’s ADL honored Trump’s son-in-law at its annual summit. See https://www.timesofisrael.com/adl-honors-jared-kushner-at-annual-summit-despite-pushback-from-some-groups/ (3/7/24) (“ADL honors Jared Kusner at annual summit, despite pushback from some groups.”)