8 March 28 • 2019
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G

allup’
s 2019 World Affairs 
Survey confirms something 
that’
s held true for decades: 
Most American voters, 
whether Democrat or 
Republican, support 
and sympathize with 
Israel.
Reading the report 
amid the national uproar 
over Democratic Rep. 
Ilhan Omar’
s tweets 
about the Israel lobby, several writers 
have focused on what they see as declin-
ing support for Israel among liberal 
Democrats, who represent 56 percent 
of the party, Gallup senior editor Lydia 
Saad told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Yet according to Gallup, support for 
Israel among liberal Democrats has 
remained consistent (and the majority 
position) for at least the past decade. 
For all the talk of their hostility toward 
Israel in recent weeks, 58 percent of 
liberal Democrats and 66 percent of 
moderate/conservative Democrats view 
Israel favorably, and only 9 percent of 
Democrats view Israel very unfavorably.

But Republicans, who often point 
to declining support for Israel among 
Democrats, should also be paying atten-
tion to similar trends in their own party.
The largest recorded drop this year 
is the percentage of Republicans — not 
Democrats — who sympathize more 
with Israel than with the Palestinians. 
Republican sympathies for Israel fell 11 
percentage points this year, to 76 percent 
from 87 percent, a slightly lower level of 
sympathy than Gallup has recorded in 
the last decade.
Support for Israel among Republicans 
certainly remains robust, with 43 per-
cent of Republicans reporting a “very 
favorable” view of the country. But there 
are signs that this support should not be 
taken for granted. A significant minority 
of Republicans, for a variety of reasons, 
are eschewing America’
s traditional 
alliance with Israel and are skeptical of 
President Donald Trump’
s ability to han-
dle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Despite the fact that Trump’
s approval 
rating among Republicans is 90 percent, 
Gallup found that 32 percent of conser-
vatives (and 18 percent of Republicans) 

feel that the president is not doing 
enough to find a peaceful solution to the 
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
This might be because more than one-
third of Republicans also feel that Trump 
is favoring Israel too much. Last year, the 
University of Maryland’
s Critical Issues 
Poll found that while a majority (57 per-
cent) of Republicans do want the Trump 
administration to lean toward Israel 
when mediating the Israeli-Palestinian 
conflict, a significant minority — 39 per-
cent — do not.
“While support for Israel remains 
high among Republicans and sympathy 
remains high, all is not perfect,
” said 
Shibley Telhami, who directs the Critical 
Issues Poll.
It’
s not just pollsters who feel this way. 
conservatives invested in the U.S.-Israel 
relationship also echo this sentiment.
“While the real challenge today might 
be on the left, we can never take the 
conservative base for granted,
” David 

Brog, a Jewish American who served as 
executive director of Christians United 
For Israel from 2006 to 2015, told JTA. 
“[These findings are] a timely reminder 
that there’
s always work to be done.
”
America, including the Republican 
Party, is only getting younger and more 
diverse. Millennials, now in their mid-
20s and 30s, make up the largest share of 
the labor force and the voting public. If it 
hopes to continue winning elections, the 
Republican Party will have to appeal to 
both of these groups — and members of 
both are increasingly skeptical of uncriti-
cal support for Israel.
Before pointing fingers at declining 
support for Israel in the other party, 
pro-Israel Republicans ought to take a 
good look at the state of affairs in their 
own house. ■

Laura E. Adkins is JTA’
s opinion editor.

commentary

The Republican Party Has 
Its Own Israel Problem

Laura E. Adkins
JTA

guest column
Let the Sun Shine on State Records
F

our years ago, two 
state legislators 
were rumored to be 
misusing state resources 
while covering up the 
affair they were having 
with each other.
This couldn’
t be imme-
diately proven, however, 
because reporters couldn’
t 
access documents in their state offices 
that would reveal the details behind the 
cover-up.
That’
s because Michigan is one of only 
two states in the nation that does not 
subject the governor or state legislators to 
the existing open records law called the 
Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA.
At the time, in the fall of 2015, then-
Rep. Jeremy Moss was a freshman House 
Democrat determined to change this 
legal blind spot and drafted a series of 

bills to expand access to 
government records.
While he was working 
on these bills, a story 
more substantial than a 
minor political sex scan-
dal broke that thrust this 
work in Michigan into 
the national spotlight: the 
Flint water crisis.
These scandals — big and small — 
and the lack of information of how they 
were carried out are part of the reason 
Michigan ranks dead last among all 50 
states in government ethics, according to 
a study by the Center for Public Integrity. 
Their report measured 13 functions of 
government and Michigan failed 10 of 
them, including public access to infor-
mation, legislative accountability and 
executive accountability.
With the increasing scrutiny on the 

lack of government oversight that term, 
the transparency legislation moved 
successfully through the House of 
Representatives, but the bills have never 
been taken up in the Michigan Senate.
This year, however, things are differ-
ent.
Moss is now serving in the Senate, 
where he is ready to usher this legislation 
through the upper legislative chamber 
after it recently passed the House, with 
the help of new House bill sponsor 
Rep. Ryan Berman. Moss and Berman 
also gained a critical partner in Gov. 
Gretchen Whitmer, who has sought to 
increase transparency in state govern-
ment even in these early days of her 
administration.
In just four years, these efforts went 
from earning only a few champions in 
2015 to being lauded by the governor in 
her State of the State address in 2019.

The time to let the sun shine on 
Michigan government is imminent, and 
it is on us to own that opportunity. This 
bipartisan coalition is committed to see-
ing this issue through — once and for 
all. ■

Sen. Jeremy Moss (D–Southfield), the lead 
author of the Legislative Open Records Act for 
the last four years, represents citizens of the 
11th District in Oakland County that includes 
Farmington, Farmington Hills, Ferndale, Hazel 
Park, Huntington Woods, Lathrup Village, 
Madison Heights, Oak Park, Pleasant Ridge 
City, Royal Oak Township and Southfield. Rep. 
Ryan Berman (R–Commerce Township), who 
sponsored the House Bill 4011 of 2019 in 
the Legislative Open Records Act, represents 
citizens of the 39th District in Oakland County 
that includes the city of Wixom, Commerce 
Township, a portion of West Bloomfield 
Township and the 
village of Wolverine Lake.

Sen. Jeremy 
Moss

Rep. Ryan 
Berman

NIKKI CASEY FOR JTA

