8 March 28 • 2019
jn
views
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