LISTEN: Cory Booker Says He & AIPAC President ‘Text Back & Forth Like Teenagers’

In recent weeks, some Republicans have accused the Democratic party of “hating Jews” and not being good friends to Israel. But one Democratic presidential contender says that he has a very close relationship with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC.

Cory Booker spoke to a group of AIPAC members from his home state of New Jersey during AIPAC’s annual conference this month. He told the group that he and AIPAC president Mort Fridman have a very close relationship. Booker said he and Fridman talk on the phone and “text message back and forth like teenagers.” You can listen to a recording of Booker’s remarks, which were obtained and first reported by the Intercept, here.

Booker also talked about the rise of anti-Semitism in the US; he said that hate crimes were on the rise in New Jersey. Booker has championed this issue before, co-sponsoring legislation against hate crimes in his state. Booker also praised what he called the “Jewish way” of standing up for progressive values and said that he had been inspired by Jewish values to protest President Trump’s travel ban.

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Most of Booker’s Democratic Rivals Skipped the AIPAC Conference This Year

Booker was one of the few Democratic candidates for president who attended the annual AIPAC conference this year. Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, Beto O’Rourke, and Elizabeth Warren all said they would skip the conference this year. So did Pete Buttigieg, Julian Castro, and Jay Inslee. Howard Schultz, the Starbuck CEP who says he plans to run for president as an independent, also passed on the AIPAC conference.

The #SkipAIPAC movement, which had its own moderately popular hashtag on Twitter, was pushed by the left-wing MoveOn.org. Move On says that AIPAC peddles “anti-Arab” and “anti-Arab” points of view; the group is urging all Democrats to bow out of the three-day AIPAC conference, which will kick off in Washington DC on Sunday, March 24. So far, plenty of Democrats are still on board with the conference; New York Senator Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are both expected to speak at the event, among other high-profile Democrats and Republicans. Vice President Mike Pence will headline the event, as will Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

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President Trump Says Democrats Are ‘Anti-Israel’ & Says Ilhan Omar’s Remarks Are Proof of That

Trump also told reporters that Ilhan Omar’s remarks prove that Democrats have become an “anti-Israel” and “anti-Jewish” party. white House press secretary Sarah Sanders refused to respond directly to questions about the president’s remarks, but she said, instead, “The president has … laid out clearly his position on this matter,” Sanders said. “Democrats have had a number of opportunities to condemn specific comments and have refused to do that.”

Members of both parties have sharply criticized freshman representative Ilhan Omar for her remarks about Israel and about AIPAC. On The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Eliot Engel, said that Omar should apologize for what he called “a vile, anti-Semitic slur” she made at an event in Washington, D.C. earlier in the week.

During a talk at a bookstore in DC this month, Omar discussed, among other things, the power of lobbyists and of AIPAC in particular. She said that she’s been accused of anti-Semitism and wondered out loud why it is acceptable for Democrats to criticize the NRA, but not to criticize AIPAC. In a widely-criticized statement, Omar said:

“I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says it is OK for people to push for allegiance to a foreign country.”

Many have criticized Omar for talking about “double alleigance” and “dual loyalty,” which is sometimes seen as a coded way to express anti-Semitism. A spokesman for AIPAC told the New York Times, “the charge of dual loyalty not only raises the ominous specter of classic anti-Semitism, but it is also deeply insulting to the millions upon millions of patriotic Americans, Jewish and non-Jewish, who stand by our democratic ally, Israel.”