VICTOR JOECKS: What Democrats now find intolerable

Opposing antisemitism can get you kicked out of the Democrats’ political coalition.

I usually don’t find it difficult to write this column. The turbulent times we live in are bad for the country, but they make it easy to find topics. Often it’s as simple as stating things everyone used to agree on: Men are not women. America is a great country. Capitalism is better than socialism. Judge people by their character, not their skin color.

But writing a post-Election Day column without knowing the results of the election is no easy task. Here are some predictions with “Dewey defeats Truman” potential.

I think Democrats will win the House. A late revision allows me to note that Democrats should control the Senate and almost certainly with seats to spare.

I think Nevada Democrats win every seat they won two years ago and a few others. Republicans should be thrilled to survive this cycle with Gov. Joe Lombardo and Controller Andy Matthews winning re-election — an increasingly unlikely outcome as I write this. At least one election won’t be called until after late-arriving mail ballots come in. Even if there’s a logical explanation for why this happens — and favors Democrats — it’s a terrible way to run elections.

But here’s one prediction you can be confident about. Michigan Rep. Haley Stevens won’t be welcome at future Democrat events.

Stevens ran in the Michigan Senate Democrat primary. She lost by less than 1 percentage point to Abdul El-Sayed in August. El-Sayed is a Bernie Sanders-clone on policy, although that is increasingly common among Democrats. El-Sayed has connections to both the Democratic Socialists of America and the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist organization. While he has tried to moderate rhetorically, he has campaigned with Hasan Piker, an internet personality who once said that “America deserved 9/11.”

Neither man has done much to hide his antisemitic beliefs. In March, a Lebanese man attacked a preschool at a synagogue in Michigan. El-Sayed downplayed the attack by saying “hurt people hurt people.” For his part, Piker has said, “It doesn’t matter if (expletive) rapes happened on October 7th. Like that doesn’t change the dynamic for me.”

It was finally too much for Stevens. On Sunday, she endorsed Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers. She said her decision was driven by the antisemitic rhetoric surrounding the effort to elect El-Sayed and his refusal to clearly reject it.

“Loyalty to a party should never require abandoning your values or judgment,” she wrote on X.

Democrats were happy when Republicans such as Liz Cheney made similar comments about President Donald Trump. They didn’t have quite the same response to Stevens.

Democrat Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said it was a “despicable betrayal.” Democrat consultant James Carville called her a “used condom.” So much for the Party of Women.

In response to the blowback, Stevens wrote, “We cannot preach inclusion while punishing dissent.”

The left, however, has long used “inclusion” as a club to push intolerance. Look at the threats conservative speakers face on college campuses or the leftists who celebrated Charlie Kirk’s assassination.

Opposing antisemitism shouldn’t be a partisan position. Unfortunately, Democrats are making it one. Just ask Stevens.

Contact him at [email protected] or 702-383-4698. Follow @victorjoecks on X.