The Silence On Tucker Carlson’s Rhetoric Is Dangerous

By J. Philip Rosen

For the better part of the last two months, I have sat across the table from senior officials at the State Department and the Department of Justice. Our conversations centered on one issue: how to confront the alarming rise of antisemitism in the United States. As chairman of the World Jewish Congress, this work is central to my mission, and what I witnessed in Washington was both serious and heartening.

In one meeting, Leo Terrell, the Justice Department’s ambassador on antisemitism, set aside his trademark red MAGA cap and wore instead a red hat honoring Hadar Goldin—the young Israeli soldier killed in combat with Hamas eleven years ago whose remains were finally returned to his family last week. The symbolism was striking. It reflected an administration that, at least within the departments I visited, is approaching antisemitism with an intensity and clarity of purpose that has not always been present in Washington.

At State, officials briefed me on their efforts to address antisemitism on university campuses and in other sectors of American society. For years, as a member of the Conference of Presidents, I visited that same building and left with the unmistakable impression that hostility toward the Jewish community still lingered in its halls. This time, the shift was unmistakable. The institution is changing, and that change matters.

It is precisely because of this progress that the current silence regarding Tucker Carlson’s rhetoric is so troubling.

In my view, Carlson has increasingly embraced themes that echo extremist or white-nationalist narratives, including giving a platform to figures such as Nick Fuentes, whose openly antisemitic positions are well documented. Carlson has questioned the loyalty of Jews and Christian Zionists and has, in my assessment, amplified sentiments that undermine the safety and standing of Jewish Americans. These are not merely policy disagreements; they are messages that, intentionally or not, legitimize bigotry.

What concerns me even more is the reluctance of political leaders—many of whom have long been genuine friends of the Jewish people—to call this out with the urgency it deserves. Carlson’s influence on the political right is significant and ignoring this trend risks allowing antisemitic tropes to migrate from the fringes into the conservative mainstream. If that happens, it will do profound damage not only to American Jews but also to the conservative movement itself.

The fight against antisemitism cannot be selective. It cannot stop at the water’s edge of partisan convenience. If government officials are prepared to confront antisemitism within international institutions, academia, or foreign governments, they must also be willing to address it when it emerges from figures with large domestic audiences.

Elie Wiesel wrote, “We must always take sides.” My own family—grandparents, cousins, aunts, uncles—were murdered in the Holocaust while too many remained silent. The consequences of silence are not abstract to me.

America is not Europe in the 1930s. But history teaches that hateful ideas take root when they go unchallenged. Carlson’s rhetoric, in my judgment, crosses a line that no one committed to the security of the Jewish people—or to the health of American democracy—can afford to ignore.

At a moment when the federal government is showing renewed seriousness in combating antisemitism, it is time for political leaders across the spectrum to speak with equal clarity. Never again must be more than a memory; it must be a principle we are prepared to defend in real time. n

J. Philip Rosen is Chairman of the board of World Jewish Congress-American Section and a Member of the Board of Trustees of Yeshiva University.