Bruce Blakeman Says Brad Lander Would Have Been Concentration Camp Guard If Given the Chance

The Republican nominee for New York governor, Nassau County executive Bruce Blakeman, is receiving backlash for claiming that congressional candidate and former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander would have been a Nazi concentration camp guard if given the chance. Both Messrs. Blakeman and Lander are Jewish.Mr. Lander on Tuesday beat Congressman Dan Goldman in the Democratic primary to represent New York’s Tenth Congressional District, which covers Lower Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn. Mr. Goldman, a more moderate pro-Israel Democrat backed by AIPAC, is currently in his second term. On Wednesday, Mr. Blakeman argued that Mr. Lander is an antisemite. “Brad Lander — he’s a disgrace. He’s antisemitic. Even though he’s Jewish, this guy would be a camp guard in the concentration camp if he could,” Mr. Blakeman said live during an appearance on the conservative channel Newsmax. “He’s a disaster. He’s terrible.”“The fact that he’s even won the Democratic Party primary shows you that [Democrats] are in bad shape and they need a redirection, and they need to do that by voting for me for governor,” Mr. Blakeman said, arguing that “traditional, common sense, moderate Democrats” should get behind him. “I will stop the lunatics in their party,” Mr. Blakeman said. A spokesman for Mr. Blakeman did not immediately respond to a message seeking additional comment.Mr. Lander has long described himself as a liberal Zionist who believes in a two-state solution. He was one of three congressional candidates backed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who successfully took on his own party’s establishment on Tuesday. Another Mamdani-backed candidate, Darializa Avila Chevalier, unseated the chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Congressman Adriano Espaillat. Mr. Mamdani’s former colleague in the legislature, State Assemblywoman Claire Valdez, also won her primary to represent parts of Brooklyn and Queens after Mr. Mamdani backed her over Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez’s chosen successor, Brooklyn Borough president Antonio Reynoso. Mr. Lander is not as far left on the issue of Israel as Ms. Chevalier and Ms. Valdez. Ms. Chevalier was criticized incessantly for attending a rally on October 8, 2023, after the Hamas attacks on Israel the day prior. At the time, the Democratic Socialists of America said that it was co-sponsoring the event in order to defend Palestinian Arabs’s right to “resist” Israel, which critics said amounted to an endorsement of the October 7 attacks. Mr. Lander promptly quit the DSA after being a member of the organization for more than three decades.

Bruce Blakeman Says Brad Lander Would Have Been Concentration Camp Guard If Given the Chance

Bruce Blakeman Says Brad Lander Would Have Been Concentration Camp Guard If Given the Chance

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