That depends on who and where they are. The Jewish vote matters more than it would seem based on its small national numbers for three reasons.

First Jews typically vote Democrat. Reagan received more Jewish votes than any other of his party and that was 39%.

Secondly, Jews vote at nearly twice the percentage than most other groups. They are also more likely to donate money to the candidate of their choice.

Third and this is the most critical in this campaign; Jews are concentrated in the blue states with the most electoral votes: New York, Pennsylvania, Florida, Illinois and California.

In these states Jews could be as high as 10-15% of the vote. If Obama’s weak foreign policy experience, and tepid response to Iran, his association with Wright, Farrakhan and Ayers, and now recently sacked foreign policy advisor Robert Malley costs him Jewish support he could lose the big states with the big electoral numbers that Democrats typically get. Hillary is still a darling of the liberal Jewish voters, and would easily grab a much bigger proportion.

If Mary Grabar’s piece is at all typical of the response he may get from numerous other immigrant groups, also concentrated in blue states, this will only compound his liability to the party.

print