Ocasio-Cortez, progressives trash ‘antisemitic’ Politico illustration of Bernie Sanders

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) joined a growing crowd of progressives on Twitter on Saturday to denounce illustrations published by Politico as anti-Semitic.

The illustrations in question were published Friday as part of a Politico investigation into Sanders’s wealth and how he came to be worth just over $1 million. One illustration depicts Sanders, who is Jewish, next to a tree made of money, while another shows a grinning Sanders appearing to hold his house in the palm of his hand while two other properties he owns sit on his shoulders.

Bernie Sanders has three homes and a net worth approaching at least $2 million.
In a strict, bottom-line sense, he has become one of those rich people against whom he has so unrelentingly railed.https://t.co/PawDq3S07m

— POLITICO (@politico) May 25, 2019

In a tweet Saturday afternoon, the New York congresswoman wrote that the illustration was a clear example of historic anti-Semitic stereotypes surrounding Jewish people and wealth, adding that the news site published the images because Sanders is “a progressive politician they don’t like.”{mosads}

“Can ⁦@politico⁩ explain to us how photoshopping money trees next to the only Jewish candidate for president and talking about how ‘cheap’ and rich he is *isn’t* antisemitic?” the congresswoman wrote. “Or are they just letting this happen because he’s a progressive politician they don’t like?”

Can ⁦@politico⁩ explain to us how photoshopping money trees next to the only Jewish candidate for president and talking about how “cheap” and rich he is *isn’t* antisemitic?

Or are they just letting this happen because he’s a progressive politician they don’t like? pic.twitter.com/O9qvDBw4ib

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) May 25, 2019

A second tweet accused the website’s defenders on social media of “selectively” enforcing rules against anti-Semitism on the left, pointing to the numerous lawmakers and others who demanded apologies from Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) over remarks she made about the Israel lobby.

“Notice the people willing to explain this away, yet when Ilhan’s words are taken out of context, they are the 1st to jump on her,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “Look at how these accusations are selectively enforced on the left, esp when it’s the *alt-right* actually committing antisemitic violence in the US.”

Her criticism was echoed by other progressives on social media, including David Sirota, a speechwriter with Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign who previously worked as a reporter.

“Meet @Politico — a DC newspaper that sees a president call Nazis ‘very fine people,’ and then decides to create a graphic putting a money tree behind the president’s Jewish opponent, whose father’s family was killed by Nazis,” Sirota wrote on Friday.

Meet @Politico — a DC newspaper that sees a president call Nazis “very fine people,” and then decides to create a graphic putting a money tree behind the president’s Jewish opponent, whose father’s family was killed by Nazis pic.twitter.com/dHblLCWfID

— David Sirota (@davidsirota) May 25, 2019

Sanders’s chief of staff, Ari Rabin-Havt, concurred with Sirota, calling the image an “anti-Semitic trope.”

Politico style book: “needed more context” = the previous tweet contained an anti Semitic trope.

The current tweet contains a doctored photo of Bernie in front of a literal money tree and a house that is not his. Because that is better? https://t.co/T43RCVCoki pic.twitter.com/N8LfxgbiID

— Ari Rabin-Havt (@AriRabinHavt) May 25, 2019

“What if we photoshop a money tree next to the Jew?” added Washington Post reporter Jeff Stein in his own tweet.

What if we photoshop a money tree next to the Jew?

— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) May 25, 2019

Politico did not immediately return a request for comment from The Hill regarding the illustrations Saturday.

Sanders, who is currently placing second in most polls of early 2020 Democratic primary states, would be the first Jewish president if elected to the office in 2020.