Why are American Jews on the left

Donald Trump was not the first Republican president frustrated by American Jews’ rejection of him despite his ardent support for Israel. Richard Nixon and George W. Bush too were stung by the dissonance between the gratitude and affection they drew from Israeli Jews and the cold shoulder they received from American Jews.

American Jews have long been one of the most reliable constituencies of the Democratic Party. Jewish support for Democratic candidates ranges from 60% to 90%, averaging roughly 75%. Only African Americans surpass Jewish Americans in allegiance to the Democratic Party. Studies show that for American Jews – like for African Americans – belonging to the Democratic Party has become the core cultural identity; not only as Jews’ group identity, but as their individual identity. This means that most non-Orthodox American Jews understand themselves first and foremost as Democrats, not Jews; their affinity group is not the Jewish nation or other Jews, but the Democratic Party and other Democrats.

This phenomenon flies in the face of an iron rule of American political sociology: as groups move from the margins of American society to the mainstream, and as they rise from poverty to wealth, they migrate from the left to the right. Jews don’t; or haven’t.

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