Jewish and Muslim groups condemned President Trump for calling Senator Chuck Schumer “a Palestinian,” saying that the president used the term as a racial slur.
Mr. Trump made the comments on Wednesday at a meeting in the Oval Office with Micheál Martin, the prime minister of Ireland. A reporter asked Mr. Trump about tax cuts, and Mr. Trump responded by criticizing Democrats and then focused on Mr. Schumer, the minority leader and the highest-ranking elected Jewish official in the United States.
“Schumer is a Palestinian, as far as I’m concerned. He’s become a Palestinian,” Mr. Trump said. “He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore. He’s a Palestinian.”
Nihad Awad, the national executive director of CAIR, the largest Muslim civil rights organization in the United States, said in a statement that Mr. Trump’s use of the term “Palestinian” as a racial slur was offensive and “beneath the dignity of his office.” He added that Mr. Trump’s comments contributed to the “dehumanization of the Palestinian people.”
Amy Spitalnick, chief executive of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said Mr. Trump managed to be both racist and antisemitic at the same time. Saying Mr. Schumer was not Jewish “feeds into a broader narrative the president has tried to advance, which is that there are good Jews and bad Jews,” she said. The good ones are the ones who vote for him, and the bad ones are the vast majority of Jews who do not, she said. His use of “Palestinian” as a slur is part of a broader effort to drive wedges between Jews and Muslims, she added.
Halie Soifer, chief executive of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said Mr. Trump’s comments were “abhorrent” and showed why many Jewish voters did not support Mr. Trump. “His rhetoric, agenda, and alignment with right-wing extremists are endangering American Jews,” she wrote on social media.
Mr. Trump’s comments came after Senate Democrats said on Wednesday that they would not back a Republican bill to fund the government through the end of September, raising the chances of a government shutdown at the end of the week.
The office of Mr. Schumer, whose new book on antisemitism in America will be published next month, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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