FLORIDA (VINnews/Editorial) – The sadder story coming out of Florida tonight is not that Dan Bilzerian lost his Republican congressional primary. It is that he received roughly 11,000 votes at all.
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Bilzerian ran a campaign steeped in antisemitic rhetoric and repeatedly invoked Adolf Hitler. His statements and campaign material have led to him being widely condemned as a neo-Nazi and antisemite.
And yet, thousands of Republican voters still walked into polling places and chose his name.
That should disturb every American, regardless of political party.
Bilzerian was decisively defeated by Rep. Randy Fine, who secured the Republican nomination. Fine, who is Jewish, had been the target of some of Bilzerian’s most inflammatory rhetoric during the campaign.
The election result is certainly a victory over antisemitism. But celebrating the defeat while ignoring the 11,000 votes would miss the bigger warning.
How does a candidate who openly embraces Hitler and repeatedly attacks Jews manage to attract thousands of votes in an American congressional primary?
That is the question we should be asking tonight.
This is bigger than one congressional district and bigger than one political party. Antisemitism does not become less dangerous because the candidate promoting it loses.
Bilzerian lost.
But the fact that thousands of Americans were willing to vote for him is the part that should keep us awake.
Bilzerian started no different than Hitler. Very few Germans followed him in the 1920. Hitler sat in jail, wroteMein Kamft. People thought he would never amount to anything. When you keep on listening to propaganda, hate and lies, when another blames a particular group for a country’s trouble and misery, people start believing the lies and propaganda. In 1933 , Hitler captured the Reichstrag with only 33% of the vote. His hate was directed at the Jews. Many Jews served in WWI and were decorated with honor. It didn’t matter. Hitler exterminated the Jews and blamed Germany’s loss of WWI and the economic crisis facing Germany on the Jews. Germany’s brilliant Jews lost their positions as professors in universities, doctors in hospitals, lawyers,scientists, engineers. 6 million were murdered in the Holocaust. That’s what repeated lies, tropes and propaganda do; it poisons a people. There was a Genocide of Jews committed by Hitler and the Nazis. There was later a Genocide in Rawanda in Africa. Turkey committed a Genocide against Armenians. Israelis did not commit a Genocide in Gaza. If you feed your enemy 4000 calories per day, if you tell your enemy to get out of the way before you strike, drop fliers, make phone calls and if the population of Gaza is larger than it was, there is NO GENOCIDE. IF YOU ATTACK A COUNTRY, RAPE, MURDER, PILLAGE, BURN
, KIDNAP, EXPECT SOLDIERS TO COME GET YOU. THIS IS WAR. HAMAS ATTACKED ISRAEL. ISRAEL’S SOLDIERS RESPONDED. IF YOU WANT PEACE, THINK SMARTER NEXT TIME.
The Frum world is being blindly naive about this, like it’s still 2023.
The main divide is not left vs. right.
Trump, who created the breaking of boundaries, has contained most of it toward the rhetoric that he like and has been successful in keeping it in our favor.
This election is foreshadowing what’s to come when Trump leaves. The volume will be scary. Balazaran is not an anomaly; he is the future.
Florida has 500k Muslims. They are doing to United States what they did in Europe. Politicians see the power in that sect. Truth is, Jews have to come out and vote
Stop worrying about less than 17,000 people in one district while nearly a quarter million voted for the Jew hater in Michigan, another quarter million for the Commie Jew hater in Florida, milliins are voting and nominating Jew haters nationwide all on the democrat side, while on the Republican side they are being defeated one after the other.
If it can be revealed the origin of his 11,000 votes and it shows to be a less respected social base, that might soften the sting to some degree but if the core of his support is more respected right wing, that’s a serious problem indeed.
Actually, he got more than 11,000 votes, and ended up with 18.7% of the total in a report I saw. Nearly 1 in 5 who voted in a Republican primary chose the Nazi sympathizer. Rachmanah l’atzlan.
Yet not one person is taking this as the wake up call from Hashem that it’s meant to be!!!! Wake up!!! Whether you believe it’s telling you to do teshuva, or whether you believe it’s telling you to pick up and go to Eretz Yisrael – do something!!!!
The count of 11,000 votes is a stark number. It shows how easily a destructive ideology can find a foothold, even in plain sight. The true danger is not just in the voice that speaks hatred, but in the ears that choose to hear it as truth. A single defeat does not erase the presence of those who are willing to validate such darkness with their vote.
Update: Dan received close to 17000 votes. See below RANDY FINE WINS THE FLORIDA PRIMARY
Randy Fine
Incumbent
51,076
56.9%
Dan Bilzerian
16,773
Aaron Baker
12,070
With 96% votes in
The 11,000 votes are a stark reminder that antisemitism isn’t always a fringe belief. It lives in plain sight and can gain traction even when openly hostile. This isn’t about one election; it’s about the persistent presence of this ancient hatred. We must confront it directly, not just when it loses, but every time it shows itself.
We are facing trouble in the future just as the Jews did in Europe. In Europe it was because the reform movement and now again because of the reform movement.
When a BenGvir talks “murder” it justifies the hate from right & left. That kind of talk is unprescedented in Jewish history and in Das Torah.