Proud Islamophobe and Kanye's 'Good Jew': Who Is Trump Insider and Far-right Provocateur Laura Loomer? - U.S. News - Haaretz.com
WASHINGTON – For many Americans just learning of the existence of Laura Loomer, the far-right provocateur's comments both past and present are causing increasing levels of shock and dismay.
Loomer's ascendance into Donald Trump's inner circle coalesced around last week's presidential debate in which the Republican candidate trafficked in rambling conspiracy theories including factually incorrect claims about immigrants eating pets.
Since then, Loomer has made racist comments about Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris' Indian heritage, managing to pack several stereotypes into a single tweet in which she wrote that if Harris won the November elections, "the White House will smell like curry and speeches will be delivered via a call centre."
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Both Loomer's comments and her proximity to Trump in the last weeks have caused great alarm among Trump's Republican allies, with figures such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Sens. Lindsey Graham and Thom Tillis urging the former president to distance himself from the 31-year-old.
For many in the Jewish community, however, Loomer has long been known as an agitator who positions her own Jewish heritage to push Islamophobia – all for self-promotion.
Loomer watches as Donald Trump visits volunteer firefighters in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday.Credit: Matt Rourke/AP
Loomer, who has described herself as both a "proud Islamophobe" and an "investigative journalist," first came to prominence as a pro-Trump activist who flaunted her Judaism while speaking at "anti-sharia" rallies. But she clashed with far-right white supremacists who deemed her "alt-light" and launched antisemitic attacks against her.
Free spirit?
Asked about her over the weekend, Trump called Loomer "a free spirit" and "a big fan" of his campaign, while claiming he wasn't aware of specific conspiracy theories she has spread. Loomer, who accompanied Trump to ceremonies commemorating the September 11 attacks, said as recently as last year that 9/11 was an "inside job."
She was banned from Uber in 2017 after calling on the rideshare service to permit riders to reject Muslim drivers, only to be suspended from Twitter months later after describing Ilhan Omar (then a congressional candidate) as "anti-Jewish." She also accused the future Muslim congresswoman of belonging to a religion in which "homosexuals are oppressed" and "women are abused."
Loomer also praised the drowning deaths of thousands of migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean, posting "Good. Here's to 2,000 more." She was later banned from Facebook and Instagram for saying that Omar wanted "another 9/11" and stating "Islam is a cancer."
Following her banning from Twitter, Loomer handcuffed herself to the company's New York headquarters while adorning a yellow Star of David imitating what the Nazis forced Jews to wear during the Holocaust.
She won the Republican primary for her Florida district's congressional seat in 2020, buoyed by Trump allies like Roger Stone and her campaign manager Karen Giorno, who two years later would attend Trump's infamous Mar-a-Lago antisemites sit-down with the rapper Ye, formerly Kanye West, and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes.
Trump at a rally in Las Vegas on Friday.Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images via AFP
Trump enthusiastically endorsed Loomer against her Democratic opponent, Jewish Democratic Rep. Lois Frankel, whom the then-president dismissed as a "Pelosi puppet."
Her campaign was additionally backed by Republicans Abroad Israel co-chair Marc Zell, who deemed her a "heroine of Israel" who "will put the Squad in its proper place" – referring to the group of outspoken progressive members of Congress.
During her race, Loomer told Jerusalem-based Israel News Talk Radio that "we have jihadists in Congress who are supporting BDS and calling for the eradication of Israel," adding: "It's what President Trump said, the Democrat Party is the party of Israel-haters and Jew-haters."
Following Trump's endorsement, his daughter-in-law and future Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump visited Loomer on the campaign trail, days before Loomer used Holocaust imagery to attack Frankel for supporting the Black Lives Matter movement.
"Lois Frankel loves Black Lives Matter. That is meshuggah," the ad stated, later deeming Frankel "gornisht Lois," using a Yiddish word for "absolutely nothing." It also stated that Frankel "kneels" to a group that wants to end U.S. foreign aid to Israel and dismissed her as "incapable of protecting the Jewish community or Israel."
'Jihadist' Democrats 'walking Jews to the gas chamber'
After the Anti-Defamation League decried the ad as "disgusting," Loomer's campaign told the ADL to "focus its attention on antisemites in power," again using the controversy to attack Omar.
Loomer would later tell the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that Frankel, long considered one of the most pro-Israel stalwarts in the Democratic Party, was "doing the bidding for the jihadists in the Democrat Party who are just literally walking Jews to the gas chamber."
Rep. Ilhan Omar speaking in Minneapolis last month. Loomer once called her "anti-Jewish."Credit: Kerem Ycel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP
Both Trump and the Republican Party are brandishing the "Jew-haters" talking point in their case to American Jewish voters in the 2024 election, during which Trump has frequently plied dual-loyalty tropes when addressing supporters and detractors alike.
Unlike Republicans Abroad Israel, the Republican Jewish Coalition did not back Loomer during her 2020 campaign, earning the ire of Loomer, who noted that individual RJC board members – including GOP mega-donor Bernie Marcus – did back her.
Marcus would go on to be a key Trump donor and one of the largest benefactors to AIPAC's United Democracy Project Super PAC that spent unprecedented amounts in Democratic primaries aimed at defeating progressive candidates.
In Florida, Frankel comfortably defeated Loomer, who said the race was "putting the Jews on trial" in her district. In 2021, Loomer tried to challenge Republican incumbent Rep. Daniel Webster in a different Florida district, buoyed by her then-ally Greene, as well as other Republicans embroiled in controversies related to antisemitism like Rep. Paul Gosar and Michael Flynn, a former national security adviser to Trump.
Though Loomer lost, she refused to concede and blamed her defeat on "big-tech election interference." She would soon be allowed back on Twitter in 2022 after Elon Musk bought the social media platform.
Soon after her 2022 defeat, Loomer earned praise from Ye as one of the few "good Jews" – the rapper was speaking with InfoWars conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. In the same livestream, Ye openly declared his support for Hitler and the Nazis. "I see good things about Hitler also. Every human being has something of value that they brought to the table, especially Hitler...The Jewish media have made us feel like the Nazis and Hitler have nothing to offer the world." Loomer would later call in to the show to say "as a Jew" she supported their free speech message.
In the days after Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel, Loomer was among the most ardent proponents that October 13 was a planned "global day of jihad."
This claim was cited by Joseph Czuba, an Illinois landlord who fatally stabbed 6-year-old Palestinian-American Wadea al-Fayoume while critically wounding his mother in an incident that has symbolized anti-Palestinian and Islamophobic racism over the past year.