RJC Summit 2025 in the News

The annual RJC Leadership Summit this year garnered significant media coverage. Here is a small sample:

Jewish Insider: RJC kicks off 40th anniversary summit amid GOP's antisemitism reckoning

The Republican Jewish Coalition's annual leadership summit kicks off tonight at the Venetian Resort in Las Vegas with much to celebrate.

President Donald Trump's recently brokered ceasefire and hostage-release agreement is certain to be among the administration's accomplishments touted by a range of high-profile speakers including Cabinet officials, congressional leaders, pundits and media figures.

The RJC, which was established in 1985, is also celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, and the proceedings will feature "content about where we came from and where we are today," said Sam Markstein, the group's national political director.

"It's come a long way from its humble beginnings," Markstein told Jewish Insider in an interview on Thursday.

Hanging over the three-day conference, however, is the specter of rising antisemitism on the party's far right, an issue that Markstein said the RJC does not intend to avoid...

Jerusalem Post editorial: Republican Jewish Coalition faces leadership test on Israel's fate at Las Vegas summit

...What changed inside the Republican Party is clearer still. During the past decade, the GOP moved from being reliably pro-Israel to staking out signature policies that reset the regional map.

The embassy move to Jerusalem, promised for years by both parties and finally implemented in 2018, and the Abraham Accords, which opened formal ties with the UAE, Bahrain, and later Morocco and Sudan, were consequential acts that reshaped expectations. They anchored a worldview in which US-Israel alignment is explicit, and Arab-Israeli normalization is a practical project rather than a slogan.

The RJC's role has grown in parallel with it. It is no longer a boutique voice; it has become an organizing machine with a national reach and substantial funding.

In 2024, it raised and spent more than $15 million to mobilize Jewish voters in key states, pairing micro-targeting with a relentless ground game. That capacity means the RJC does not just cheer from the sidelines; it shapes candidate incentives and legislative priorities...

Associated Press: Republican Jewish leaders planned a ceasefire celebration, pivoted to take on antisemitism within

Concerns that antisemitism is on the rise among Republicans burst to the surface this weekend, turning a conference of the nation's leading Jewish Republicans from jubilation over a tenuous ceasefire in the Middle East into a clarion call to stem the spread of anti-Jewish voices within the party.

The emerging schism was laid bare by a prominent conservative think tank president's defense of talk show host Tucker Carlson's controversial decision to welcome a far-right activist with antisemitic views onto his podcast Thursday, and Carlson's hesitation to challenge some of his views. It prompted nearly every speaker who took the podium at the Republican Jewish Coalition's annual conference in Las Vegas to call for rooting out anti-Jewish elements in the GOP.

Still, the meeting's proceedings sent a clear signal that the Republican Party has work to do to reconcile views within its ranks about the path forward for Israel in its relationship with the United States, its staunchest ally. But the voices speaking from the podium Friday and Saturday were united in their condemnation of antisemitism.

"We are at this point in what I consider sort of the early stages of an undeclared civil war within the Republican Party, as it relates to Israel, and antisemitism and the Jewish community," Republican Jewish Coalition leader Matthew Brooks said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Las Vegas Review-Journal: President Trump, House Speaker Johnson, others address Las Vegas meeting of Jewish Republicans

Addressing a Republican Jewish Coalition gathering in Las Vegas, House Speaker Mike Johnson declared that "peace is on the way to Israel and the hostages are home."

Originally scheduled to appear in person, Johnson instead joined the annual Leadership Summit on Saturday morning at The Venetian through a live video feed.

He said he had to keep his Washington, D.C., post as the government shutdown entered its second month.

Likewise, President Donald Trump recorded a video broadcast to the gathering in which he touted his 2024 election victory, and his administration's foreign and domestic policies.

"Very importantly, the RJC ensured that we won the highest percentage of the Jewish vote of any Republican since 1988," he said.

...[Speaker Johnson] credited the Republican Jewish Coalition with helping the party win the White House and Congress.

"It's never been more important - as we all know - than it is right now for us to stand together arm and arm and it's my great honor and blessing to do so," Johnson told the group.

New York Times: G.O.P. Figures Seek Distance From Tucker Carlson, Denouncing Antisemitism

In an interview, Matt Brooks, the executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said it was a mistake for Republicans to debate whether it was appropriate for Mr. Carlson to be "platforming" Mr. Fuentes.

"That's a term of the left," he said. "Our issue isn't so much that Tucker had Nick Fuentes on for an interview. Our issue is that he failed to meet the moment and ask him tough questions about why he admires Adolf Hitler, why he's a Holocaust denier and hates Jews, why he is pro-Putin and pro-Stalin."

Mr. Brooks said it was unfortunate that the "Hitler is cool" wing of his party was gaining attention, but he noted that it was far from a new phenomenon.

Jewish Republicans in the past have combated the influence of David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan leader who made inroads with the Republican Party in the 1990s. They stood up to Pat Buchanan, the former Republican presidential candidate who advanced antisemitic ideology.