It׳s 2054 and a Republican Jew is president

The victory of the Republican presidential candidate in the 2054 election, came as no surprise. Joseph Fredrick Kushner, the first American Jew who would serve as president, has won wide support for the large electoral base of the Republican Party, which in the past three decades has gradually become the political home of the Jewish community in the United States.

In the battle between the two leading political heirs, the winner was Kushner, 41, the grandson of former President Donald Trump and the son of Jared and Ivanka Trump, who beat the Democratic presidential candidate, Isra Hirsi, 51, the daughter of the former Minnesota Representative Ilana Omar.

During the campaign, Hirsi created a controversy when she accused Kushner of being “a Trojan Horse for a foreign power”, an allegation that only helped solidify the backing for Kushner among American Jews.

The traditional support for the Democrats among American Jews started to erode in 2024 when Trump was re-elected for a second term. The incumbent President Joe Biden, the Democratic candidate, still carried the Jewish vote but with a much smaller margin compared to other elections.

It was possible to notice 30 years ago the demographic and political metamorphosis of the Democratic Party and the beginning of the change in American voting patterns.

The old guard of the Democratic Party, represented by the likes of President Biden and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, still maintained close ties with Jewish activists and donors and promoted a pro-Israel agenda.

But these old-timers were replaced by a young generation of members of the progressive wing of the Democratic Party in which African-American, Hispanic and Muslim activists became more dominant. In the 2024 election, they expressed critical if not hostile positions towards Israel.

Against the backdrop of Israel’s then war against Hamas in Gaza, Democratic members of Congress called for ending the US military support for Israel. Their call reflected the views of young progressive Democratic voters who identified more with the Palestinian cause than with Israel. Many of them participated in the pro-Palestinian and anti-Israeli demonstrations that took place on American campuses that year.

At the same time, the Republicans were winning by larger numbers among two important demographics in the American-Jewish community – Modern Orthodox like the Kushners and Ultra-Orthodox Jews. The high birth rates among these two groups coupled with the high rates of assimilation among secular and Reform Jews helped turn them into a majority among American Jews and a powerful force in the Republican Party.

The Democratic Party was able to maintain its influence and power in New York and among left-leaning voters. But Kushner succeeded in uniting the various wings of the GOP, including traditional conservatives, populists and libertarians, as the party was able to attract in addition to Jewish Americans more support from Hispanics, Asian-Americans and African-Americans, and led the party to victory.