Alaskan senator accused of antisemitism after ad against Jewish rival

US Senate candidate Al Gross has accused Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan of publishing antisemitic tropes. Sullivan published an ad showing Gross, who is Jewish, surrounded by cash with a faded-out picture of New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, who is also Jewish, in the background.

This ad has disgusting anti-Semitic tropes but it’s what we should expect from a candidate who has hidden how his family does business with communist China and has voted time and again to benefit their bottom line. They should take the ad down. https://t.co/K8yrIOxoLj

— Dr. Al Gross (@DrAlGrossAK) October 31, 2020

The ad was accompanied by the text: “Lower 48 liberals are flooding Alaska with millions,” possibly referring to out-of-state funding for Gross’s campaign. Both campaigns have received large amounts of funding from outside of Alaska, 87% of Gross’s and 76% of Sullivan’s, according to the Anchorage Daily News.

The combined spending of the two campaigns reached almost $21 million as of October 14, and outside groups have spent about $27m. more.

“This ad has disgusting antisemitic tropes but it’s what we should expect from a candidate who has hidden how his family does business with communist China and has voted time and again to benefit their bottom line,” Gross tweeted on Saturday. “They should take the ad down.”

Gross is an independent candidate running with the Democratic nomination.

His race with Sullivan has garnered national attention as it may result in a Republican seat in the Senate flipping to a Democratic seat.
 

Opposition leader Yair Lapid spoke out against the advertisement on Sunday, calling it “a disgrace and a stain on American democracy.”

As Israel’s Leader of the Opposition and the son of a Holocaust survivor I have to express my anger at this antisemitic advert against the Jewish candidate for Senate in Alaska, Dr. Al Gross. It is a disgrace and a stain on the American democracy we all admire so much. https://t.co/VgcINoAKm0

— יאיר לפיד – Yair Lapid (@yairlapid) November 1, 2020

“As Israel’s leader of the opposition and the son of a Holocaust survivor I have to express my anger at this antisemitic advert against the Jewish candidate for Senate in Alaska, Dr. Al Gross,” he tweeted. “It is a disgrace and a stain on the American democracy we all admire so much.”

Gross, an orthopedic surgeon and former commercial fisherman, has not previously held office, the Anchorage Daily News reported.