A storm is brewing in Rockland County, N.Y., a campaign ad says.
As dramatic music pulses in the background, the Rockland County Republican Party’s video first targets what the party considers overdevelopment in the county of about 329,000 people.
Then it takes a turn. County Legislator Aron Wieder, an Orthodox Jew who supports new housing developments, is “plotting a takeover” that threatens “our way of life,” the advertisement proclaims. After the video asks what’s at stake, the words “Our Families” are overlaid on a photo of a white, non-Orthodox couple and their children posing on a front lawn.
“Others have lost the fight,” the ad says as it shows headlines about Hasidic Jews — a subgroup of ultra-Orthodox practitioners — voting to form their own town. “IF THEY WIN, WE LOSE. TAKE BACK CONTROL,” declares the video, which the party has since deleted from its Facebook page.
The advertisement drew fire this week at the highest levels of state government, as well as from federal and local lawmakers. New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D) said the video was “the very definition of discrimination” and an attack on Hasidic Jews.