Former Congresswoman Michele Bachmann resigned from the Heritage’s National Task Force to Combat Antisemitism (NTFCA) on Thursday, slamming the think tank’s board of directors for failing to hold President Kevin Roberts accountable.
In a statement sent exclusively to Newsmax, Bachmann suggests the once respected think tank appears to be on life support because the board had not acted to “repair the breach if the good name of Heritage is to survive.”
Roberts pushed the think tank into crisis after Tucker Carlson interviewed white supremacist and Hitler-admiring antisemite Nick Fuentes. Roberts took the moment to go public in a video to defend the Carlson interview.
Roberts later called posting the video a “mistake” but has yet to condemn Carlson for his advocacy of antisemitism and continues to call Carlson a “close personal friend.”
“I resigned from the Heritage antisemitism task force because Heritage leadership failed to stand against the voices of antisemitism on the political right,” Bachmann, a former presidential candidate, said.
“Inexplicably, consistent voices of antisemitism on the political right were embraced, and worse, defended by the leadership of Heritage Foundation.”
“This is the biggest PR disaster in Heritage’s history,” she added. “Heritage leadership shot a cannon through their brand.”
Bachmann, now the dean of Regent University’s Robertson School of Government, said she “loved and supported the organization since its inception” but now warns that “something has clearly gone wrong within the leadership of Heritage.”
Bachmann is one of a growing number of prominent conservative voices to resign from Heritage, citing Roberts’ refusal to denounce antisemitism.
Leaders of the NTFCA also announced this week that group was officially separating from Heritage, indicating it no longer could stay part of the organization after it failed to condemn Carlson.
“The political left embraces antisemitism full stop,” Bachmann said, warning the right could soon be taken over by such thinking, telling Newsmax that “Antisemitism has no place within conservatism.”
Carlson’s Antisemitism
Since he was fired from Fox News in 2023, Carlson and his podcast have become ground zero for antisemitism on the right.
The former host has on more than one occasion suggested that Israel — or “Zionists” — exert undue control over U.S. policy, the media, or public discourse.
For example, at a memorial for Charlie Kirk, he stated: “So it’s about 2,000 years ago in Jerusalem … and Jesus shows up and he starts telling the truth about people … they just go bonkers” and then mocked the idea. “Why don’t we just kill him? That’ll shut him up …” he said, while laughing.
The Anti-Defamation League said: “Carlson’s remarks dangerously reinforced the belief that Jews killed Jesus and that Jews have been a malevolent force throughout history.
“This antisemitic myth has led to expulsions and murders of Jews for centuries.”
In another episode of his podcast, Carlson said that Kirk was killed because of the many enemies he had — and described Kirk’s recent opposition to an Israeli attack on Iran as creating some angry ones.
Many have noted that Carlson regularly uses language that implies Israel or an Israeli lobby “controls” or “pulls the strings” in U.S. politics or media — language that echoes classic antisemitic conspiracy tropes about Jewish control of governments, banks, and media.
In Carlson’s documentary series “The 9/11 Files” and other segments, Carlson has given air to the idea that the official 9/11 narrative is false and that neoconservatives (often overlapped with pro-Israel Jews in discourse) or Israel helped engineer or allowed the attacks in order to advance a “greater Israel” agenda.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, has recently spoken out against Carlson’s bigotry, arguing conservatives need to reject his antisemitism.
“Fuentes and Carlson have a right to say what they are saying. But every one of us has an obligation to stand up and say it is wrong,” he said.
“I don’t have a single friend that’s an antisemite or admirer of Adolph Hitler, and if I did, they would not be friends for long,” Bryan Leib, a Jewish community leader, told Newsmax.
Leib, who recently resigned from NTFCA, said he was “shocked” Roberts continues to brag about his friendship with Carlson.
“But what’s really reprehensible is that Heritage’s Trustees refuse to hold Roberts accountable.”
Revolt at Heritage Foundation
In the wake of Roberts’ failure to condemn Carlson, Heritage is already seeing an exodus of top people, including fellows Stephen Moore and Chris DeMuth.
They have been joined by almost a dozen Jewish and Christian leaders who have quit NTFCA.
A leaked video of a nearly two-hour Heritage staff town hall held on Wednesday showed furious employees demanding Roberts’ resignation and condemning his refusal to defend Jewish colleagues.
“We, as an organization, have been unable to utter the words … if you want to cut through it, Tucker Carlson is an antisemite,” one staffer told Roberts in the video. “And we still do not have a statement about that.”
Another described Heritage as “bleeding” under Roberts’ watch.
Longtime fellow Robert Rector demanded to know why the think tank had tolerated Carlson’s embrace of Fuentes.
“He adores Hitler and says he was a f***in’ cool guy,” Rector said in the meeting. “Do we want him in the conservative movement?”
Roberts, facing near-universal condemnation from his own staff, offered an apology that critics described as empty and evasive.
He has refused to denounce Carlson or disassociate Heritage from the podcaster.
Rabbi Yaakov Menken, executive vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values representing 2,500 Orthodox rabbis, said Roberts’ actions “pose a huge danger — not just to the Jewish people but to American civilization.”
Late this week, Zionist Organization of America President Morton Klein called on Roberts to resign from Heritage.
Klein claimed major Jewish donors have already cut off the think tank from their philanthropy, a move that he says will cost Heritage “millions of dollars” in donor support.
Heritage legal scholar Amy Swearer at the foundation’s open forum called Roberts’ conduct “a masterclass in cowardice that ran cover for the most unhinged dregs of the far right.”
Rector and others said Roberts’ failure to confront antisemitism has destroyed Heritage’s standing as a moral and intellectual authority.
As Bachmann told Newsmax, the damage may be permanent.
Unless the board acts swiftly, she warned, “there may be nothing left to save.”
In addition to Roberts, the Heritage website lists 13 members of its Board of Trustees, including
- Barb Van Andel-Gaby,
- Michael W. Gleba,
- Larry P. Arnn, PhD,
- John Coleman,
- Robert P. George,
- Ryan Haggerty,
- Price Harding,
- Virginia Heckman,
- Shane McCullar,
- Rebekah A. Mercer,
- Abby Spencer Moffat,
- Nersi Nazari, PhD,
- Darryle Owens,
To date, none of the Trustees have offered any comment or criticism of Roberts actions.
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