Although it was not a factor in Senator Manchin’s decision, Tanden has a shaky history on Israel matters.
By David Isaac, World Israel News
Neera Tanden’s nomination to head the Office of Management and Budget appears to be in jeopardy. After Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said he wouldn’t support her confirmation, “behind-the-scenes jockeying began for those seeking to be the fallback option,” Politico reported on Feb. 20.
“I have carefully reviewed Neera Tanden’s public statements and tweets that were personally directed towards my colleagues on both sides of the aisle from Senator [Bernie] Sanders to Senator [Mitch] McConnell and others,” Manchin said in a statement on Friday.
“I believe her overtly partisan statements will have a toxic and detrimental impact on the important working relationship between members of Congress and the next director of the Office of Management and Budget. For this reason, I cannot support her nomination,” he said.
Tanden, president and CEO of the far-left think tank Center for American Progress and a longtime Clinton confidante, has the dubious distinction of out-tweeting former President Donald Trump (over 1.5 times more to be exact), according to Newsweek.
Her sharply worded social media posts attacked Democrats and Republicans alike. She said, “vampires have more heart than Ted Cruz,” the Republican senator for Texas. Of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), she said “Russia did a lot more to help Bernie than the DNC’s random internal emails did to help Hillary.”
On Feb. 10, Sanders said, “Your attacks were not just made against Republicans. There were vicious attacks against progressives, people who I have worked with — me personally.”
Tanden apologized for her online rhetoric. “I deeply regret and apologize for my language, some of my past language,” she said. “I recognize that this role is a bipartisan role, and I recognize I have to earn the trust of senators across the board.”
Although it was not a factor in Manchin’s decision, Tanden has a shaky history on Israel matters.
In March 2019, Tanden opposed Trump’s recognition of the Golan Heights, “a blatant political move to boost the chances of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of Israeli elections and earn political points here at home.”
She said, “Unfortunately, it could actually destabilize the region, isolate the United States and diminish the chances of Arab-Israeli peace even further.”
Under her tenure, CAP in 2012 came under fire from Jewish groups for language its staffers used that was considered anti-Israel and borderline anti-Semitic. In one personal Twitter post, a CAP writer referred to “Israel-firsters,” which the Jewish groups said was borrowed from anti-Semitic tropes questioning Jews’ loyalty.
CAP defended itself by saying the “inappropriate” language appeared in personal tweets, and not on CAP’s website or official blogs.
CAP sought to distance itself from the anti-Israel and anti-Semitism charge and at one point hosted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to speak in 2015.