As the 2022 midterm election approaches, pundits and politicos will undoubtedly talk about the Jewish community’s interests. But speaking about “the Jewish community” these days is a huge mistake. Maybe more than ever, there is no single Jewish voice in America. Like most of America, the Jewish community has become deeply sorted along ideological lines. While politically and culturally Orthodox Jews are generally in line with evangelical and other Christian conservatives, politically liberal Jews (who are almost entirely non-Orthodox) have turned away from traditional institutions and cultural markers of Judaism. Their politically conservative non-Orthodox counterparts, though, staunchly support Israel and value traditions and distinctive Jewish cultural mores
Data from Pew’s landmark study of Jewish Americans in 2020 reveal the depth of this ideological sorting. A socio-political phenomenon has taken hold of American politics over the past few decades where ideologies have become more internally homogeneous and more distinct from each other. More specifically, sorting occurs when ideological and attitudinal positions no longer vary but are expected to align to particular liberal or conservative attitudes. The result today is that, compared to a few decades ago, liberals (and Democrats) are more uniformly left-leaning, while conservatives (and Republicans) are more uniformly right-leaning. Both the left and right generally promote packages of ideas and attitudes that must be adopted wholesale if one is not to fall into disfavor.
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