(JNS) — The Georgia state Senate voted 44-6 on Thursday to pass a bill that uses the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism to define Jew-hatred in state law.
The legislation, which now heads to the desk of Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, had passed the state House 129-5.
Kemp, who visited Israel for the first time last year, has said he will sign the bill because it “builds on our commitment to protect Georgians from criminal acts, including those based on hate.”
Georgia state representatives Esther Panitch, a Democrat, and John Carson, a Republican, led the legislation, which calls on state agencies to define Jew-hatred “as provided for in the working definition of antisemitism and the contemporary examples of antisemitism adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.”
“I am overwhelmed with gratitude to my colleagues and leaders, who listened to the Jewish community about what we were being subjected to with antisemitism and took action,” Panitch, the only Jewish member of the Georgia state legislature, told JNS.
Chris Carr, the attorney general of Georgia, wrote that HB30 is important amid rising antisemitism. “In Georgia, we continue to push back against these acts of evil and in support of our Jewish friends and neighbors,” he stated. “We’re thankful to our General Assembly for sending a message that antisemitism has no place in our state.”
Rabbi Ari Weisenfeld, associate national director of state relations for Agudah Israel of America, encouraged other states to follow suit.
“Agudath Israel is especially grateful to Representatives Panich and Carson for championing the bill last year and for continuing to advocate for it this year,” he stated. “We also thank Senate President Pro Tempore John Kennedy for sponsoring the bill in the Senate.”
Shawn Evenhaim, board chair of the Israeli-American Coalition for Action, applauded the Georgia legislature for its “bold stand against antisemitic and national origin discrimination.”
“By acting today, Georgia is protecting their citizens against anti-Jewish bias and hatred, which has been at crisis levels since Oct. 7,” Evenhaim added.
Carson, who sponsored the bill, noted the efforts of attorney Joe Sabag, “who helped lead the formation of Georgia’s anti-BDS law in 2016 and developed this IHRA bill” and also thanked Naty Saidoff, chair emeritus of the Israeli-American Coalition, for affording him “the opportunity to visit Israel and learn more about the problem of global antisemitism. (BDS is to the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.)
Sabag, executive director of Israeli-American Coalition for Action, called the bill “a major step forward for equal protection for Jewish Georgians.”
“Without the IHRA definition, our community was suffering a civil rights deficit, where perpetrators of antisemitic crime and discrimination would target Jews and Jewish institutions and then hide behind the false pretense that they were motivated by anti-Israel politics and not anti-
Jewish bigotry,” he said. “Today’s passage of HB30 is a great step forward for Georgia.”
Jordan Cope, policy education director at StandWithUs, attended the vote. “With antisemitism having exploded worldwide post-Oct. 7, the IHRA definition remains a tool of paramount importance for helping identify and quell the mounting tide of antisemitism,” he stated.
“Georgia’s moral clarity on this matter sets a clear example from which other states ought to draw inspiration as Jews around the world desperately seek assurances of their own safety,” he added.
