Jeff Ballabon: Two-State Solution Is A Costly Failure

Jeff Ballabon, on the left, as a VIP guest at an annual Russian Jewish Community Foundation charity ball in Boston, in November 2007.

Campaigns and Elections:

Insider Insights: Jeff Ballabon

By Politics magazine

03/24/08

Jeff Ballabon is known in Washington as the go-to-guy for relations within the conservative Jewish community. In 2004, he helped develop a successful strategy for President Bush to reach out to Orthodox Jews. Currently, he is president of Ballabon Group, a consulting firm oriented towards helping clients with crisis management and media relations. A graduate of Yale Law School, Ballabon was a senior media executive at Primedia Television prior to his work on the Hill.

Politics: How would you advise the presidential candidates to reach out to the Orthodox Jewish vote?

Ballabon: Republicans have to approach any minority differently than Democrats.

Based on what we executed in the last election, and based on what we saw in the field, the way campaigns tend to be structured is geographical, and that's not effective in helping to grow the Jewish vote, or for that matter other ethnic votes; minorities aren't monolithic or geographic, they're composed of many self-defining affinity groups, often with their own national media.  A successful national campaign has to reach Jews based on how different segments of the community think, not deliver the same "Jewish" message to everyone or create outreach events based solely on geography.  Events should be based on message.  That is true for all minority groups - there is not just one Hispanic or Latino identity and there is no such thing as an identity based on state.

Democrats, on the other hand, are able to rely on a "fear" message. There's a simple message for those on the left in appealing to minorities: we will protect you from the majority. In the case of Jews, the Democratic message, as evidenced on the NJDC [National Jewish Democratic Council] website, is consistent for many years: be very afraid of the GOP because it is the party of scary Christians. On the Republican side the messaging and surrogates and events have to break down differently.

Until now the GOP has not figured out how to reach out to us, yet it's fundamental. Focus on affinity groups that are gettable and approach people based on a set of ideas not on ethnicity; we know how to do it and it's something we're hoping to have an opportunity to grow. We think this approach translates across the board and to other groups Republicans have been trying to capture.

Politics: What's the biggest issue for the community you represent heading into this year's presidential election? 

Ballabon: The community is afraid.  There is the rise of open anti-Semitism in many places and people are saying it is reminiscent of the years immediately preceding the Holocaust. We take seriously the threats made by Iran to obliterate Israel. The UN and mainstream media's anti-Israel bias is palpable. Against this backdrop, there is great concern about Israel being pressured by the next Administration to make concessions. More liberal Jewish communities argue that Israel actually needs more pressure from the US to hurry up and create a new state for the Palestinians - but these Jews are dyed-in-the-wool Democrats for whom Israel comes way after a host of liberal social policies.

Jews who do have Israel as one of their top voting priorities are in play in 08.  They tend to view the current "Two-State Solution" as a costly failure.  They are not persuaded by candidates who just say they are "Pro-Israel" or trot out Jewish surrogates.  They want to hear what candidates intend to do.  This includes the most traditional cadres, like Orthodox, Russian, Syrian and Iranian Jews which together comprise an increasingly significant chunk of the Jewish vote and the only real segment not already committed. They would like to see the US return to the regional paradigm, bringing Arab states back into the picture and insisting that they also help provide political suffrage and economic opportunity for Palestinian Arabs, rather than pushing the entire burden on Israel.

Politics: Do you see any presidential candidate being successful with this demographic right now?

Ballabon: In 2004, for the first time, a national campaign actually reached out to Orthodox Jews with a targeted message and targeted events. Orthodox leaders flew in from all over the country to attend an official Bush-Cheney campaign event we ran during the convention. If you look at some of the Orthodox press, you find there still is a sense of excitement that they were included in the political process. Until 2004, until the work we were doing in the field, basically all these subgroups felt ignored. This is true of Orthodox and other important but less well known groups, like Syrian Jews and Russian Jews and Iranian Jews, which are natural Republican constituencies.

Polls show that "fear of anti-Semitism" still is a great defining factor for many Jews and that traditionally helps Democrats.  But the Republican campaign that learns how to drill down to affinity groups based on other ideas and doesn't just lump them all in to a national "Jewish campaign" will do well.

Politics: In general, are the candidates doing a good job reaching out to minority groups?

Ballabon: There are traditional approaches to both parties. If you consider the current primaries you'll see that in the Democratic primaries, the voting patterns can easily be separated by racial, ethnic and gender demographics and so they approach outreach using identity as an issue much more openly.  Basically, for Democrats, identity matters. For Republicans, identity in and of itself is not really considered an issue - other than perhaps faith.  The Republican primary vote has been broken down by policies, and so where a candidate stands on immigration, Iraq and the economy is more likely to determine how you vote than your skin color or gender.

Politics: Do you prefer being behind the scenes as opposed to being an elected official?

Ballabon: I worked in the Senate. I truly loved the public policy that I was involved in.   It was life changing.  In all honesty, it made me more idealist than cynic.  However I like continuing that work in different ways. I have no aspirations of being an elected official. I have 5 children and a wife, and that comes first and it's what holds me back. I know people in that position and it takes a toll. Hats off to them.

Interview by Lauren Zingarelli.

posted by: jrtelegraph

Comments

[42 inch lcd sale]

Another water in this performance is northeast members and organs; the paper's bk chicken fries, percentage drove predators of used water, is out dismantled to this mouthpiece.