Talk:List of Jewish members of the United States Congress

Religion or Ethnicity or self-identification?

We need to be specific about the criteria for this list. Specifically, is this only for Congress members that called themselves Jewish - whatever they meant by that? Or only for those that were Jewish by religion, and said as much? Or is this also by those whose ancestors were ethnically Jewish - and if so, how far back? We should write as much in the lead to the article, and possibly specify in the entries for each member if they are here by ethnicity, religion, self-identification, or what. --GRuban (talk) 21:00, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

At the moment it is just about those who are religiously Jewish, however I would like to add a subsection to include those who ancestors were Jewish, such as George Allen and Barry Goldwater. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SleepCovo (talk • contribs) 00:08, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Specified in lead. Just curious, do you consider Adam a Jewish ancestor? :-) --GRuban (talk) 15:58, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

There is much such thing as ethnically Jewish. Jews are Chinese, Indian, Russian, Polish and many other ethnicities. I think the list is comprosed of those people who identify as Jewish, either religiously or culturally. 216.154.26.255 (talk) 00:26, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Pursuant to established practice - Barry Goldwater and others do not belong in this list, nor is the source reliable as it specifies that it is only a matter of opinion that many were Jewish. Collect (talk) 16:20, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

We might add two columns, one for religion and one for ancestry, that explain specifics in each case. But I'm not going to do it. --GRuban (talk) 18:53, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Where would that leave those of mixed ancestry, like Goldwater? If one notes he had Jewish forebears only, it is playing into dubious hands, for the implication would be that, uniquely for anyone with Jewish antecedents, this factor cancels out all other ethnic components of the 'blood-line', something that, I think unwittingly, plays into the hands of anti-Semites. Nishidani (talk) 19:46, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

The columns would explain specifics. "Had a Jewish great-grand-uncle, twice removed. Also once ate lox on a bagel." --GRuban (talk) 21:25, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

A similar discussion about inclusion criteria is taking place in this RfC on List of ethnic minority politicians in the United Kingdom. Cordless Larry (talk) 20:32, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

Who counts as Jewish?

The criterion should be those who are halachically Jewish - that is, they were born of a Jewish mother or have converted to Judaism. Halachic Jews who convert to another religion do not cease to be Jews under Jewish law, although they cease to be recognised as members of a Jewish community. Any such cases can by noted, such as George Allen, whose mother is Jewish but who is a Christian. (It is of course possible that a person who is not halachically Jewish can still consider themself Jewish and identify as such. Such cases would also have to be noted.) Under this criterion, Barry Goldwater was not Jewish, since his mother was not Jewish and he was a Christian. Brian Schatz has a Jewish mother and practises Judaism. Michael Bennet has a Jewish mother and declines to state his religion. He should be included unless it can be shown he is a Christian. Intelligent Mr Toad 2 (talk) 08:19, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to one external link on List of Jewish members of the United States Congress. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20071026102737/http://www.wkrn.com/nashville/news/ap-congressional-incumbents-reelected-cohen-takes-lead-in-memphis/58131.htm to http://www.wkrn.com/nashville/news/ap-congressional-incumbents-reelected-cohen-takes-lead-in-memphis/58131.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 19:23, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Delegates to the U.S. House of Representatives

Should we add a section on Jewish Delegates to the U.S. House of Representatives? Delegates represent U.S. territories and the District of Columbia, but still are considered members of Congress. While I haven't gone through the list of Delegates from each past and current territory to see which ones have been Jewish, I can think of at least one Jewish Delegate to the House: David Levy Yulee, who was the Territory of Florida's final Delegate prior to admission as the 27th state. Yulee already is listed in this article as the first Jewish Senator, but I think that his service as a Delegate also should be included, particularly since that made him, as far as I know, the first Jewish member (albeit a non-voting one) of the House of Representatives. What do you all think? AuH2ORepublican (talk) 22:31, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on List of Jewish members of the United States Congress. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20100427105819/http://blogs.jta.org/politics/article/2010/04/21/1788714/ted-deutch-a-most-jewish-speech-from-the-most-jewish-district to http://blogs.jta.org/politics/article/2010/04/21/1788714/ted-deutch-a-most-jewish-speech-from-the-most-jewish-district

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 23:15, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

Mike Levin

Congressman Mike Levin (D-CA) was born to a Jewish father and a Catholic mother. He told the San Diego Jewish Journal a few days before he was sworn in to the U.S. House of Representatives that, while he was baptized Catholic, "I was raised with both the Catholic faith and also the Jewish faith. I have deep respect for Jewish culture and tradition and celebrate High Holidays with my dad," and that he considers himself "culturally Jewish." http://sdjewishjournal.com/sdjj/january-2019/no-gambler-an-interview-with-congressman-mike-levin/ Should Levin be added to the article? @User:Mélencron, you previously had removed Levin from the article (when other editors had added him); after reading Levin's interview quoted above, do you still belive that Levin was not "raised in the Jewish faith" as required by the article? AuH2ORepublican (talk) 04:31, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

How many Jewish senators are there?

Maybe I'm miscounting, but I see eight Jewish Senators, not nine. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Joe in Australia (talk • contribs) 02:09, 16 July 2019 (UTC)

Barry Goldwater

I edited this page to add Barry Goldwater, who's father was Jewish. Sen. Goldwater himself, though episcopalian, often referred to himself as Jewish. It appears that my edit has been removed. Jamdud22 (talk) 04:28, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

The first two sentences of the article's introduction are as follows: "This is a list of members of the United States Congress who practiced Judaism as a religion.[1] It does not include members who had Jewish ancestry but were not religiously practicing." Barry Goldwater did not have a Jewish mother and he never practiced Judaism (not even as a child), so he does not meet the criteria for this article. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 04:39, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

That criteria would make sense if it was consistent but it's not. David Levy Yulee was born to Jewish parents and raised Jewish, however he converted to Christianity and no longer practiced Judiasm when he was in government...Yet he is included in this article. Barry Goldwater had Jewish ancestry via his father and was not practicing Judaism, if David Levy Yulee is included then so should Barry Goldwater. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1700:1EC1:30C0:3DA3:39C0:C5AE:2F48 (talk) 01:58, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Problems with the article

This article has many problems:

1. created by the sockpuppet of a banned editor notorious for creating and defending unsourced lists of politicians;
2. almost completely unsourced (and therefore many WP:BLP issues), and sourcing it would be a huge effort; and
3. duplicate of List of Jewish American politicians#Representatives, which is actually sourced.

I redirected to the appropriate target above, but was reverted. Can editors here please explain why? Jayjg ^(talk) 19:28, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Here are my responses to your three concerns:

1. The fact that a banned sockpuppet created the article originally does not mean that it hasn't been edited by serious editors over the past five years.

2. You are correct that the article does not include a specific reference to each person's practice of Judaism, but it includes links to the main Wikipedia article for each of those persons, each of which sets forth that the member of Congress in question was or is Jewish. I think that adding footnotes to each entry with evidence of such person's Judaism would be a terrific addition to the article. Would you like to help to improve the article?

3. The article entitled "List of Jewish American politicians" is a very poor substitute for the article on Jewish members of Congress that you decided to delete. First of all, "List of Jewish American politicians" is geared towards providing *current* officeholders, with very little mention of former officeholders (all of which are grouped together at the end of each section, as if they were honorable mentions or something). The stand-alone article on Jewish members of Congress lists such persons chronologically, includes birth and death years, years of service, state represented, political parties while in office, and other information, and is thoroughly searchable and sortable. Moreover, it follows the same general format as other articles that list members of racial, ethnic or religious groups in Congress.

If the "List of Jewish American politicians" indeed provides reliable sources for the former and current members of Congress that it lists, then that's a good start for improving the "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" article. Please note that many former congressmen included in Stone's "The Jews of Capitol Hill: A Compendium of Jewish Congressional Members" are included in the "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" article but not in "List of Jewish American politicians," so the fact that the former article lists a lot more Jewish members of Congress than the latter article does not mean that "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" is incorrect.

I agree with you, however, that it does not make sense to have two lists that, after they both are improved, would be identical. My proposal is for "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" to remain as a stand-alone article and for "List of Jewish American politicians" to make a cross-reference to "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" in its section for historical members of Congress. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 19:54, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

@AuH2ORepublican:

• Every article must have inline citations in the existing article verifying the claims made in it; links to other Wikipedia articles are not sufficient; see WP:PROVEIT, WP:CIRC, and WP:CHALLENGED etc. Regarding the living people on this list, and your suggestion that I "help to improve the article", please see WP:BLPREQUESTRESTORE. You restored the material, so you are obligated to source it. I think the article should be deleted, so it makes little sense to suggest that I source it.
• List of Jewish American politicians lists former office-holders in almost every section of the article; it is in no way geared towards providing *current* officeholders. If you want to adopt some of the formatting of this article in that one (e.g. around table format, chronology, birth and death years, etc.) feel free to do so.
• Regarding your suggestion that "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" to remain as a stand-alone article and for "List of Jewish American politicians" to make a cross-reference to "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" in its section for historical members of Congress, that might make sense, and I'd considered it myself, but the effort to add all the required citations to this article is huge, and it really must be done now. In any event, given that there are so many different kinds of Jewish American politicians, it doesn't make sense to have one specific subset have its own article, while all others are in the "main" article.

I suggest you restore the redirect now, and mine this history of the article for any relevant material you want to include in List of Jewish American politicians. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:55, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Well, I suggest that you hear from other editors to the List of Jewish members of the United States Congress article before you decide, on your own, to delete it. Maybe no one will care, and it will be deleted, but you'll never know until you ask. I've already copied and saved the information in the article so that I can use it in the future; it would be a shame if no one else could access such information, because the congressional information in the Jewish-politicians article is terribly incomplete (it lists only 25 former Representatives when there should be over 150) and does not seem to even try to present useful information on non-current officeholders (no photo, political party, etc.).

In the meantime, I will start adding footnotes denoting the page numbers in Stone's 2011 book on Jewish members of Congress (surely a reliable source) that discusses each of those persons listed in the article; the ones that Stone did not list will require looking at other sources. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 21:37, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Why not fix up List of Jewish American politicians instead? Regardless of what you add here, it should still be deleted for the other reason I listed above; "given that there are so many different kinds of Jewish American politicians, it doesn't make sense to have one specific subset have its own article, while all others are in the "main" article." Jayjg ^(talk) 22:07, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Why would I add 150-200 new entries to an article with an inferior structure instead of adding sourced footnotes to the few dozen Jewish members of Congress that had not been sourced? At that point, the editing community can decide whether to (i) substitute the incomplete, spartan information in the "List of Jewish American politicians" article with a cross reference to the more complete information in the "List of Jewish member of the United States Congress" article or (ii) incorporate the more complete article directly into the incomplete, spartan section in the Jewish-politician article. Given the fact that the Jewish-politician article would become unwieldy should it actually become a complete source of information on Jewish officeholders in the U.S. (as opposed to what it is now), I think that the cross-reference is the way to go.

As for the pretense that you are using to delete the article now that it is on the way to becoming fully sourced--that "Jewish politicians" includes "Jewish members of Congress," so they should not be the subject of their own article because there isn't a separate article for "Jewish lieutenant governors" or something--that is not a proper reason to delete an article. If there aren't enough Jewish lieutenant governors to merit their own article, then an article on Jewish politicians is a very good place to list such officeholders, and it's a good thing that the more general article exists. But if there are enough Jewish members of Congress to merit their own article, then the more general article can make reference to the more complete article and then there would not be any duplicity of information. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 22:39, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

the pretense that you are using to delete the article? Please WP:AGF and try again. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:43, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Even though you deleted the article without even gauging what editors thought about it (which is not the sign of someone editing in good faith), I assumed good faith when you responded to my reversion of your deletion by stating your concerns with the article. I then commenced to source the entries that were not specifically sourced, which is not as difficult as I initially assumed, given that all of the pre-2011 Jewish members of Congress (or at least all of the ones that I've looked up so far) appear in Stone's "The Jews of Capital Hill." But you now are saying that it doesn't matter if the article is sourced, because the "fully sourced article" to which you refer (which, by the way, uses "http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com" as its "reliable source" for Ron Wyden being Jewish--Wyden appears in the Stone book, by the way, so there's no need for him to be sourced with non-reliable sources that imply original research; and it lists former Senator William Cohen of Maine, whose mother was a Christian and who himself is a Unitarian Universalist) includes only rudimentary information on a small percentage of the Jewish Americans who have served in the Unites States Congress. The article on Jewish politicians is not even a poor substitute for the article on Jewish members of Congress; it is no substitute at all. It only provides photos and complete information for *current* U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives, despite the article having been created 13 years ago (which is plenty of time to provide complete information if it was meant to provide a complete and exhaustive list). Former officeholders are listed alphabetically instead of chronologically (despite the article's only introductory sentence providing "This is a list of notable Jewish American politicians, arranged chronologically."), and the article does not include a photograph, dates of birth or death,exact dates of service (only years), or notes on the reason why they left Congress or other matters of interest. You deleted all of that information that is nowhere to be found in the Jewish-politicians article, yet you chide me for not assuming good faith when I described your latest reason for deleting the article as a pretense?

You are making Wikipedia worse by deleting a useful, informative article on a whim (there, I did it again). I reiterate my opposition to your unilateral decision to delete the article, and again ask you to obtain the opinion of other editors before deleting all of that information that editors put together over the past several years. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 23:28, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

By the way, there is an article called "List of Jews in politics." The article includes a cross-reference to "List of Jewish American politicians" and to other articles about Jewish politicians from other countries, but also includes stand-alone information on Jewish heads of state and Jewish heads of government. I do not believe that the List of Jewish American politicians, a subgroup of List of Jews in politics, should be deleted and the information subsumed within the List of Jews in politics--there certainly is enough room in Wikipedia for a more general article and a more specific article, and the editors of the more general article did well in including the cross-reference to the more specific article. I would posit that the same holds true for an article on Jewish American politicians generally and an article on Jewish members of Congress specifically. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 23:40, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

@AuH2ORepublican: There's nothing wrong with being bold; see WP:BOLD and WP:BRD. I made a bold edit, you objected and reverted, now we're discussing. Perfectly normal (perhaps even desirable) editing, so the vehemence of your responses is puzzling at best.

Back to the point, if you feel so strongly that the other article should be improved, why not copy the material from here into it? Jayjg ^(talk) 16:34, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

I already explained that the section devoted to U.S. Senators and Representatives in "List of Jewish American politicians" does not include anywhere near the information, nor does it have the format necessary to provide the information, set forth in "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress." It is a lot easier to add citations of sources to the specific article than to reformat and input over 100 entries into the more general article. As I said before, it seems to me that the section on members of Congress in "List of Jewish American politicians" should cross-reference to "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress," just as "List of Jews in politics" cross-references to "List of Jewish American politicians" and to other articles specifically about Jewish politicians in certain nations (but includes information regarding particular areas that do not have their own article, such as Jewish heads of state). I guess that if you really wish to turn "List of Jewish American politicians" into one-source shopping with no "outsourcing" you can insert the entire "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" article into the section on members of Congress, but (i) that seems unnecessary, and would make the "List of Jewish American politicians" article unduly long and difficult to navigate through and (ii) I am not technologically savvy enough to help you do that.

In just a few hours, I have provided citations to sources of well over half the entries in "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress," and I should finish the job in a couple of days (work permitting). One good thing to come out of this exercise (apart from confirming that the persons listed belong in the list) is that I discovered that Samuel Marx (D-NY), who appears in "Jews of Capital Hill" but not on the article and of whom I never had heard, was a Jewish Representative-elect who died before he could take office. The articles listing black U.S. Senators, black U.S. Representatives and Hispanic members of Congress each include members who were elected but not seated (either because of death, illness or an election challenge), so when I'm done with the citations I will add a section for Representatives who were elected but not seated and include Samuel Marx. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 17:07, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

@AuH2ORepublican: Yes, the format, information provided etc. in this article is much superior to that found in the duplicate section in List of Jewish American politicians. So why not simply take the material in this article, and copy it into the other article, replacing what is already there? That article already contains similarly formatted information in many other sections. Is it simply a matter of not being "technologically savvy enough"? Jayjg ^(talk) 17:26, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Three reasons: (i) I believe that the material is best served being in its own article, (ii) adding all of that information and formatting to the Jewish-politicians article would make it extremely long and thus burdensome to navigate through it, and (iii) as you surmise, I almost certainly would mess up the formatting if I attempted to insert the entire 90,000-byte article into a section of another article.

But let me ask you: Why not simply add a cross-reference to "List of Jewish members of the United States Congress" in the congressional section of "List of Jewish American politicians"? That's a lot easier than inserting an entire article into the section, and would keep both articles at a reasonable size. "List of Jewish American politicians" already is at nearly 100,000 bytes, and I can't imagine how large the article will become, and how difficult it will be to navigate through it, if it ever reaches its stated intention and becomes an exhaustive list of Jewish politicians in the United States with no cross-references to other articles. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 18:59, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Fair enough. I've deleted the information in the other article, and pointed it here. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:48, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. I honestly think that it's the optimal solution. I also would recommend doing the same if there were specific articles about other subgroups of Jewish American politicians, although I don't think that there are any other such articles, nor cab think of any other subgroups that would be both large enough (not too many Jewish governors in the U.S.) or notable enough (there have been a lot of Jewish members of the New York state legislature, but that wouldn't be the type of subject on which an encyclopedia normally would have a stand-alone article) for its own article. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 22:59, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Sounds good; if other parts of the main list get too large, they can also be turned into sub-articles. Jayjg ^(talk) 13:52, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

"who practiced Judaism as a religion.[1] It does not include members who had Jewish ancestry but were not religiously practicing"

The lede of this article restricts the contents to people "who practiced Judaism as a religion.[1] It does not include members who had Jewish ancestry but were not religiously practicing". Do the contents reflect that, that every person on the list practiced Judaism? The very first person on the list, for example, (Yulee) has a note indicating that he practiced Episcopalianism. Does Stone (the source used for the vast majority of the entries here) discuss whether these individuals "practiced Judaism as a religion"? Jayjg ^(talk) 17:38, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

The note on David Levy Yulee states that he converted to Christianity as an adult (in fact, when he already was in the Senate); he was born and raised Jewish and had practiced Judaism prior to such point, as Stone described in detail. Stone does list a handful of ethnic Jews even if they never practiced the religion (Senator John S. Cohen, Fiorello LaGuardia, Barry Goldwater, maybe a couple of others), but he does note if that is the case, or if they stopped practicing; his book is very well sourced. Because of this, a handful of people listed by Stone have been excluded from the article. One person that has been excluded despite Stone stating that he had been raised Jewish is Senator William Cohen (whom, I note, is included in "List of Jewish American politicians). Cohen's mother was Christian, he never converted to Judaism, and he is an Unitarian Universalist, but according to Stone (and, I just found out, the Encyclopedia of World Biography, in article based on 13 excellent sources: https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/history/us-history-biographies/william-sebastian-cohen), Cohen was raised Jewish at his (Jewish) father's insistence and prepared for his bar mitzvah, but Cohen refused to formally convert to Judaism (as was required for his bar mitzvah given that his mother was not Jewish), and from then onward he practiced Christianity. Perhaps I was a bit hasty when I said that Cohen never practiced Judaism, and after reading more about him now believe that his inclusion in the article should be considered; I similarly have pointed out in this Talk page (seeking a consensus from the editing community) that Congressman Mike Levin of California claims to have been raised both in the Catholic and Jewish faiths, that he celebrates Jewish holidays with his father and that he considers himself "culturally Jewish," so his inclusion in the article (like Cohen, he had been included originally but was removed by an editor based on the understanding that he had never practiced Judaism) should be considered. So, yes, the persons listed in the article have a reliable source stating that they practiced the religion. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 18:42, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Stone actually describes the Jewish religious practice of each individual on this list? I (at random) looked up Leonard Irving, and Stone appears to write nothing whatsoever about Irving practicing Judaism. Can you quote what he says about Irving's religious practice? Jayjg ^(talk) 20:00, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

I said that Stone noted when such person did not practice, or had stopped practicing, Judaism. And the book is about Jewish members of Congress, and he states in the introduction that everyone there was Jewish according to Jewish law, except as noted (Goldwater, etc.). He also includes converts to Judaism (John Adler). AuH2ORepublican (talk) 22:52, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, as I suspected. Stone says nothing about the vast majority's practice of religion, he's mostly talking about ethnic origin. We can't assume based on things he doesn't say. I'm going to switch the opening paragraph so that it indicates what is actually in this list (and in all similar lists), that is, people that reliable sources have described as "Jews" or "Jewish". Jayjg ^(talk) 13:45, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Let me preface this by saying that I understand your edit, and that the article's introduction has given me pause for some time. But are you sure that not including some parameters of who should be listed in the article is a good idea? It's not that I want to imbue the words in Stone's book (or any other source that describes someone as "Jewish" or "a Jew," for that matter) with a precise characterization of their subject as a practicing Jew, it's that not including any discussion of the issue surely will lead to edit wars when someone tries to add lifelong Christian George Allen because his mother's family was Jewish (although he didn't even learn about it until he was in his 50s or something)--I mention Allen not because it would be an extreme example of defining a Jewish American based solely on ethnicity, but because one or two years ago some editors did add Allen to the article on at least two occasions that I recall. Could we at least mention that persons with Jewish ancestry but who were neither raised in the Jewish faith nor who practiced the religion will not be included? AuH2ORepublican (talk) 15:51, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

I've been through this with many similar lists. The main problem with trying to create specific criteria (e.g. "Jewish ancestry", "two Jewish parents", "Jewish mother", etc.) for these kinds of lists is that you almost inevitably fall afoul of WP:NOR. The criteria for this list has to be the same as for every single list; that is, WP:V and WP:NOR. So, if we say that this list include people who are "Jewish / a Jew" and "members of Congress", then that means it includes people who reliable sources says are "Jewish / a Jew" and "members of Congress". If reliable sources describe Allen as "Jewish", then he goes on the list. If they do not, then he does not. And if some reliable sources say he's Jewish, and other reliable sources say he's not Jewish, then we put him on the list with an explanatory footnote.

By the way, a secondary issue with the former criteria is that they meant that the list contents differed from the title. Those criteria were for a list titled List of members of the United States Congress who practice Judaism, and you would likely have had a difficult time finding many names that were reliably sourced. Jayjg ^(talk) 18:04, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

OK, fair enough. We're probably going to end up with a lot of footnotes, but, thinking about it further, that's not that bad, since it would add a bit of nuance to a question that, in many cases, is not black or white. Having, say, Bill Cohen appear on the list with a footnote noting that he was brought up Jewish by his Jewish father but has practiced Christianity since he was a teenager and now is a Unitarian Universalist would give readers a more complete picture than if the list merely included him or excluded him. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 18:36, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Yes, but we can still only include Cohen if reliable sources describe him as "Jewish / a Jew", and we only include the "explanatory footnote" if reliable sources disagree about whether or not Cohen is a Jew. Jayjg ^(talk) 18:46, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Ted Kaufman

I added Ted Kaufman to the Senator section as he has a Jewish father and a Catholic mother. Under Reform and Reconstruction Judaism, he would be seen as a Jew. In a Senator document he describes himself as "half Jewish," which is a type of Jew rather than someone with just Jewish ancestry. He also say "I went to Jewish events." In the NYT, he also talks about having conversations with his while eating bagels and lox, which is something that ethnic Jews do. [1][2]Pennsylvania2 (talk) 20:00, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

All reliable sources point to Ted Kaufman being Roman Catholic, not Jewish. You have not presented a single reliable source that says otherwise. When you provide Kaufman's self-description as "half-Jewish" as evidence of his being Jewish denotes profound ignorance of the nomenclature used within the American Jewish community; "half-Jewish" actually means "not actually Jewish, but my father and his family is Jewish." And your depiction of eating bagels and lox as "something that ethnics Jews do" is, to put it politely, crass stereotyping. More to the point, the aricke is not about "ethnic Jews," it's a list of Jewish members of Congress. While Senator Kaufman is ethnically Jewish on his father's side, I have never seen any reliable source say thst he was raised Jewish ir ever has practiced Judaism. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 04:51, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

By the way, @User:Pennsylvania2, I agree with your addition of Congressman Mike Levin to the article. If you check out the "Mike Levin" subject line in this Talk Page, you will find that I previously had advocated for Levin's inclusion because he has said that he was raised in both the Catholic and Jewish faiths (contra Kaufman, who was raised Catholic only) and that he celebrated Jewish High Holy Days (presumably Yom Kippur, Rosh Hashanah, etc., and not just Hanukkah) with his (Jewish) father. I hadn't received a second to my motion to add Levin, so I waited. So thank you for finding a reliable source listing Mike Levin as a Jewish member of Congress and for adding him to the article. If you similarly find a reliable source that Kaufman actually was raised in the Jewish faith, I will support his inclusion in the article even though he's a practicing Catholic. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 05:12, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Ted Kaufman is not Jewish. Neither is Jason Chaffetz, unless Wikipedia employs the definition of a Jew embodied in the Nuremberg Laws. Chaffetz's father was born Jewish, which means nothing, since Jewishness is conveyed by the mother. His mother was a Christian Scientist, and he himself is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Zozoulia (talk) 14:14, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

According to the reliable source cited in Chaffetz's entry in the article, he was raised in his father's religion (Judaism) and converted from Judaism to the LDS Church: https://forward.com/news/359962/meet-jason-chaffetz-the-mormon-congressman-who-converted-from-judaism/

Suggestions from Brooklyn area

Some local politicians to add: Inna Vernikova, Ari Kagan, Alec Brook-Krasny, and Yuri Dashevsky MSTVD (talk) 06:34, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion:

• Congressman Elect George Santos (cropped).jpg

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:24, 17 November 2022 (UTC)