Conservative political columnist Patrick Buchanan, whose perceived hostility to Israel worries the pro-Israel community, said Wednesday that he has not yet decided whether to challenge President Bush in the Republican primaries next year.
But he said that if he does decide to run, a decision he would announce in early December, he would strongly oppose foreign aid because of his desire to “look out for America first.”
Buchanan served as White House communications director under President Reagan. While in that office, he drew the ire of U.S. Jews for his defense of alleged Nazi war criminals in the United States facing extradition by the Justice Department to stand trial in other countries.
He defended his position by arguing that such trials should take place in U.S. courts and not in courts abroad, which he said would not necessarily conduct fair trials.
Last year, Buchanan was branded an anti-Semite by New York Times columnist A. M. Rosenthal for arguing that few Americans wanted the United States to go to war against Iraq with the notable exception of “Israel and its amen corner” here.
Buchanan denied he was anti-Semitic, although he later apologized for the statement.
William F. Buckley Jr., editor of the conservative National Review, will also brand Buchanan an anti-Semite in an upcoming issue, according to a report in the Washington Times.
Buchanan had no comment Wednesday on that article.
The conservative commentator said he does not share Louisiana State Rep. David Duke’s view that if they both ran against Bush, they would form a good “one-two punch.”
Buchanan added that he rejects “everything” that Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, has said in the past. But he blamed “White House mice,” who he said for months had tried to reject assertions that Bush was “the father of David Duke,” for now “calling me (Duke’s) brother.”
Less than two weeks earlier, on NBC-TV’s “McLaughlin Group,” Buchanan said Duke’s positions are very much in line with conservative thinking in America.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
