When the Georgia legislature reconvenes Jan. 8, lawmakers will get another chance to pass a bill defining antisemitism in state law.
A bill which would do so passed the state House last session with bipartisan support but stalled in the Senate.
Two Cobb County Republicans are among the chief proponents and critics of the measure.
State Rep. John Carson, R-northeast Cobb, is a lead sponsor of House Bill 30, which would define antisemitism in state law, using the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism.
Supporters have said that HB 30 would enable prosecutors to charge people with hate crimes if they commit violent crimes motivated by antisemitism.
“If you commit an unlawful act against a Jew, and the motivation is antisemitism, then you are subject to enhanced penalties,” Carson told the MDJ. “In the exact same way, if you commit an unlawful act against someone of color, and the motivation is race, then you are subject to enhanced penalties.”
State Sen. Ed Setzler, R-Acworth, meanwhile, has said the IHRA definition is “both vague and will have dangerous effects, legally, if put into statute.”
The bill has gotten renewed attention since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, and after a spate of incidents in Georgia over the last year.
Those incidents have included the distribution of antisemitic flyers in metro Atlanta neighborhoods (including in Cobb), a neo-Nazi march outside an east Cobb synagogue, and a stunt where antisemitic messages were projected onto an Interstate 75 overpass in Cobb.
Dueling definitions
The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition reads as follows: “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals…
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