Welcome to the Tikva podcast on Great Jewish Essays and Ideas. I'm your host, Eric Cohen.

Our subject today is the political affiliation and voting behavior of American Jews, a topic

that has long fascinated both Jewish analysts themselves, as well as

broader observers of the American political scene. Why are Jews liberals? And how has the liberal

Jewish vote changed over the years? Which issues from Israel to questions of religion and state

to questions of law and order drive changes in Jewish voting behavior? And as a new Jewish

voting bloc, Orthodox Jewish

conservatives emerging, which could actually change the nature of the Jewish vote in the years ahead.

I'm very pleased to be joined today by two guests, first Jay Lefkowitz, who's written numerous essays

over the past few decades analyzing Jewish voting behavior, Jewish political ideas. He's had high-level

positions in the American government, including in both Bush administrations, and he's now an attorney in

New York. Jay, thanks for being here. Good afternoon, Eric. We're also joined by Mitchell Rockland,

a scholar at the Tikva Fund, a modern orthodox rabbi, who's very important essay a couple months ago in Mosaic,

offered one of the most interesting analyses of the Orthodox Jewish vote in the most recent

2016 election. Mitch, thanks for being here. Thank you. So Jay, let's start with you, and maybe you can

give us some real historical perspective on the Jewish vote in America. Put simply, how do Jews become such a stalwart liberal voting block?

And how has the liberal Jewish vote evolved over the years?

So, Eric, it's very interesting, first of all, that we're even having this discussion

because American Jews constitute somewhere between three and maybe 5% of the population if you come up with

the most expansive definition of who counts as a Jew in America these days.

And they're largely living in states, New York, California, that aren't really that

competitive on the national scene. And yet there have

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