Alvin Rosenfeld and Leslie Lenkowsky’s op-ed “Can the Biden Administration Define Antisemitism?” (Jan. 8), urging the Biden administration to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, inaccurately describes President Donald Trump’s 2019 Executive Order on Combating Antisemitism. The executive order didn’t simply suggest that federal agencies consider the IHRA definition. It mandated that they do so (using the word “shall”) when they enforce Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.

The op-ed might also have noted that in a Feb. 23, 2021, letter to the president of the American Zionist Movement, Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrote that the Biden administration “enthusiastically embraces” the IHRA definition, including its examples of contemporary antisemitism.

Susan B. Tuchman
Director, Center for Law and Justice
Zionist Organization of America

This letter to the editor was published in the Wall Street Journal and can be viewed here.