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No, Sen. Chuck Schumer isn’t an Israeli citizen
If Your Time is short
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Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., an American citizen, is one of 10 senators who are Jewish.
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Schumer doesn’t have dual citizenship with Israel, his spokesperson told PolitiFact.
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U.S. senators must be U.S. citizens for nine years to hold office, according to Article I of the Constitution.
A recent Instagram post questions the loyalties of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, comparing the New York Democrat with an "enemy combatant" and claiming he is a "dual Israeli citizen."
But that’s wrong.
This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)
"He’s not a dual citizen," Schumer spokesperson Alex Nguyen told PolitiFact.
Schumer, an American citizen who was born in New York, is one of nine senators who are Jewish; Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., was the tenth until her September death. Some federal lawmakers have been the target of misinformation about their nationality before. In 2019, for example, we debunked a claim that the Jewish members of Congress held "dual citizenship with Israel."
Aryeh Tuchman, director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism, told PolitiFact then that such lists perpetuate the anti-Semitic trope of Jewish disloyalty.
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"Jews have a long experience of being put on lists with very negative results," Tuchman said. "The implication that you are promoting is that these people are not loyal citizens of the country."
In 2015, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., rebutted the assumption that he had dual citizenship with Israel.
"That’s some of the nonsense that goes on in the Internet," he said at the time. "I am, obviously, an American citizen, and I do not have any dual citizenship."
Jewish Americans are not automatically granted citizenship in Israel. While Israeli law generally grants immigration visas "to every Jew who has expressed his desire to settle in Israel," a citizenship certificate is granted only to those who wish to live in Israel permanently.
U.S. law, meanwhile, requires senators to be U.S. citizens for nine years to hold office, according to Article I of the Constitution.
We rate claims that Schumer is an Israeli citizen False.
CORRECTION, Nov. 14, 2023: Nine U.S. senators are Jewish. There were 10 until Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., died in September. An earlier version of this fact-check was incorrect on the figure.
Our Sources
Instagram post, Oct. 24, 2023
PolitiFact, No, members of Congress don't have automatic dual citizenship with Israel, Feb. 25, 2023
PolitiFact, The backstory behind Diane Rehm's question to Bernie Sanders on dual Israeli citizenship, June 11, 2015
Jewish Virtual Library, Jewish Members of the 118th Congress, visited Oct. 27, 2023
Email interview with Alex Nguyen, director of communications for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Oct. 27, 2023
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No, Sen. Chuck Schumer isn’t an Israeli citizen
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