JCC Threats: All 100 US Senators Sign Letter Urging White House Action

All 100 senators have signed on to a letter urging the Trump administration to take action after a series of bomb threats that have targeted Jewish Community Centers and Jewish Day Schools across the country. The bipartisan plea is addressed to Department of Homeland Security Chief John Kelly, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director James Comey.

The senators thanked the officials for the recent efforts in addressing the threats and asked that they be informed of further actions the departments plan to take.

"We stand ready to work with you to ensure that these centers can continue to serve their communities free from violence and intimidation," the senators wrote.

Leaders in the Jewish community recently met with Comey to discuss the threats that have been targeting Jewish institutions for the past two months.

"The representatives of the Jewish community left with the highest confidence that the FBI is taking every possible measure to resolve the matter as quickly as possible," the JCC of North America said in a statement.

In the letter to the department heads, senators wrote that they are concerned the incidents are accelerating and failure to address and deter these threats will place innocent people at risk and threaten the financial viability of JCCs. The senators wrote that federal authorities can provide crucial assistance to Jewish institutions by improving their physical security, deterring threats from being made and investigating and prosecuting those making the threats or may seek to make the threats in the future.

"We also recognize the anti-Semitic sentiment behind this spate of threats and encourage your Departments to continue to inform state and local law enforcement organizations of their obligations under the Hate Crime Statistics Act and other federal laws," the senators wrote.

The letter from the senators comes on the same day that several Jewish centers were once again targeted by threats. Community centers and day schools in at least five different states received threats on Tuesday. Four office locations of the Anti Defamation League also received telephoned bomb threats on Tuesday. At least 100 threats have been made over the past five waves of such incidents. After the sixth wave of threats on Tuesday, the number of incidents has crossed 100.

Last week authorities arrested a Missouri man who has been tied to eight of the threats.

• Read the full letter here.

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