Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue has cut off donations to a Texas congressional candidate after she called for converting an immigration detention facility into a prison for American Zionists — a demand that, given that the vast majority of American Jews identify as Zionists, amounts to a call to imprison most of the American Jewish community.

Maureen Galindo, running in a Democratic primary runoff for Texas’s 35th congressional district covering parts of San Antonio and surrounding counties, wrote on Instagram that if elected she would introduce legislation declaring Zionism to be antisemitic, and would convert the Karnes County Immigration Processing Center into “a prison for American Zionists and former ICE officers for human trafficking.”

As of Sunday, Galindo’s ActBlue donation page displayed a notice that it was “not accepting donations,” and her campaign shifted to an alternative platform. Galindo attributed the cutoff to “lies and defamation.”

Galindo has attempted to defend herself against charges of antisemitism by recycling one of the oldest tricks in the Arab anti-Israel propaganda playbook: the claim that Zionist Jews are not real Jews. In her telling, “Zionists” are European colonizers with no authentic connection to the Jewish people, while the true Semites — and therefore the true victims of antisemitism — are Arabs and others indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa. It follows, by this twisted logic, that Zionism is itself antisemitic, and that targeting Zionists cannot be antisemitic by definition.

The word “antisemitism” was coined in 19th-century Germany as a clinical-sounding euphemism for Jew-hatred, and has referred exclusively to hatred of Jews in every context it has ever been used. Galindo’s redefinition is not a good-faith linguistic observation — it is a rhetorical device designed to launder open hatred of Jews as something other than what it plainly is.

In a statement issued after the controversy erupted, Galindo insisted she had not used the words “internment camps” and that the media had distorted her remarks. She clarified that she wished to imprison “billionaire Zionists who have profited off genocidal prison state materials and trafficking,” and added that she also wants a “department and TV channel” dedicated to exposing child abusers, whom she would send for violent sterilization at the same facility. “Prosecution has nothing to do with religion,” she wrote — before adding that the abusers “will probably be most of the Zionists.”

Galindo has also claimed that Zionists seek to conquer the United States using Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Department of Homeland Security, asserting that ICE was trained by the IDF and that DHS is based in Israel. She has further alleged that her Democratic primary opponent, Bexar County Sheriff’s Deputy Johnny Garcia, is controlled by “billionaire Zionists” engaged in human trafficking in southern Texas, and called for him to be tried for treason.

The reaction from Democratic leadership was swift. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Suzan DelBene called Galindo’s comments “extremely dangerous” and “vile,” stating they had “no place in Democratic politics.” Representatives Josh Gottheimer and Jared Moskowitz issued a joint statement saying that if Galindo were elected, they would “force a vote to expel her every day she is here,” adding: “Maureen’s insane, antisemitic views — including putting Americans in concentration camps — have no place in our party or country.”

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called the remarks “bigoted garbage and antisemitism.”
Adding a further dimension to the controversy, Democrats have alleged that Galindo’s campaign is being propped up by Republican interests. A political action committee called Lead Left PAC, founded less than a month ago and declining to disclose its donors, has spent more than $900,000 promoting Galindo — making it the largest single spender in the primary runoff.

Links to the Republican fundraising platform WinRed were reportedly removed from the PAC’s website metadata after the connection was reported. House Speaker Mike Johnson denied any knowledge of the effort, saying he had not known Galindo existed before her comments surfaced.

Galindo finished first in the March primary; she faces Garcia in the runoff election on Tuesday.