The last minute call claims: “In the name of our chief rabbis, we urge you to vote for Sean Maloney for Congress. Sean has a proven track record of standing up for our community in Kiryas Joel. He fought the surrounding towns and villages that were trying to block the expansion of multi-family housing in our community . He secured tens of millions of dollars to build low-income housing in our community. He promised our leaders that if elected, he would do the same for the communities in Rockland County. Please show your support and vote Sean Maloney for Congress.” Maloney is currently the representative of New York’s 18th congressional district, which includes Kiryas Joel, a predominantly ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, but New York’s congressional map was redrawn for the 2022 election. Maloney is candidate to represent the newly created 17th congressional district that includes Rockland County, another county that has a large Jewish community. In Orange County, where Kiryas Joel is located, there are tensions between the Orthodox Jewish community, one of the poorest on paper in the US, and the surrounding neighborhoods. In 2018, the community split from the city of Monroe after years of lawsuits and conflicts over zoning. While Maloney helped bring money to the Kiryas Joel community for local infrastructure projects, there is no evidence that he supported the community in zoning battles.
A transcript of the robocall was obtained by CNN. The call was first reported on Sunday by The Forward, a Jewish publication. According to the anti-rombocalling app Nomorobo, the number associated with the calls is estimated to have made about 100,000 to 150,000 calls Sunday night to phones in the 845 area code — which is an area code for parts of the region Maloney represents, including of Rockland County. The message reviewed by CNN failed to identify who paid for the call in the introduction and to provide a callback number, which violates Federal Communications Commission rules for automated or pre-recorded political campaign voice calls. The number from which the calls were received is no longer a working number. A spokesman for Maloney called the call an “anti-Semitic slur.”
“This robocall was not affiliated with or authorized by our campaign in any way,” Mia Ehrenberg, Maloney’s spokeswoman, told CNN. Maloney’s opponent, Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, told The Forward the call was “absolute nonsense,” adding, “I don’t condone it,” and his spokesman Bill O’Reilly told CNN, “That’s not from us.”