The Heritage Foundation’s campaign against antisemitism was supposed to be the right’s answer to the charge that it had grown indifferent to hate. “Project Esther,” launched with fanfare last year, promised to marshal conservative thinkers, pastors and policy experts into a unified stand against Jew hatred. It was meant to show that the movement could police its own. Instead, it has become a study in avoidance, apology and moral drift.
The collapse began when Heritage president Kevin Roberts recorded a video defending Tucker Carlson after the former Fox News host gave a friendly platform to neo-Nazi agitator Nick Fuentes. When outrage followed — not only from liberals but from conservatives who still recognize decency — Roberts doubled down, insisting he would not “cancel” a friend. In a staff meeting days later, he apologized for what he called a “short-circuited process,” blamed a departed aide for the script and pleaded ignorance about Carlson’s record. He said he had a “moral obligation” to stay on and clean up the “mess” he created, while promising an undefined “plan” to review Heritage’s relationship with Carlson. The video defending Carlson remains posted.
That meeting, as reported by Jewish Insider, revealed an institution in turmoil. Senior fellows demanded a clear, public break with Carlson, warning that Heritage was “bleeding trust, reputation, and donors.” One staffer told Roberts that after nearly a week, Heritage still could not utter the words “Tucker’s an antisemite.” Another said bluntly, “We all understood what you said.” The anger in the room was not about poor phrasing — it was about moral failure.
Roberts’ apologies — sprinkled with caveats and talk of “wedge strategies” to win over Fuentes’ audience — only deepened the sense that Heritage was rationalizing proximity to hate. He even described Carlson and Fuentes’ listeners as potential converts to conservatism, as though antisemitism was a marketing problem rather than a moral one.
Meanwhile, Project Esther itself is disintegrating. The Zionist Organization of America and Young Jewish Conservatives have quit the National Task Force to Combat Antisemitism that helped shape it. Now the task force’s own co-chairs — Mario Bramnick, Victoria Coates, Ellie Cohanim and Luke Moon — have formally cut ties with Heritage, vowing to continue their work elsewhere and to confront antisemitism on the right as well as the left. Their break is an act of conscience, but not yet of reform. Until the movement itself draws firm boundaries — naming and rejecting those who traffic in hate — even courageous departures will not cure its moral drift.
Roberts’ later speech at Hillsdale College — where he vowed Heritage would “never, ever, ever stop fighting antisemitism” — rang hollow. Words cannot disguise the reality that Heritage’s credibility depends on whom it elevates and whom it rebukes. To condemn antisemitism in theory but excuse its enablers in practice is to forfeit moral authority.
Project Esther began with a real insight: that antisemitism’s rise demanded courage from the right as well as the left. But Heritage turned that insight into a branding exercise — and it collapsed the moment conviction collided with convenience. Fighting antisemitism requires clarity, not calibration, and integrity, not institutional spin.
If Roberts hopes to salvage either his reputation or Project Esther’s, the path is simple: disavow Carlson, repudiate those who mainstream hate and show that principle still outweighs politics. Until then, Project Esther will stand as a warning that moral courage cannot be subcontracted — and that the right’s crisis is not just strategic, but spiritual.
