America’s highest elected Jewish public official and fresh off writing a new book on antisemitism, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer sat down with The New York Times to express his unique vantage point on the state of American Jewry and Israel.

In his forthcoming book, “Antisemitism in America: A Warning,” Schumer chronicles what he describes as a troubling shift in American society.

“For the first 50 years, it was sort of what you might call the golden age for Jewish people, not only in America, but forever, because we had never seen such acceptance,” Schumer explained. But he points to October 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel as the moment “that changed it all,” leading to an explosion of antisemitism in “ways we’ve never seen.”

“When you use the word ‘Zionist’ for Jew — you Zionist pig — you mean you Jewish pig,” he said, citing incidents like protesters telling “all the Zionists” to get off the New York subway and the home of the Brooklyn Museum’s Jewish director being vandalized despite the museum taking no position on Israel.

Despite his own angst against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Schumer took particular issue with accusations of genocide against Israel.

“Jewish people were subject, at least in my judgment, to the worst genocide ever,” he said. “And it is vicious of the opponents to call this genocide. Criticize it? For sure. Say Israel went too far? For sure. And you know what it does? It increases antisemitism, because they’re making Israel and the Jewish people look like monsters, which they are not.”

“For the first time, Jews I know started saying, ‘Oh, God, maybe it could happen here.’ No one thought it would happen here, but for the first time, the thought: Maybe it could happen here. And as the highest-ranking Jewish elected official, not only now, but ever in America, I felt an obligation. I had to write the book.”

Schumer’s interview comes as he faces fierce backlash from fellow Democrats after voting for a Republican spending bill to avoid a government shutdown on Friday, with calls growing for a replacement.

Defending his controversial vote, Schumer argued he faced “two bad options” and chose what he believed was the lesser evil.

“A shutdown would shut down all government agencies, and it would solely be up to Trump and DOGE and Musk what to open again, because they could determine what was essential,” he explained. “So their goal of decimating the whole federal government, of cutting agency after agency after agency, would occur under a shutdown.”