Green Party Challenger to Congressman Josh Gottheimer Falsely Accused by “Journalist” in Smearing Call and Text Message

On Monday, September 23, a “journalist” called a person that the caller believed to be a co-worker of Beau Forte who is currently a candidate for the 5rh District US Congressional seat challenging Josh Gottheimer, a fierce Israel supporter.  (The quotation marks are used because the person is possibly not a true journalist and might have just been acting as one.)

The recipient of the call was told that the caller was a reporter for a news outlet.  The male caller gave a name and the name of a news outlet, and started questioning the recipient about Beau Forte, accusing him of having made “anti-Semitic” statements.  No evidence or examples or proof of anti-Semitism was provided by the supposed journalist.  For now we are withholding the name and news outlet as we attempt to verify the caller was who he said he was.  Once we can confirm the identity we can update this story. The reporter whose name was used in the phone call and the owner of the news site referenced have been contacted by text and e-mail but have not returned the inquiry about this call – they have not confirmed nor denied. The site owner was specifically asked if their news site believes “opposition to Israel policy to be anti-Semitism?” No answer thus far and we will update further if they grow a spine.

The call recipient did not know Beau Forte, did not have any idea what this person claiming to be a journalist was talking about.  The call recipient immediately hung up.  

This apparently made the journalist – apparent mad and he texted the call recipient the following message. 

The call and the text message came from this telephone which is likely an internet phone number (215) 602-4833, possibly not a true phone.  A search on the number has not identified any news site including the one that the” journalist” cited as what he was representing.

We have reviewed Beau Forte’s campaign site and internet and twitter comments.  Candidate Forte is steadfastly opposed to US support for genocide and in particular the actions of Josh Gottmeier in support of US – Israel genocide and Gottheimer’s attempts to turn back free speech protections for people who speak out against Israel and / or its policies.  Josh Gottheimer would likely consider Beau Forte’s political position in support of Palestinians to be anti-Semitic and he would like to outlaw such advocacy.  We found absolutely zero evidence of anti-Semitism in Beau Forte’s content.

The Democratic and Republican parties are united in support of Israel and so is Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.  They support at the national and NJ state level laws that falsely define criticism and opposition to Israel as anti-Semitic.  Beau Forte, the Green Party and its presidential candidate Jill Stein oppose such repressive laws in defense of US – Israel genocide.

It would be seen that this “journalist” could have been doing some sort of favor for pro-Israel Gottheimer perhaps with or without Gottheimer’s knowledge.

But if this person is truly a journalist or thinks he is one – it is gravely unethical to leverage your journalist access to a readership audience and the news site that you publish on as a political tool to smear opposition to a candidate that you favor.  Also a journalist leveraging their position simply to smear a citizen at their place of work with false accusations is highly unethical.

Real journalist, pretend journalist or hack journalist – it is a sad day that reporters and news institutions stand on the side of repression and removal of free speech rights and censorship of the press as this possible pretender did. 

Gladly FIghtBackBetter allies itself with the protectors of free speech and free press. 

Good luck to Beau Forte for getting to the bottom of who this smear artist posing as a journalist is – hopefully we can unmask him and his news site so that he is no longer a credible source of useful information.

Beau Forte has this to say of the incident:

“I am pro-Palestine and I support protected speech rights of the millions of Americans who oppose US support for genocide.  I support the demand to end US support for Israel and call upon the US to immediately curtail Israel’s attempt to alight the entire Middle East into total war and to condemn Israel technical terror – turning consumer items into bombs to terrorize Lebanon’s civilian population.  I suggest to D5 voters to place close observance of the lengths that my opponent Josh Gottheimer is currently going to implement fascist repression against the Palestinians, Muslims and pro-humanitarians of every faith and ethnicity that join the cry for an immediate end to the genocide.” Beau Forte responding to false smear by supposed journalist