There is a dangerous bill moving through the California state legislature that would strip away the ability for CA Jews to represent their full ethnic diversity.
SB1387 would require state agencies to include “Jewish” as an ethnicity for collecting and reporting demographic data.
We are clear: Jewish is not an ethnicity. Individuals can convert to and from religions, and this is not possible with ethnicity. Furthermore, “Jewish” as an ethnicity most often captures people of white Ashkenazi ancestry, and we already know that Jews of Color are dramatically undercounted. California’s Jewish community is beautifully diverse, and this could create an inaccurate depiction of our community as whiter and more homogenous than it really is.