Craig Goldman, a Republican member of the Texas state House, defeated Trey Hunt to become the representative of Texas’s 12th Congressional District. Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas) currently holds the seat but opted not to seek reelection.
Goldman is the third Jewish GOP member of the U.S. House of Representatives after incumbents Reps. Max Miller (R-Ohio) and David Kustoff (R-Tenn.).
Kustoff defeated Sarah Freeman in the state’s 8th Congressional District, according to the Associated Press. With 79% of votes counted, Kustoff was up 47.5 percentage points, with 235,357 votes, per the AP.
With 88% of votes counted in Ohio’s 7th Congressional District, Miller was up more than 15 percentage points with 179,269 votes, per the AP, which called the race.
Goldman was up nearly 30 percentage points, with 192,808 votes and 78% of votes counted, according to the Associated Press, which called the race.
Matt Brooks, CEO of the Republican Jewish Coalition, told JNS that the RJC was “thrilled” to congratulate Goldman on his “decisive win.”
Goldman’s victory “grows Jewish GOP representation in the House of Representatives to its largest presence in over 30 years,” Brooks said.
Brooks added that Goldman “has been actively involved and engaged with the RJC for over a decade, and we are excited to work with him in the 119th Congress.”
AIPAC, which endorsed Goldman, wrote shortly before 11 p.m. that “so far, 190 AIPAC-backed candidates have won their elections tonight.”
Goldman drew praise from House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.), Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.)—who chairs the House Republican Conference—and Aryeh Lightstone, a former senior adviser to David Friedman, the former U.S. ambassador to Israel.
On his campaign website, Goldman stated that he would stand with Israel, “the only true democracy in the Middle East.”
“The enemies of Israel are dangerous and relentless. The October 2023 slaughter of over 1,400 Israelis, including at least 36 Americans, at the hands of Hamas makes this reality abundantly clear,” he wrote. “While Israeli hostages remain captive in Gaza, it is critical that Israel is able to defend herself and ultimately is able to achieve its military objective: to dismantle Hamas.”
“There is simply no room for ambivalence or wavering on where the United States stands in this matter,” he added on the site. “The United States must continue to stand by Israel in its fight against the sheer brutality and inhumanity of Hamas.”
