Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect Stands Up Against Trump

Steve Adubato goes one-on-one with Steven Goldstein, who recently took over as Executive Director of the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect, who has put the center in the limelight by speaking out against President Trump’s recent statements and actions.

6/28/17 #2053

 

 

 

 

Excerpt:

"We are honored to welcome back our good friend Steven Goldstein, Executive Director of the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect. Good to see you Steven. Great to be here Steve. Now what did you just say about our studio? [laughter] Well, I was just saying the last time I was at your studio, it was in beautiful Paterson, New Jersey. Beautiful. Listen, I love New Jersey. I'm a New Jerseyan. But you're in Lincoln Center now? These digs? He's doing well. Rising up in the world. You happen to hang out with the PBS flagship station, WNET? This is awesome. That's what happens. Mazal tov, as my people say. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. So, tell us about the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect. It is all about what? So the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect is about fighting prejudice in America, and fighting for a kinder and fairer world. The world of Anne Frank's dreams. Now that's put us in a position of speaking out very often against President Trump. Hmm. We are a Jewish organization that fights for justice for everyone. So we are opposed when President Trump tries to institute a Muslim ban, preventing refugees from coming into this country. Because Steve, we ask might one of them be the next Anne Frank? Shouldn't we try to save every Anne? We oppose the wall on the Mexican border. What hungry, needy immigrant who seeks the American Dream will we deny? Again, who will be the next Anne Frank? By the way, for those who don't know who Anne Frank was, and why she matters so much, go ahead. Right. Anne Frank was a young girl who died at age 15 at the end of... toward the end of World War II in a concentration camp. She was captured by the Nazis in Amsterdam. And she wrote a famous diary of her hiding in Amsterdam before she was captured by the Nazis. And she wrote a book not just about history, but exhorting the rest of us to fight for social justice. And it's one of the world's great bestselling books of all time. You know Steven, we've known each other for a long time. And by the way you headed up a previous organization, it's still doing great work, called? So I used to head, and I founded, Garden State Equality in 2004. And Stephen, I'll tell you, I'm having a good time with my job now, but when I'm old, and I'm getting there already, I will look back at my days of Garden State Equality and say those were the happiest days of my life. And very much tied to the effort for..."