The January video was likely intended to mock Elon Musk, whose critics alleged that he performed the same salute during a rally that month
Jack Schlossberg, a Kennedy family scion and Democratic primary candidate for New York’s 12th Congressional District, performed a Nazi salute in a since-deleted Instagram video reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon.
“Yo, yo, check this out,” Schlossberg said repeatedly into the camera as he performed the salute multiple times.
Schlossberg posted the video—since scrubbed from his social media—in January, likely intending to mock Elon Musk. The billionaire was the subject of controversy that same month when critics accused him of making a Nazi salute while telling an audience, “My heart goes out to you” during a rally celebrating President Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
Schlossberg’s social media activity has already caused a stir this week. The Free Beacon reported on Wednesday that Schlossberg, whose father is Jewish, had posted musings about producing “Jew Blood” and semen for a “MAHA energy ball.” The post appeared to mock Schlossberg’s mother’s cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and comments the secretary of health and human services made in 2023 suggesting COVID-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews.
Schlossberg, the only grandson of former president John F. Kennedy, joined a crowded field of Democrats looking to replace retiring Rep. Jerry Nadler (D., N.Y.), who will leave Congress at the end of his term after more than half a century in public office. Nadler dismissed the Kennedy heir’s chances in September, saying he “certainly is not going to be a major candidate.”
Nadler, widely known as the lower chamber of Congress’s worst-smelling member, has not yet made a formal endorsement in the race. State assemblyman Micah Lasher, though, has long been a protégé of the retiring representative and is expected to receive Nadler’s support. Other candidates include New York City councilman Erik Bottcher, assemblyman Alex Bores, and gun-control activist-turned-podcaster Cameron Kasky.
Schlossberg holds degrees from Harvard and Yale universities, but his professional experience is comparatively thin. Both a job as a staff assistant in the State Department and as political correspondent at Vogue lasted just one month, according to his LinkedIn page. His longest-held position was 10 years as the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation’s New Frontier Award chairman, a job he likely received through familial connections.
The Schlossberg salute is not the first Nazi-related news to involve a Democrat running in a 2026 election. Graham Platner, a candidate in Maine’s Senate primary, has faced a storm of outrage and multiple staff resignations over a Nazi tattoo he later covered up.
Schlossberg did not respond to a Free Beacon request for comment.
