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Debbie Schlussel (born April 9, 1969) is an American attorney, author, political commentator, movie critic, TV host, and blogger.

Schlussel writes movie reviews and commentary regarding pop culture, politics, Islamic terrorism, American Muslims, illegal immigration, news, and sports.

Early life and political career

Schlussel was born in Detroit, Michigan to a family of Polish Jewish descent. She received a BA from the University of Michigan and later earned a JD and MBA from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Schlussel graduated from Southfield High School in 1986. In 1990, Schlussel ran for the Republican nomination for the 4th District (Oakland County) of the Michigan House of Representatives. She was defeated by Barbara Dobb by a single vote from around 8500 cast.

Schlussel claimed voter fraud led to her defeat, making allegations of impropriety against the family of her opponent and the judge who ruled on the issue. The judge previously represented her opponent in a criminal matter. In 1998, she lost in the same district (now renamed the 39th) against Marc Shulman.

Professional life and views

Schlussel is a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, who reviews films for both radio and her web site.

The New York Times described her in 2010 as, "a kind of all-purpose film critic, political commentator and Web opinion spinner." She was a talk show host at radio station WXYT-FM, then known as WKRK, in Detroit from 2002 to 2003.

Muslims and Islam

Professor of Media and Public Affairs William Youmans described Schussel as a "leading right-wing observer of AD blogging, articles, and op-eds inform other right-wing activists, who mobilize against government-community relations when they seem too cozy. This group has called for greater scrutiny of Arab and Muslim Americans by government officials, and officials they consider pro-Arab are frequent targets of their protests. Consistently, Schlussel and her allies have described Detroit's Arab Americans as potential terrorists." Professor Julianne Hammer described described Schussel as an "anti-Muslim pundit".

Schlussel has alleged that American politicians, including the late former Republican Senator Fred Thompson and former Democratic President Barack Obama, have connections with radical Islam, In October 2001 she alleged that President George W. Bush was connected to the Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR). CAIR later sued Schlussel of trademark violation when she used their acronym in a web-domain directing readers to Islamophobic webpages.

In 2007, she stated that atheists are intolerant of Christians, and that American Muslims are no more moderate than those in the Middle East; that blog post of hers was read aloud on The Rush Limbaugh Show.

After the killing of Osama bin Laden, Schlussel wrote on her blog, "1 down, 1.8 billion to go", referring to the world's total Muslim population.

In 2011, she was listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as one of 10 people in the United States' "Anti-Muslim Inner Circle".

Controversies related to comments on the Holocaust

On May 30, 2012, Schlussel wrote a blog post commenting about a speech by President Barack Obama, in which he mistakenly used the phrase "Polish death camps" referring to the German death camps in occupied Poland. She said Obama owed no apology for his remark, and she criticized

the feigned shock and fake moralizing over his comments, yesterday, about German Nazi death camps in Poland being a Polish death camp ... Poles murdered millions of Jews, they maintained several death camps, and they wiped out almost all of both sides of my family, as well as those in hundreds of thousands of other Jewish families. This wasn't just the Nazis. It was tens of thousands of eager Poles and more.

In addition to discussing Polish collaboration with the Nazis, she said that a "majority were all too happy for the Judenrein". She discounted the Polish Righteous Among the Nations by stating that only a "very tiny few" gentile Poles aided the Jews. Her commentary provoked protest in Poland. The chairman of the Polish Parliament's Foreign Affairs Commission, Grzegorz Schetyna, called her commentary a pack of lies.

In its daily news release, the Polish government-affiliated Institute of National Remembrance dubbed Schlussel's commentary as defamatory.

References

1. Cieply, Michael."A Movie Critic Loses Her Screening Privileges (But Gets ‘Em Back)", The New York Times, November 21, 2010.
   See also Cieply, Michael. "Studio Returns a Critic's Movie Pass", The New York Times (November 22, 2010).
2. Cieply, Michael. "Much Movie Title Meshugas", The New York Times, May 3, 2010.
3. Neville, Arthel. "Saudi Arabia Friend or Foe?; Who Should Get Sniper Reward Money?", CNN, November 26, 2002.
4. "William Youmans | School of Media & Public Affairs (SMPA) | the George Washington University". Retrieved October 7, 2019.
5. Youmans, William (2011). "Domestic Foreign Policy: Arab Detroit as a Special Place in the War on Terror". In Nabeel, Abraham (ed.). Arab Detroit 9/11: Life in the Terror Decade. Detroit, Michigan: Wayne State University Press. pp. 23, 97, 101, 276, 279–81, 336, 371, 373. ISBN 978-0814335000.
6. Juliane Hammer (September 3, 2019). Peaceful Families: American Muslim Efforts Against Domestic Violence. Princeton University Press. p. 46.
7. "Untraceable E-mails Spread Obama Rumor". CBS News. October 15, 2007.
8. "CAIR-MI to React to Ruling on Trademark Infringement by Hate Blogger"
9. Muslim civil rights group sues critic Debbie Schlussel for fake CAIR Michigan website, Associated Press, January 6, 2011.
10. Ashenfelter, David (January 11, 2011). "Blogger Schlussel renames organization after CAIR lawsuit". Detroit Free Press.
11. "Senator Joe Biden Under Fire Over Controversial Remarks; Has NFL Moved Beyond Racist Past?", Paula Zahn Now, CNN, January 31, 2007.
12. Schlussel, Debbie (February 7, 2007). "When Atheists a/k/a Future Muslims Attack". debbieschlussel.com. Retrieved October 26, 2015.
13. Schlussel, Debbie. "Meet Your 'Moderate', 'American' Muslim Neighbors: New Study Shows U.S. Muslims Are Extremists", debbieschlussel.com, May 23, 2007.
14. Grewal, Zareena. Islam Is a Foreign Country: American Muslims and the Global Crisis of Authority, p. 357 (NYU Press 2013).
15. Norton, Anne. On the Muslim Question, pg. 69 (Princeton University Press 2013).
16. Lemons, Stephen (May 1, 2011). "Osama bin Laden Dead: Debbie Schlussel Calls for Killing 1.8 Billion Muslims; Let the Crackpot Raving Begin!". Phoenix New Times.
17. Steinback, Robert. The Anti-Muslim Inner Circle, Intelligence Report, Summer 2011, Issue Number: 142, Southern Poverty Law Center; accessed May 26, 2017.
18. Ernst, Carl. Islamophobia in America: The Anatomy of Intolerance, p. 73 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013).
19. ^ Schlussel, Debbie (May 30, 2012). "Poles Were Complicit in Holocaust: Outrage Over Obama "Gaffe" is Fraudulent, Ignorant". Debbieschlussel.com. Retrieved April 23, 2013.
20. "White House shrugs off Polish apology demands", AFP (May 30, 2012).
21. "Poland welcomes Obama letter on 'death camp' error", Reuters, June 1, 2012.
22. "A collective letter – also in English – addressed to the extremely unprofessional American journalist Debbie Schlussel, including an email" (in Polish). Retrieved July 7, 2012.
23. Schetyna, Grzegorz (July 6, 2012). "Gość Radia Zet". Radio Zet (Interview) (in Polish). Interviewed by Monika Olejnik. Warsaw. Retrieved July 9, 2012.
24. IPN (2012). "Przegląd mediów – 6 czerwca 2012" [Media review, June 6, 2012]. ipn.gov.pl (in Polish). Institute of National Remembrance. Archived from the original on March 2, 2014. Retrieved July 9, 2012.

External links

• Appearances on C-SPAN

• 1969 births
• Living people
• American bloggers
• American Orthodox Jews
• American people of Polish-Jewish descent
• American political commentators
• American social commentators
• American conspiracy theorists
• American critics of Islam
• Jewish American attorneys
• Jewish American writers
• Michigan lawyers
• Michigan Republicans
• People from Southfield, Michigan
• University of Michigan alumni
• University of Wisconsin Law School alumni
• Wisconsin School of Business alumni
• Writers from Detroit
• 21st-century American non-fiction writers
• 21st-century American Jews