Biden Nominee for Human Rights Job Withdraws Over Alleged BDS Support

US President Joe Biden’s pick for assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor has withdrawn from consideration due to opposition from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s ranking Republican, Jim Risch of Idaho, over her alleged support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel, Politico first reported. Sarah Margon was nominated in April 2021; the Senate has delayed consideration of several of Biden’s nominations apparently for partisan reasons. Margon told Politico that she informed the Biden Administration that she does not want to be renominated for consideration by the new Senate. She was formerly the Washington director of Human Rights Watch and now works as foreign policy director at billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundations. Risch cited some of Margon’s past tweets in attacking her lack of support for Israel, though a bipartisan group of foreign policy professionals, some of them prominent in the Jewish community, in a letter of support dismissed the anti-Israel allegations against her. The Biden Administration has been pushing to prioritize human rights in its foreign policy.