On Friday, May 17, 2024, First Amendment Clinic Director Andrew Geronimo moderated a conversation with Jodi Rudoren, editor-in-chief of the Jewish news outlet the Forward, at the City Club of Cleveland.
Geronimo and Rudoren engaged in a wide-ranging conversation about the need for rigorous reporting and respected journalism, especially at this moment of national attention to the Israel-Hamas war abroad and the repercussions on American campuses and beyond. As the editor-in-chief of the Forward, the nation’s most widely read Jewish news outlet and an independent and non-ideological source for news and opinion across the political spectrum, Rudoren has been a leading commentator since the October 7 Hamas attack. In conversation with Geronimo, Rudoren shared her insights on the complexities journalists face in reporting on the war abroad and antisemitism here in the United States.
The event was well-attended by members of the Cleveland community. The audience included students from MC2STEM high school, who asked questions about how the Forward has dealt with antisemitism directed towards it as a Jewish news outlet and how the Forward engages with teenagers and young adults considering increasing instances of antisemitism in youth culture and on school campuses.
The City Club of Cleveland is one of the nation’s oldest continuous independent free speech forums. It is a non-partisan organization that firmly believes in the free expression of all ideas and the benefits of an open exchange. The conversation between Geronimo and Rudoren was one of the City Club’s Friday Forums, a luncheon program devoted to significant national and regional concerns.
A recording of the conversation can be accessed on the City Club’s website: Independent Journalism in an Era of Polarization: A Conversation with Jodi Rudoren, Editor-in-Chief of the Forward.