A court reportedly ruled Wednesday that an ex-Obama official must take a “26-week Anti-Bias Program” after he repeatedly harassed a halal cart vendor in New York City.
Former Obama aide Stuart Seldowitz reached a deal to complete a “26-week Anti-Bias Program through Queens Counseling for Change” in exchange for prosecutors dropping his hate crime charges, Judge Beverly Tatham ruled per the prosecution’s request, according to the New York Post.
Seldowitz received supervised release in November after being arrested and charged with a hate crime against a halal cart vendor in New York City. Video showed the former White House security advisor harassing the vendor, who did not speak English, calling the unidentified man a “terrorist” and suggesting he was a rapist. (RELATED: Los Angeles Police Investigate Possible Hate Crime After Someone Vandalizes Jewish Mural Near Iconic Deli)
“If we killed 4,000 Palestinian kids, it wasn’t enough,” Seldowitz said in the video. “It wasn’t enough.”
Seldowitz repeatedly confronted the vendor for two weeks on the street corner in the Upper East Side, a Colombia graduate student who filmed the altercation alleged, according to the outlet. The former Obama official was shown wearing different outfits in various videos.
NEW: Barack Obama’s former foreign policy advisor Stuart Seldowitz is caught on camera laughing about the thought of torturing a halal cart vendor’s parents.
The Islamophobic slurs were made in New York City.
Seldowitz asked the cart worker if he “r*pes” his daughter like… pic.twitter.com/jeeuXoD3eQ
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) November 22, 2023
Seldowitz’s hate crime charges will be dropped once he finishes the “anti-bias” program with no new arrests or violations of the victim’s protection order, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office confirmed to the New York Post. The 64-year-old suspect was present at the hearing but reportedly refused to speak.
Seledowitz served as a deputy director and senior official in the U.S. State Department’s Office of Israel and Palestinian Affairs in the early 2000s and was the acting director of the National Security Council South Asia Directorate under the Obama administration.