WEST BLOOMFIELD (AP) – Rachel Weinberg describes herself as a religious Jew first and a proud American second. He said he had only one choice for president: Donald Trump.

“I don’t like everything he says,” the 72-year-old retired kindergarten teacher from Michigan said after volunteer pollsters from the Republican Jewish Coalition knocked on her door Sunday. “But I vote for Israel. This is our life. I support Israel. Trump supports Israel with his mouth and his actions.”

Weinberg’s home in West Bloomfield in vote-rich Oakland County was among more than 20 homes the Republican Jewish Coalition visited that morning. He had also voted for Trump in previous elections.

The door-to-door outreach to Jewish voters with a history of supporting Republicans is part of the group’s new effort this year in five presidential battleground states in hopes of supporting Trump against Democrat Kamala Harris in the Nov. 5 election. Although polls show that Jews vote decidedly Democratic, the Republican Jewish Coalition hopes the door-knocking will garner enough votes to make a difference in an election year when the war between Israel and Hamas has inflamed controversy and fomented division.

Nearly 7 in 10 Jewish voters nationally supported Democrat Joe Biden in 2020, while nearly 3 in 10 Jewish voters supported Trump that year, according to AP VoteCast, a comprehensive survey of voters. A Pew Research Center poll released last month found that nearly two-thirds of Jewish voters support Harris.

Biden won Michigan in 2020 by fewer than 155,000 votes out of nearly 5.5 million. Although Jewish voters make up just 2% of the state’s electorate, the 15,000 new Republican Jewish voters the coalition has identified since the 2020 election (out of nearly 120,000 Jewish voters in the state) could make an impact. RJC spokesman Sam Markstein said the race was very close.

The Republican Jewish Coalition’s targeting is quite specific in Michigan, as it is in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania. The work here is concentrated in Oakland County, the state’s second most populous county with 1.3 million people, just northwest of Detroit.

There is a particular focus on upper-middle-class suburbs such as Farmington Hills, Oak Park, Southfield, and West Bloomfield; they are home to the state’s largest Jewish population, and some windshields display Israeli flags.

Biden defeated Trump 66% to 33% in 2020 in the West Bloomfield Township district, where 82-year-old David Cuttner and 22-year-old Noam Nedivi campaigned for the coalition on Sunday. The margin wasn’t far off from the national trend.

The coalition’s powerful effort aims to chip away at Democrats’ advantage within that voting bloc. “This includes direct mail, social and digital mailings, all aimed at the Jewish community. And it will be the biggest investment ever made, a total push, to win Jewish voters for Republicans,” Markstein said.

The Republican Jewish Coalition bought $15 million in advertising in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania. But what’s new for this election is its $5 million in door-to-door aid, primarily its investment in voter data aimed at more efficiently identifying potential Trump supporters.

Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said in a statement that Jewish voters were an important part of the winning Democratic coalition.

“While Kamala Harris shares the views and values ​​of the majority of American Jews, Donald Trump threatens and belittles us, uses anti-Semitic rhetoric, aligns with dangerous extremists, and aspires to be a dictator from day one,” Soifer said.

Tensions have been high since the war began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants killed 1,200 people in Israel and took 250 hostage. More than 42,000 Palestinians were killed in Gaza in subsequent clashes, according to Gaza health officials.

In a September poll by the Pearson Institute and the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, Republicans were more likely than Democrats to support Israel, while Democrats were more likely to be critical.

The conflict has intensified focus on relations between Israel and the United States, which has provided at least $17.9 billion in military aid since the war began.

And many Jews say rising acts of anti-Semitism in the United States and anti-Israel protests in cities and on college campuses make them feel unsafe. Campaigning on Sunday, Nedivi said he was a victim of antisemitism at the University of Michigan, where he attended.

Zeke Aharonov had an alternative message to fellow religious Jews after more than 200 people lined up to vote early at the West Bloomfield library on Sunday.

“As Jews, it is our duty to be wary of fascism and to fight it,” the 26-year-old cybersecurity technician said as he left the library. “And the way we fight fascism is to vote against Donald Trump.”