Bruce Harrell's Wife & Staff Traveled To New Orleans CAM Summit

New documents obtained by HardPressed provide more details of Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell’s trip to a Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) summit in New Orleans in December 2025.

The records include correspondence between CAM’s team and the Mayor’s office, presentation materials, videos, photographs and a conference program.

The records also show that Harrell’s wife, Joanne, accompanied him to New Orleans, along with three of Harrell’s staff members, Communications Director Jamie Housen, Chief People Officer Aisha Foster and Chief Public Safety Officer Natalie Walton-Anderson. All made the trip to New Orleans with less than a month before Harrell left City Hall as Mayor. None of them have been retained by current Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson. 

The Mayor’s Office paid $2,400 for Foster and Walton-Anderson, who posed for a photograph, to attend the summit. Other photographs show Harrell posing with a group, participating in a press conference, sitting with Housen, and speaking at a panel discussion.  

Harrell and CAM did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

CAM asserts that anti-Zionism is antisemitism. One vehicle for codifying that is through the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which has been rejected by the American Civil Liberties Union and even the author of the IHRA definition has warned that right wing Jews are weaponizing it.

CAM’s advisory board includes Martin Oliner, who previously told an Israel Heritage Foundation event that “maybe we need to kill more civilians,” as Israel was killing thousands of Palestinians in Gaza in May 2024; Johnny Moore, who ran the infamous Gaza Humanitarian Foundation program, which Médecins Sans Frontières called "sites of orchestrated killing;" and Arie Lipnick, who has been dubbed “one of the top minds in Republican strategy,” and also traveled with RNC chair Michael Whatley on a trip to Israel, where Whatley reportedly met privately with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during Donald Trump's 2024 campaign for president.

Upon returning from the CAM summit in New Orleans, Harrell was provided with a model proclamation for International Holocaust Remembrance Day which incorporated the IHRA definition of antisemitism. He and his staff were also asked to join a WhatsApp group and the Seattle Police Department’s (SPD) chief was invited to a virtual CAM law enforcement training session on January 13 2026. 

SPD Public Affairs Sergeant Patrick Michaud told HardPressed that he was not aware of any SPD employees attending the proposed CAM training in January. At a previous CAM training, police were taught that symbols like the watermelon were antisemitic. 

“You occupy a bully pulpit.”

The day before Harrell conceded the 2025 mayoral election to Katie Wilson, his staff confirmed his intent to travel to New Orleans and secured a room at the JW Marriott hotel for himself and his wife Joanne.

Harrell’s base flight and hotel were paid for by the 501(c)(3) Combat Hate Foundation, which sponsors CAM. Airline tickets were coordinated through AllFly, CAM’s “official travel partner,” where Harrell upgraded his and Joanne’s tickets to first class at personal expense. Harrell was also provided complimentary Uber credits from CAM for ground transportation.  

Seattle’s Ethics and Elections Commission Executive Director Wayne Barnett wrote to HardPressed that “Harrell’s wife traveling with him is not a concern to me, (if the trip is OK).  There is a great opinion out of the New York City ethics board about forty years ago stating that political life is hard enough on couples that requiring them not to travel together or attend events together is unwise and unnecessary. We tend to follow that rule.”

Before traveling to New Orleans, Harrell’s office was asked to take CAM’s Municipal Antisemitism Action Index Survey, which included questions like:

• Has your municipality entered into a sister city relationship with a municipality in Israel for cultural, educational, and informational exchanges?
• Has your municipality integrated the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, including its examples, into city code, including any hate crime legislation?
• Does your municipality have a policy that prohibits doing business with companies that boycott or divest from Israel or engage in discrimination based on ethnicity or national origin?
• Has your municipality adopted ordinances that prohibit the wearing of masks at public protests, except for health-related reasons?

CAM also shared an unlisted YouTube video for Harrell to watch, "Antisemitism 101: A Pre-Summit Briefing."

Within the video, Indiana University professor Alvin Rosenfeld referred listeners to the IHRA definition of antisemitism. New York Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, a former IDF tank commander, told viewers that seeing protests against Israel has been “deeply disorienting for us because we’ve never experienced this kind of animosity towards Israel.”

Hirsch then pitched that “mayors are the closest to people. What they say really matters… You occupy a bully pulpit and all politicians do. What you say really matters.” 

“We’re not going to let them win.”

A program for the CAM summit sent to the Seattle Mayor’s office highlights a full scope of events, and includes the logos of CAM and the African American Mayors Association, which were publicly identified as “Summit Partners” on CAM’s website. Other logos included on the summit program included the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, New Orleans & Company, Stand With Us, New Orleans Tourism and Cultural Foundation, and the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans. 

CAM CEO Sacha Roytman-Dratwa, who lives in Israel, addressed summit attendees in his opening remarks. He recounted seeing protesters outside New Orleans' Gallier Hall with signs that read “NOLA JEWS TO CANTRELL & MORENO: DEFEND NOLA NOT GENOCIDE!” and “ANTIZIONISM ≠ ANTISEMITISM” and “JEWS SAY: COME FOR ONE, FACE US ALL!” and “ICE + CAM GET OUT OF NOLA!”

“We’re not going to let them win, my friends,” Roytman-Dratwa told summit attendees, referencing the protesters outside. “We’re not going to let them win.”

Roytman-Dratwa previously served in the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit and received widespread media attention after he posted an image of himself smeared with mud on Facebook in 2012 with the caption “Obama style.” He previously told ABC News when asked about the photo, “I’m not a racist. Please stop [spreading] lies about me.”

The next day, December 3, the summit was opened by a presentation from Aviva Klompas, the former speechwriter for Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations. 

Later that morning, then-Tacoma Mayor Victoria Woodards headlined a session titled “Recognizing the shift from protest to intimidation.” CAM’s program states that the discussion would “Identify when public expression crosses from legitimate protest into harassment and intimidation. Speakers will outline practical warning signs of escalating risk, along with the lawful tools cities can use to respond while protecting free speech.”

Another session titled “When hate hits home: what mayors do next” included, Secure Community Network’s National Security Advisor Stephanie Viegas, Boulder Colorado Chief of Police Stephen Redfrean and former NYC Department of Corrections Commissioner Louis Molina, who was then NYC’s Commissioner for the Department of Citywide Administrative Services.

Harrell spoke on a panel billed as “Leading from City Hall” and a “fireside chat.” Harrell was asked to “explore what it means to lead from the center of local government during a moment of rising tension, polarization, and uncertainty” and was sent a list of prewritten questions. New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who had seen his federal corruption charges dismissed by Donald Trump’s Department of Justice earlier in 2025, also spoke on the panel. 

Later that night, the African American Mayor’s Association (AAMA) hosted a “Networking Reception” sponsored by police technology company Axon. 

The next day, December 4, Harrell and then-Tacoma Mayor Woodards were penciled in to attend the AAMA 4th quarter board of trustees meeting. That same evening, CAM’s summit agenda included “private group meetings (invitation only).”

Harrell and CAM did not answer if Harrell was invited to these private meetings.