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Chabad leaders in San Francisco are taking a close interest in this year’s mayoral race, as high levels of overt antisemitism rattle the S.F. Jewish community.

“Everyone in the room knows people — many people — that are afraid to wear a Magen David in high school or elementary, or they take off their kippah,” Rabbi Mendel Levin of Chabad of the Neighborhood told J.

The fear permeating much of the Jewish community is what Chabad rabbis from across the city discussed in separate meetings with three of the mayoral candidates — Mayor London Breed, philanthropist Daniel Lurie and former Supervisor Mark Farrell — in the past two months.

“I definitely think that, on a value-based level, all three candidates were very supportive,” Levin said.

The meetings, held at West Portal’s Chabad, were attended by Chabad representatives from Cole Valley, West Portal, Noe Valley and the Sunset, as well as the Russian-language Schneerson Center, the Richmond Torah Center, Sephardic synagogue Anshey Sfard, Orthodox synagogues Congregation Adath Israel, Congregation Torat Emet and Congregation Chevra Thilim, and the Bais Menachem Yeshiva Day School.

Rabbi Yosef Langer of Chabad of SF also attended.

Daniel Lurie is a philanthropist and nonprofit founder from a prominent San Francisco Jewish family. His mother, Mimi Haas, was married to Peter E. Haas, the great-grandnephew of Levi Strauss, and the Haas family has donated massive sums to institutions across the Bay Area. He’s also the co-founder, with political organizer and cafe owner Manny Yekutiel, of the Civic Joy organization, which plans events to brighten up and improve the city.

Lurie isn’t the only Jewish candidate in the running. Longtime Supervisor Aaron Peskin joined the race in April, bringing his Tel Aviv-born mother, Tsipora Peskin, to witness him signing the paperwork at San Francisco City Hall.

Levin said he’d reached out to Peskin but had not yet heard back. He also said the group helped Lurie wrap tefillin at the meeting.

Farrell served as mayor for five months in 2018 following Mayor Ed Lee’s death. In 2013, Farrell was one of the supervisors who signed a letter condemning a bus advertisement calling Israel an apartheid state.

Meanwhile, Breed has fairly close connections with Jewish San Francisco, having traveled to Israel with the Jewish Community Relations Council last May. In June, she met with young Jews at a Moishe House in the Castro to talk about antisemitism. She also discussed the commercial DNA testing she’d done that showed she has Jewish roots.

Besides antisemitism and safety, Levin said the group discussed existing regulations around day care centers run by religious organizations and the perennial Chabad suggestion for a nondenominational moment of silence at the beginning of the day in public schools.

Levin said this is the first time that Chabad rabbis have had meetings of this sort with mayoral candidates. However, Chabad as an organization is known for cultivating relationships with local governments. And S.F. mayors have regularly shown up over the years for menorah lightings in Union Square and similar events.

But Levin said it was important that the candidates hear from Chabad rabbis how Jews are feeling right now.

“The more they hear, the more they see, the more they’ll take it seriously,” Levin said. “I definitely feel like it moved the needle.”