Bethany Mandel

Mandel was raised by her mother[1] near Rochester, New York,[5] at times in poverty.[6] Her mother died of lupus when Mandel was 16,[7] at which time she was estranged from her father, and the guardians named in her mother's will appropriated much of her inheritance.[8] Her father died by suicide when she was 19,[9][6] after struggling with an addiction to opioid painkillers.[10]

She transferred to Rutgers University in 2005 for its strong Jewish Studies department and Jewish student community, and worked full-time while a full-time student,[11] graduating in 2008 with a degree in history and Jewish studies.[2] During her college years, she adopted conservative views after finding that Medicaid and other government welfare programs she had expected to help her after her mother's death were inefficient and ineffective,[12] as well as due to the influence of college friends and the writings of Ayn Rand.[1]

Born Bethany Ann Horowitz, she changed her name at age 18 to Bethany Shondark Murphy, with Murphy being her mother's maiden name.[1][6]

Upon graduation, Mandel moved to Washington, DC and worked for Washington Hebrew Congregation while looking for a position in conservative politics.[1] After reading about the Jay Pritzker Academy near Siem Reap in Cambodia, she wrote and asked to teach at the school, becoming a fifth grade teacher there for a year.[1] Returning to Washington, DC in 2010 to pursue an Orthodox conversion to Judaism,[5] she found work as a fundraiser and writer at the Heritage Foundation, and then as a marketer, editor and blogger for Commentary magazine, and a guest commentator on numerous radio and television shows.[13] Her effective advocacy for conservative causes led to her being named as one of "36 under 36" individuals reinventing Jewish life by the Jewish Week in 2013.[12]

Since 2013, she has been a freelance writer and commentator while working from home to raise her children.[14]

In 2016, she was the target of online harassment after writing about her opposition to Donald Trump during his campaign for the Republican nomination for president.[15] However, she has written about her vote for Donald Trump in the 2020 US Presidential election,[16] citing his policies towards Israel and "some of his domestic policy (tax cuts, pushback against cancel culture and the media)."[17]

Mandel was born to a Catholic mother and a Jewish father, and sought out Rabbi Barry Freundel for an Orthodox conversion that would make her Jewish status universally recognized.[5] She has also said that she left the Reform movement in which she originally affiliated because of its close association with progressive and liberal politics.[25]

She completed her conversion in 2011,[2] and in 2014 learned that the rabbi had filmed her naked while preparing her for conversion.[5][26] She wrote an article entitled "The Convert Bill of Rights" that went viral, making her a spokeswoman for the many victims of the Freundel scandal. She served on a committee appointed by the Rabbinical Council of America to suggest safeguards against future abuses in the conversion process.[27]For this work, the Forward named her one of the "Forward 50" in 2015,[28] and the Rutgers University Hillel honored her with its Young Alumni Award at its 2016 Annual Gala.[11] She has also said that it became clear to her that the RCA did not want to enact meaningful changes to its conversion program, that she resigned from the committee when she understood this, and that the experience left her disenchanted with Orthodoxy as a whole.[17] As a consequence, she and her husband stopped participating in Orthodox Jewish institutions, such as synagogues and schools,[6] before finding a supportive synagogue in Kemp Mill several years later.[25]

She is married to Seth Mandel and the mother of 4 children.[6]