HR 8282
Rabbi Michoel Ber Weissmandl Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2026
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Bill overview
This bill proposes to award a Congressional Gold Medal posthumously to Rabbi Michoel Ber Weissmandl in recognition of his courageous efforts during World War II to save Jewish people from the Holocaust. He established an underground organization, the Working Group, that secured visas, documented escapees’ accounts, and advocated for utilizing Allied air resources to combat the atrocities. Rabbi Weissmandl also played a key role in rescue operations and the establishment of a Yeshiva for Holocaust survivors in America.
Key provisions
- Posthumously awards a Congressional Gold Medal to Rabbi Michoel Ber Weissmandl.
- Recognizes his efforts in saving Jewish people during World War II, including establishing the Working Group.
- Authorizes the presentation of the medal by the Speaker of the House and the President pro tempore of the Senate.
- Allows the Weissmandl Committee to accept the medal on behalf of Rabbi Weissmandl.
- Directs the Secretary of the Treasury to design and strike a gold medal.
- Specifies that the medal should be given to Samuel Dovid Weissmandl or Rabbi Menachem Meir Weissmandl after the presentation.
- Permits the creation and sale of bronze duplicates of the gold medal.
- Designates the gold medal as a national medal under Title 31 of the United States Code.
Who is affected
- Jewish community
- Holocaust survivors and their families
- Congress
- The Treasury Department
- The Weissmandl family
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119th CONGRESS — 2d Session
H. R. 8282
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
A BILL
To posthumously award a Congressional Gold Medal to Rabbi Michoel Ber Weissmandl in recognition of his acts of valor during World War II.
This Act may be cited as the Rabbi Michoel Ber Weissmandl Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2026
.
Congress finds the following:
During his time in Nitra, he quickly became a senior figure within the local Jewish community and Yeshiva.
Weissmandl was responsible for some of the daring efforts to save the Jewish people of Slovakia from the Holocaust, which include the establishment of a Working Group
, an underground organization that raised funds to negotiate ransom with German and Slovakian officials in order to delay mass deportations.
During the Nazi regime, Weissmandl used his contacts from England to obtain visas, becoming one of the first to actively protect people of Jewish ancestry in Europe.
Weissmandl also wrote telegrams to generate awareness of the Jewish people’s plight and encouraged other strategic approaches to stop the Holocaust, including the bombing of railroad tunnels to prevent the transportation of persons to concentration camps.
Weissmandl established a Working Group—a wide variety of people from different political and ideological spectrums—whose common goal was to save people from the Final Solution
.
The Working Group was one of the first to document in writing the accounts of Auschwitz Escapees in a document widely referred to as the Auschwitz Protocols
.
Weissmandl himself later translated the initial documentation from German to Hebrew and included a widely known addendum that pleaded for action.
Weissmandl wrote the first known appeal for the use of Allied air resources to disrupt the Holocaust.
In 1942 when Slovakia started deportation for resettlement
, Rabbi Weissmandl was the first to inform the Working Group that people were being murdered and not sent to work as originally claimed.
Rabbi Weissmandl also played an instrumental role in Solomon Schoenfeld Kindertransport rescue, helping save hundreds of lives.
Rabbi Weissmandl came to America and in 1945 immediately got to work to establish a home and Yeshiva for Holocaust survivors. The Yeshiva of Nitra he established in Mount Kisco, New York, was the first Yeshiva campus in America and became an example that other institutions followed.
Rabbi Weissmandl has significantly influenced the flourishing communities of Talmudic scholars in Brooklyn, New York, and generally across the United States.
For the purpose of the presentation referred to in subsection (a), the Secretary of the Treasury (hereinafter in this Act referred to as the Secretary
) shall strike a gold medal with suitable emblems, devices, and inscriptions to be determined by the Secretary.
Under such regulations as the Secretary may prescribe, the Secretary may strike and sell duplicates in bronze of the gold medal struck pursuant to section 3 at a price sufficient to cover the cost of the bronze medals (including labor, materials, dies, use of machinery, and overhead expenses) and the cost of the gold medal.
The gold medal struck under this Act is a national medals for purposes of chapter 51 of title 31, United States Code.
For purposes of sections 5134 and 5136 of title 31, United States Code, all medals struck under this Act shall be considered to be numismatic items.