A rumor spread in 2026 that decades earlier, a Jewish cantor — someone who sings and leads and congregation in prayer — reached out to a Ku Klux Klan leader who had been harassing him and their subsequent friendship led the former klansman to convert to Judaism.
Posts with the same text spread on Facebook in late May 2026. They recounted the story of the cantor, Michael Weisser, and his family, who began to receive hate messages and death threats when they arrived in Omaha, Nebraska, from a man named Larry Trapp, who was supposedly the grand dragon of the Nebraska KKK (archived):
The posts read, in part:
Larry Trapp converts to Judaism - the religion of the family he had targeted. He meets individually with members of the minority communities he had threatened and asks each of them for forgiveness, face to face. He is welcomed into the Weissers' synagogue by a congregation he once would have treated as enemies.
Snopes readers also emailed seeking to confirm the veracity of the claim.
In short, the story was true. Though Weisser died in 2024, Snopes reached out to his wife at the time the events took place, who confirmed the story. Further, Weisser appeared in 2016 on "Snap Judgement," a New York Public Radio show, and recounted the story himself.
"It's all in Kathryn Watterson's book, Not By The Sword," Weisser's former wife, Julie Flora, told Snopes in an email. "I was in my 40s when Larry died."
She also confirmed Trapp was a grand dragon of the KKK and that she had given up work to look after Trapp in her and Weisser's home. Trapp, who was a double amputee because of diabetes, died months after his conversion in 1992.
Watterson's book is only one of the many retellings of the friendship between the Weissers and Trapp and his subsequent conversion to Judaism. Reputable news outlets widely covered the story since it happened in the early 1990s, including Time magazine, who interviewed both men, The Patriot Ledger and The New York Times.
The story also became a puppet play, "Befriended by the Enemy," that won a citation of excellence in 1995 from the Union Internationale de la Marionnette-USA (International Union of Puppetry).
In addition, the Online Nonviolent Action Database created a page with the details of the story.
Klansman converts to Judaism
"We were moving into the house and unpacking one Sunday morning, and we had a call from an unknown person," Weisser said in the "Snap Judgement" story. "I picked up the phone and said 'Hello," and he said 'You'll be sorry you moved into that house, jimboy.'"
He said he called the police, who told him they thought Trapp — who was "notorious as a white supremacist" — was behind the call.
Weisser said the family then received a package filled with racist materials, including a Ku Klux Klan business card. He then attempted to reach out to the man on the phone. He said he would regularly call Trapp on Thursday afternoons, leaving messages on his phone.
Eventually Trapp answered the phone angrily, lobbing insults at Weisser. Weisser told him he'd heard Trapp was disabled and offered to take him groceries, which Trapp turned down.
Weisser kept calling on Thursday afternoons for two more months. Then, on a Saturday, Trapp called Weisser, saying he wanted to "get out of what I'm doing" but did not know how. So Weisser said he'd visit Trapp.
Weisser and his wife, Flora, went to Trapp's house and found him sitting in a wheelchair, holding an automatic weapon and a pistol in his lap, according to the late cantor. Trapp extended his hand, which Weisser said he shook. During a long conversation, Trapp told the Weissers about his difficult childhood growing up with a violent father, which led him to join the KKK, eventually becoming the grand dragon for the Nebraska chapter of the hate group.
Later, Trapp's health worsened. Weisser told "Snap Judgement" that his wife offered to welcome Trapp into their home in order to take care of him, and she also gave up her job to look after him.
This is when Trapp asked Weisser to help him study and convert to Judaism. He converted shortly thereafter, dying a few months later. Weisser said Trapp spent nine months in his family's house.
"He died a better man than he lived," Weisser told "Snap Judgement." Trapp spent much of that time on the telephone apologizing to people he'd hurt, according to Weisser.
For further reading, Snopes confirmed in 2019 that a menorah, a traditional multibranch candelabra used to celebrate Hanukkah, the Jewish festival of lights, was once displayed in defiance to the Nazi regime in Germany.