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Sources say that some admorim and roshei yeshiva in the United States have been invited to a meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House this week, with the future of Orthodox Jewish education and other communal concerns expected to be raised.

Several details now circulating — including the full list of participants — have not been independently confirmed. There has also been no public announcement from the White House confirming the meeting as of today.

The original report said that information had been received in the United States shortly before Shabbos regarding a planned White House meeting between Trump and leading American Torah and Chassidic figures.

Another source subsequently said that information it had received indicated that the meeting was expected to take place this week.

Both sources identify the same core group of invitees: the Satmar Rebbe, the Skverer Rebbe, the Bobover Rebbe, the Vizhnitzer Rebbe of Monsey, and Rav Aryeh Malkiel Kotler. The meeting is reportedly being planned for Thursday.

Sources say that the delegation will use the alleged meeting to express hakaras hatov to Trump for his administration’s support of the Orthodox Jewish community and its institutions.

That stated agenda is consistent with issues that the Trump administration has publicly made a priority. The White House says its religious-liberty agenda specifically includes parental rights in religious education, school choice and institutional autonomy, and Trump established both a White House Faith Office and a Religious Liberty Commission after returning to office.

There is also substantial precedent for contacts between Trump and many of the Chareidi communities whose leaders are reportedly involved.

In April, Trump personally hosted a group of frum communal representatives at the White House for a Pesach gathering. Those present included representatives of Satmar and Skver, Agudath Israel representative Reb Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism Yehuda Kaploun, and Tzedek Association founder Reb Moshe Margaretten. New Square Mayor Yisroel Meir Spitzer attended and conveyed greetings to Trump from the Skverer Rebbe.

Trump also sent a personal letter to the Skverer Rebbe in August 2025 on the occasion of the wedding of the Rebbe’s great-grandchild. The letter was presented to the Rebbe by New Square Mayor Spitzer and other Chareidi activists with ties to the administration.

The relationship between the rabbinic leaders named in the current report and Trump goes back considerably further. In 2020, a letter thanking Trump for his defense of religious liberty was signed by an array of leading American admorim and roshei yeshiva, including both Satmar Rebbes, the Skverer Rebbe, the Bobover Rebbe, the Vizhnitzer Rebbe of Monsey and others.

It is with great sadness that Matzav.com reports the passing of Rav Yehoshua Safrin zt”l, the Komarna Rebbe of Manhattan, a scion of the illustrious Komarna dynasty and the son of the Komarna Rebbe, Rav Chaim Yaakov Safrin zt”l.

The Rebbe was niftar over Shabbos, leaving behind a family and a legacy deeply rooted in the extraordinary Torah and chassidic heritage of Komarna.

Rav Chaim Yaakov Safrin served as the Komarna Rebbe in New York and later in Yerushalayim and was considered one of the outstanding mekubalim and talmidei chachomim of his generation. Rav Chaim Yaakov was renowned for his mastery of both nigleh and nistar. The Satmar Rebbe, Rav Yoel Teitelbaum zt”l, is reported to have described him as unique in his generation in the realm of remez.

Rav Chaim Yaakov, born in 1891, was a descendant of the great Komarna dynasty and became one of its principal surviving leaders in the aftermath of the Holocaust, when much of the dynasty and its leadership had been destroyed. Survivors of Komarna looked to him to continue the mesorah of the famed chassidus.

The Safrin family had reached America before the Holocaust. Rav Chaim Yaakov recognized the danger developing in Europe and urged others to escape as well. He and his family arrived in the United States in 1938, and his chassidim established Bnei Yaakov Anshei Komarno for him on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

It was within that distinguished family that Rav Yehoshua grew up, surrounded by the distinctive Komarna tradition of intense Torah learning, avodah and the study of Toras hanistar.

The Komarna dynasty traces its roots to Rav Alexander Sender Safrin and, most famously, to his son Rav Yitzchok Eizik Yehuda Yechiel Safrin of Komarna, known as the Heichal Habracha, one of the leading chassidic and kabbalistic figures of the 19th century. The dynasty became particularly renowned for its emphasis on the teachings of Kabbalah and the Zohar alongside nigleh and chassidic avodah.

Rav Yehoshua was one of several sons of Rav Chaim Yaakov who continued the family’s Torah and chassidic legacy. His brothers included Rav Shalom Safrin of Yerushalayim; Rav Nesanel Safrin; Rav Menachem Monish Safrin, who served as the Komarna Rebbe in Bnei Brak; Rav Alter Yitzchok Elimelech Safrin in the United States; and Rav Yissachar Dov Safrin of Bnei Brak.

Rav Yehoshua was the son-in-law of Reb Moshe Menachem Razler zt”l.

In addition to carrying on the Komarna mesorah, Rav Yehoshua played an important role in preserving and publishing the Torah writings of his father.

Rav Yehoshua Safrin was the publisher of works left in manuscript by Rav Chaim Yaakov. Among them was Pri Chaim, containing derushim and chiddushim arranged according to the Alef Bais and based on the four levels of Pardes. Another volume of Pri Chaim contains his father’s writings on Tehillim.

Rav Yehoshua was also involved in bringing his father’s Poras Yosef to print, a collection of 267 teachings organized around Yosef Hatzaddik and the parshiyos of Vayeitzei, Vayishlach, Vayeishev, Mikeitz, Vayigash and Vayechi. The work was preserved in Rav Chaim Yaakov’s own manuscript before being prepared for publication by his son.

These efforts formed part of a larger preservation of Rav Chaim Yaakov’s Torah legacy, which includes works such as Bais Avos, Shabbos Shalom Umevorach, Pri Chaim and Poras Yosef.

Rav Chaim Yaakov eventually left New York for Eretz Yisroel in 1962 and settled in Yerushalayim, where he established his bais medrash in the Geulah neighborhood near Kikar Shabbos. The bais medrash remains active today. He was later buried on Har Hazeisim.

Rav Yehoshua, meanwhile, remained associated with the Komarna presence in New York, carrying the title of Komarna Rebbe in Manhattan and representing another living link to the family’s prewar chassidic heritage.

His passing closes another chapter in an American Komarna story stretching back nearly nine decades, to the arrival of his father and family in New York on the eve of the destruction of European Jewry.

The levayah will take place Sunday, August 30, at 11 a.m. at Shomrei Hadas Chapels, 3803 14th Avenue in Brooklyn.

The family will be sitting shivah in Manhattan.

Yehi zichro baruch.

{Matzav.com}