Robert Kraft Is Working to Stop the 'Hate Going on in the World' with His Antisemitism Foundation (Exclusive)

Kraft's foundation ran a powerful Super Bowl ad featuring Dr. Clarence B. Jones

It's been nearly one year since Robert Kraft announced his Foundation to Combat Antisemitism (FCAS), and now the New England Patriots owner is reflecting on the work his foundation has done.

Kraft, 82, initially invested $25 million into the multi-faceted campaign fighting antisemitism.

Earlier this month, FCAS ran a commercial during the 2024 Super Bowl featuring Dr. Clarence B. Jones, famously known for his speech writing work with Martin Luther King Jr.

The 30-second spot from FCAS opens with Jones, 82, saying, "Sometimes I imagine what I'd write today for my dear friend Martin. I'd remind people that all hate thrives on one thing — silence," and goes on to encourage viewers to "speak out" against all forms of hate.

Jones' participation in the spot meant a great deal to Kraft, the NFL owner tells PEOPLE. "I've always admired Martin Luther King Jr. as a man. I love people who can capture people when they speak, and he had a way of speaking that was just very special. He could connect with people."

Related: Robert Kraft Announces Antisemitism Initiative – And He's Got Tom Brady and Meek Mill On Board

Kraft continues, "And then Dr. Jones was his consigliere, his speech writer, and is a man of great depth and a lover of mankind. I had the privilege of spending three and a half hours with him in a private setting."

"We need more people like Martin Luther King and Clarence Jones, people who are open to every way that people think, good people who are bridge-builders," Kraft says. "There is so much hate going on in the world. When we're born, no one is born with hate. It's learned and taught, and we've got to stop it."

Last Spring, Kraft and his wife, Dana Blumberg, led the March of the Living in Poland, where 20,000 people walked between the remnants of concentration camps there.

"I took Meek Mill, who is a friend, because I wanted him to see what happened there years ago, and he came with us as we led this march. And when he went through Auschwitz, and he saw 46,000 women's scalps piled up in a room, piled up with baby shoes, he came over to me with tears in his eyes," Kraft says.

The Patriots owner says he "created the foundation to combat Jewish hate and all hate," and he wanted it to be driven by "actionable data" and "something that appealed to the empathy that I believe all human beings have," he says.

The foundation conducted a study with Boston Consulting Group (BCG) to better understand how Americans are educated through media.

"We saw from our last TV ad that we did in April and May, that we had reached between 130 and 150 million adults, seven to 10 times, and our ad changed the way people thought," says Kraft.

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"We raised from 20% of the population to 40%, that they had to stand up and not be silent, and look to help their brothers or sisters in need. But there's still a long way to go."

Beyond combatting hate, Kraft says a major goal of this initiative is "about education" of Americans. "Social media has become such a powerful tool and weapon that young people aren't getting the straight facts, because there's so many falsehoods on social media and it has such wide coverage."

"So we felt that going to the greatest TV event in America, the only time that you can reach probably a couple hundred million people, when it's all said and done, with this message of empathy and standing up to all hate should be in the Super Bowl. So it's very expensive to get 30 seconds, but we hope it's going to be a good return on investment."

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