New York, NY, September 5, 2012 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today urged political candidates and their supporters to "stop invoking and trivializing the Holocaust," after a South Carolina Democratic Party official compared Gov. Nikki Haley to Hitler's mistress Eva Braun, becoming the third party official in as many days to offer up a Nazi-related reference in a political context.
Earlier today, South Carolina State Democratic Chairman Dick Harpootlian reportedly evoked Eva Braun when discussing Gov. Nikki Haley's press briefing from a basement studio at the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Harpootlian was quoted as saying, "She was down in the bunker a la Eva Braun."
"This analogy to Eva Braun only serves to trivialize the Holocaust and is deeply offensive to Jews and other survivors, as well as those Americans who fought valiantly against the Nazis in World War II," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director and a Holocaust survivor. "I have said this repeatedly, but it bears repeating again that inappropriate Holocaust analogies simply have no place in politics. The Holocaust and Hitler should not be part of the discussion over which party is best equipped to lead this country for the next four years. Politicians and their supporters and surrogates should stop invoking Hitler and trivializing the memory of the six million and millions of others who perished in the Holocaust."
Earlier this week, the League wrote a letter to the California Democratic Chairman after he compared GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan's speech to the Republic National Convention to the big lie promoted by Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. According to reports, a similar sentiment was echoed by the president of the Kansas Democratic Labor Committee.