Update: Gov. Mike Huckabee has assured ADL that he never intended to make any direct comparison between today’s issues and the Holocaust.  As a result, and after having carefully reviewed a video of the speech, the League clarified its position on this matter in a letter to the governor.

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New York, NY, May 2, 2011 … Saying Holocaust and Nazi comparisons should never be used as political talking points, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today condemned two recent incidents of inappropriate Nazi analogies invoked by current and former elected officials.

During separate appearances over the weekend, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee compared inaction over the nation's mounting debt crisis to those who said or did nothing about the rise of the Nazis.

Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director, issued the following statement: 

It is highly inappropriate to use America's mounting debt crisis as another occasion to invoke Nazis and the Holocaust, particularly on the eve of Holocaust Remembrance Day, a time dedicated to memorializing, not trivializing, the six million Jews and millions of others who perished at the hands of the Nazis.

 

While we understand that there are legitimate concerns about the nation's debt, they do not justify invoking these kinds of Holocaust and Nazi comparisons.  Rep. Michele Bachmann herself acknowledged 'there is no analogy to that horrific action' that was the Holocaust, but she should have refrained from drawing such a parallel in the context of remarks about taxes.

 

We hope that Rep. Bachmann, Mike Huckabee and others will weigh their words more carefully and stop invoking this offensive analogy.