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The Minnesota GOP’s nominee for governor defended as “legitimate” his comparison of Nazi Germany to current American masking policies.
By United with Israel Staff
Former Minnesota State Senator Scott Jensen recently defended his comments comparing the beginning of Germany’s genocidal Nazi era with current mask mandates.
“Then there was the book burning, and it kept growing and growing, and a guy named Hitler kept growing in power, and World War II came about. Well, in a way, I think that’s why you’re here today. You sense that something’s happening, and it’s growing little by little,” said Jensen, who is currently running for governor of Minnesota.
On Tuesday, Jensen refused to walk back his comments.
“I want to speak to a little bit of a hubbub that’s been in the media lately about whether or not I was insensitive in regards to the Holocaust. I don’t believe I was,” Jensen declared on Facebook. “When I make a comparison that says that I saw government policies intruding on American freedoms incrementally, one piece at a time, and compare that to what happened in the 1930s, I think it’s a legitimate comparison.”
Jensen joins a list of elected officials who have compared Nazi Germany to the U.S.’ mask mandates and governmental policies that restricted personal freedoms during the Corona pandemic. Individuals making such comparisons include members of Congress, local politicians, and other public figures, such as Robert Kennedy Jr.
Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene famously claimed “vaccine Nazis” are “ruining” the U.S.
Inappropriate comparisons between Kristallnacht and modern America, referred to as “Holocaust distortion,” are not limited to the Corona-pandemic. Veteran journalist Christiane Amanpour equated Donald Trump’s presidency with Kristallnacht.
“Amanpour said on her weekday program that airs on PBS and CNN International that the Nazis were assaulting ‘fact, knowledge, history and truth.’ She said Trump attacked the same values,” reported the Associated Press.
Amanpour later said she regretted the comments in 2019.
Jensen, for his part, dismissed his critics, stating, “It may not strike your fancy — that’s fine. But this is how I think, and you don’t get to be my thought police person.”
Jensen’s original comments were made at an anti-mask rally in April 2022, where he stated, “If you look at the 1930s and you look at it carefully, we could see some things happening, little things, that people chose to push aside — ‘It’s going to be okay. And then the little things grew into something bigger.’ Then there was a night called Kristallnacht — the night of the breaking glass.”
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