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White House Nixed Holocaust Statement Naming Jews

By Josh Dawsey, Isaac Arnsdorf, Nahal Toosi and Michael Crowley, Politico

03 February 17

 

The State Department wrote a message that recognized Jewish victims, but the White House used its own that didn’t.

he State Department drafted its own statement last month marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day that explicitly included a mention of Jewish victims, according to people familiar with the matter, but President Donald Trump’s White House blocked its release.

The existence of the draft statement adds another dimension to the controversy around the White House’s own statement that was released on Friday and set off a furor because it excluded any mention of Jews. The White House has stood by the statement, defending it as an “inclusive” message that was not intended to marginalize Jewish victims of the Holocaust.

According to three people familiar with the process, the State Department's Office of the Special Envoy on Holocaust Issues prepared its own statement for International Holocaust Remembrance Day that, like previous statements, commemorated Jewish victims.

Instead, the White House’s own statement drew widespread criticism for overlooking the Jews' suffering, and was cheered by neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer.

A White House official said there was no ill intent, adding that the White House didn’t see State’s draft until after issuing its own statement and told State not to release its version because it came after 7 p.m. And the official said the White House didn't ask the State Department to craft their own statement.

Officials at the State Department, however, believed the statement was being drafted for the White House to use, people familiar with the matter said.

An official with the Office of the Special Envoy on Holocaust Issues referred a request for comment to the State Department's spokeswoman, who referred the request to the White House.

The White House’s explanations for omitting Jews in its statement haven’t quelled the controversy and in some cases made it worse. Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks originally defended the omission to CNN saying, “we are an incredibly inclusive group and we took into account all of those who suffered.” Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said he didn’t regret the wording.

"Everyone's suffering in the Holocaust, including obviously all of the Jewish people affected and the miserable genocide that occurred is something that we consider to be extraordinarily sad and something that can never be forgotten,” Priebus said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Monday accused critics of “nitpicking” over the statement. He said it was written “with the help of an individual who is both Jewish and the descendent of Holocaust survivors.” A source with knowledge of the situation told POLITICO that person was Trump aide Boris Epshteyn.

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) likened Trump’s statement to Holocaust denial. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum implicitly rebuked the White House on Monday, saying, “Millions of other innocent civilians were persecuted and murdered by the Nazis, but the elimination of Jews was central to Nazi policy.”

The Republican Jewish Coalition and the Zionist Organization of America, both funded by influential donor Sheldon Adelson, each also scolded the White House for its Holocaust message.

"The lack of a direct statement about the suffering of the Jewish people during the Holocaust was an unfortunate omission. History unambiguously shows the purpose of the Nazi's final solution was the extermination of the Jews of Europe,” the Republican Jewish Coalition’s Fred Brown said in the statement. “We hope, going forward, he conveys those feelings when speaking about the Holocaust."

“Especially as a child of Holocaust survivors, I and ZOA are compelled to express our chagrin and deep pain at President Trump, in his Holocaust Remembrance Day Message, omitting any mention of anti-Semitism and the six million Jews who were targeted and murdered by the German Nazi regime and others,” the ZOA’s Mort Klein said.

The United Nations designated Jan. 27 International Holocaust Remembrance Day to mark the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp.

In 2015, Secretary of State John Kerry issued an extensive statement on the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau that remembered "the six million Jews and the millions more murdered by the Nazis – including Poles, Roma, LGBT people, persons with disabilities.” Two years earlier, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued a statement that did not explicitly name Jews but forcefully warned against Holocaust denial.

"It is our obligation to stay true to our values and maintain constant vigilance,” she said. "We must never forget that when the checks and balances in government and society that protect fundamental freedoms are lost, the result can be massive atrocities. The United States is committed to a world in which the lessons of the Holocaust are taught and that all human rights are valued so that this will never happen again.”