(AP) – An Indiana chapter of Moms For Liberty, a group that has advocated for book bans in school districts across the country, apologized for quoting Adolf Hitler in a newsletter this week.
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The group’s chapter in Hamilton County, north of Indianapolis, released the first edition of its newsletter, The Parent Brigade, on Wednesday. Atop its masthead was a quotation attributed to Hitler reading, “He alone, who OWNS the youth, GAINS the future.”
On Thursday, the chapter’s president apologized for the quotation. An amended version of the newsletter with “context” for the quotation was posted online before the whole quote was later deleted and the newsletter reposted without it.
“We condemn Adolf Hitler’s actions and his dark place in human history,” the group’s chair, Paige Miller, wrote in a statement posted to social media. “We should not have quoted him in our newsletter and express our deepest apology.”
Founded in 2021 in Florida to oppose what it calls indoctrination in public education, Moms For Liberty now has dozens of chapters nationwide, a growing national profile and an uneasy relationship with Jewish-themed books.
At least one of its national chairs is Jewish, and the group has publicly supported haredi Orthodox yeshivas that are under fire for allegedly falling short of secular education requirements and other standards. But Moms For Liberty members have also been a driving force behind the removal of Jewish and Holocaust-themed books from schools, including a successful effort to remove an adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary from a Florida school district. Chapters have also aligned themselves with extremist groups like the Proud Boys, and the left-leaning Southern Poverty Law Center has called them a hate group, sparking criticism from Republicans.
The quotation in question is sourced to a 1935 speech Hitler gave introducing the antisemitic Nuremberg Laws. It was previously quoted publicly in 2021, when Mary Miller, a Republican congresswoman, recited a version of the quotation during a rally shortly before the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 of that year. Miller, who said “Hitler was right on one thing,” initially defended her use of the quotation before apologizing.
On Twitter, Moms for Liberty responded to the email by writing, “Everyone knows Hitler is bad” and calling coverage of the quotation “intentional dishonesty in reporting,” though it added that “The chapter shouldn’t have quoted Hitler without condemning him at the same time.”
Moms For Liberty co-founder Tiffany Justice responded to the quote with a statement that seemed to compare President Joe Biden to Hitler.
“Our Moms condemn Hitler and all he represents,” Justice tweeted above a screenshot of an article about Biden criticizing parents’-rights activists. Alongside a picture of a finger pointing at the article, she wrote, “Controlling the minds of the youth through government schools was done by Hitler, Lenin and Mao. Millions have died because of these monsters. They thought they owned the children. Sound familiar?”
The kerfuffle occurred as Moms For Liberty prepared to host its first-ever annual summit. Several candidates for president are scheduled to make appearances, including Republicans Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley, along with Democratic candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Most of the group’s activism nationally has revolved around fighting discussion of LGBTQ identity in schools, as well as matters related to race. The other items in the Hamilton County newsletter had included criticism of a local high school receiving an award from the It Gets Better Foundation, which advocates for LGBTQ youth. Immediately below the Hitler quote, there was another one from the group’s national co-founders, Justice and Tina Deskovich: “Moms For Liberty will not be intimidated by hate groups!”
Among the figures condemning the newsletter is Miles Nelson, the Jewish Democratic nominee for mayor of Carmel, Indiana, which is located in Hamilton County. Nelson tweeted, “This hate speech has no place in our community.”
The chair of the county Republican Party, Mario Massillamany, also condemned the newsletter, telling the Indianapolis Star, “I don’t think that we as a society can say enough about the atrocities that the poor Jewish people had to go through.”
According to an Indiana public radio report, the “context” the group provided for the quote had stated, “The quote from a horrific leader should put parents on alert. If the government has control over our children today, they control our country’s future. We The People must be vigilant and protect children from an overreaching government.”
Not only do they quote Hitler yms”m but also attribute the quote to him – right on the cover of their first newsletter. They knew what they were doing and did it any way.
I don’t understand how people have misconstrued this as antisemitism. Anybody with any intelligence can tell this group is alluding to the fact that if a government wants to own somebody else’s children, then perhaps THEY ARE THE BAD GUYS. Hans, are we the bad guys???
We have an instinctive, visceral reaction to anything regarding Hitler. While this may be antisemitism,it is more likely that they’re using Hitler as an example of how evil people use children to advance their agenda. Certainly,we see that now in America.
Jews here in this great USA don’t want to understand that Antisemetisim was always and will always be. It is here to stay.
Lets all pray hard for Moshicah and then we will all be cured from all evil animals.
Which Jewish books other than that awful, s*xualized graphic novel about Anne Frank do they wish to have removed?
Medipac International Communications Inc. never apologized for their anti-Semitic publishing, the way Moms for Liberty just did.
CSANews-119 Medipac International Communications Inc. ‘s issue on page 66 of 68 lists amongst the History Revisited items: Adolph Hitler helped design the Volkswagen Beetle with Ferdinand Porsche.
First off, Hitler, evil through and through, has no place or worth to be mentioned in the context of said article and is inappropriately cited for an automobile industry accomplishment.
Second, it’s factually incorrect, as he stole the Volkswagen Beetle design from one of his many Jewish victims.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/books/hitler-stole-beetle-design-from-a-jew/story-mMSaqF68m34RasNLsK6cbP.html
Adolf Hitler ‘stole idea for Volkswagen Beetle from Jewish engineer’
The idea that because a book speaks about the holocuast, its most kodesh kodshim. And if we dare condemn it we are anti semties. All of that is ludicrous.
These are books that don’t just talk about the holocaust and its persecutions of jews. These books focus on progreessive LGBT rights. They either lie and paint the holocuast as a crusade against LGBT. Or they at least take the story and spin it to modern day times teaching kids that being LGBT is morally equivalent to being an anti semite
Lets be clear, while the nazis YMS definitely went after other sects those were just causalities along the way as part of their ethnic cleansing. The only group where the nazis drew up lists to capture every last one of them and wouldn’t stop till every one i hunted down, the only group where there was a system with kapos etc. the only group who they had a special malicious and enjoyment out of extreme torture and teasing were jews. The stroy of the holocuast is the jews. Any book that mixes other garbage in should be banned. And anbyone who disagress is the real holocaust denier.
No charedi yehsiva would allow the nonsense LGBT Holocaust persecution’s books in its libraries or classrooms.
P.S. Paul, since you aren’t jewish you have no say in this manner. Your grandparents weren’t survivors like mine.
oh please it was an accident– typical lib fake news lies–