Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez 'is spreading stupidity' says Holocaust survivor, slamming her 'concentration camp' comments
A Holocaust survivor is demanding that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez be removed from Congress for "spreading anti-Semitism, hatred, and stupidity' after she said migrant detention centers were 'concentration camps'.
On Saturday, 93-year-old Ed Mosberg of Morris Plains, New Jersey, blasted the Democratic congresswoman representing Queens and the Bronx. "The people on the border aren't forced to be there – they go there on their own will," he told the New York Post.
"If someone doesn't know the difference, either they're playing stupid or they just don't care."
Mosberg was taken prisoner by the Nazis in the Plaszow and Mauthausen concentration camps during the Holocaust. His entire family was killed during that period.
The 93-year-old blasted AOC on Saturday for comments she made in an Instagram video post on June 18. "The United States is running concentration camps on our southern border, and that is exactly what they are - they are concentration camps," Ocasio-Cortez said.
In his interview, he said, "Her statement is evil. It hurts a lot of people. At the concentration camp, we were not free. We were forced there by the Germans who executed and murdered people - there’s no way you can compare."
Mosberg heads an organization of Holocaust survivors that last week invited Ocasio-Cortez to tour the Auschwitz extermination camp in what was then Nazi-occupied Poland.
When Ocasio-Cortez rejected the offer, he was disappointed. "She should be taught a lesson," he said. "If you're not there, you will never know what happened. She doesn't want to learn — she's looking for excuses. I would like to nominate her for the Nobel Prize in stupidity."
AOC's spokesperson told the Post, "She made a distinction between a death camp and concentration camp. She’s been pretty outspoken about the issue."
On June 21, From the Depths, a millennial-run group had posted an open letter on its Facebook page inviting AOC to go on an educational tour of the Nazi-run camps this summer. The group was supposed to be led by Mosberg.
"I can show her where they killed my mother, my grandparents and cousins so she understands this," he said. "I will bring her to the place where they give my wife’s mother [benzine] injections to the heart and put her on the fire."
From the Depths wrote that "over 100 international parliamentarians from across the political spectrum" have attended the tour thus far, including more than 20 members of Congress from both the GOP and the Democrat parties.
Republicans have denounced Ocasio-Cortez for her concentration camps comments. Liz Cheney, the third most senior Republican in the House, repeatedly criticized Ocasio-Cortez for the use of that term. "Please @AOC do us all a favor and spend just a few minutes learning some actual history," she tweeted. "6 million Jews were exterminated in the Holocaust. You demean their memory and disgrace yourself with comments like this."
"People like @AOC – who are not lifting a finger to solve the problem – comparing the men and women serving our country to concentration camp guards do the Congress and country a great disservice,' Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham tweeted.
Despite the backlash, AOC defended her choice of words. "DHS ripped 1000s of children from their parents & put them in cages w inhumane conditions. They call their cells "dog pounds" & "freezers." I will never apologize for calling these camps what they are. If that makes you uncomfortable, fight the camps - not the nomenclature," she tweeted.
She defended herself by arguing that concentration camps were different from Nazi death camps or extermination camps, where more than 3 million people have been estimated to have killed during the second world war. "And for the shrieking Republicans who don't know the difference: And that's exactly what this administration is doing. Concentration camps are considered by experts as "the mass detention of civilians without trial." And that’s exactly what this administration is doing."
To support her argument, she also tweeted that, "The US ran concentration camps before, when we rounded up Japanese people during WWII. It is such a shameful history that we largely ignore it. These camps occur throughout history. Many refuse to learn from that shame, but here we are today. We have an obligation to end them."