MEAWW.COM / NEWS / HUMAN INTEREST

Why was Capitol rioter wearing ‘Camp Auschwitz’ hoodie? Ivanka Trump slammed for calling them ‘American patriots’

The man was wearing what appeared to be a hooded sweatshirt with 'Camp Auschwitz' printed above an image of a skull and crossbones

In a shocking incident, a crowd of protesters stormed the US Capitol on Wednesday, January 6, and it also included some neo-Nazis, including one man, who was pictured wearing a “Camp Auschwitz” shirt.

Visuals from the riot show that thousands of Donald Trump's supporters waved Confederate flags, hung nooses and paraded white supremacist symbols as part of the violent protest to keep Joe Biden from being confirmed as president of the United States of America. 

The man was visible in video stills from inside the Capitol and was wearing what appeared to be a hooded sweatshirt with “Camp Auschwitz” printed above an image of a skull and crossbones, with the phrase “work brings freedom” printed below. Several notorious White supremacists were also among those who attended the rally outside the Capitol and were among those who broke through police lines to enter the building. 

As soon as the Internet users noticed the man's hoodie, they couldn't help but start posting a string of tweets over why they were wearing it. 

One Internet user pointed out to a tweet that has since been deleted, where Trump's daughter, Ivanka Trump, referred to this group of rioters as "American Patriots," and she was appropriately dragged for making such a wildly incorrect characterization of the people responsible for the incident. The tweet read: "Ivanka Trump called them American patriots. That's a 'Camp Auschwitz' shirt."

One Twitter user said, "A rioter today wore a hoodie that says Camp Auschwitz on it. When Jewish people tell you they fear for their life, start believing them." Another posted, "Donald told the protestors he loved them, Ivanka called them American Patriots. One of these piglets is wearing a Camp Auschwitz hoodie, call them what they really are neo-nazi terrorist scum." A third wrote, "It really is crazy to me how hateful people can be. a Camp Auschwitz sweatshirt?!? and Ivanka Trump called them 'American patriots' so happy in a couple of days ur family will be nothing to this country."

One Twitter user said, "Great news for the guy wearing a Camp Auschwitz hoodie who tried to overthrow the government today: the president of the united states loves you!" Another one sarcastically said, "You had people in the Capitol that were very fine people, on both sides, including the guy with the Camp Auschwitz T-shirt."

One angry citizen said, "I'll be sure to tell my 95-year-old grandmother, who survived the Nazi Concentration Camps... That Trump called the DOMESTIC TERRORISTS who invaded the Capitol 'very special' & 'loves them'. Including this POS wearing a Camp Auschwitz sweatshirt."

What was the Auschwitz concentration camp?

The Auschwitz concentration camp was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II and the Holocaust.

The first Nazi base in Auschwitz, named after the nearby Silesian town of Oświęcim, was set up in May 1940, 37 miles west of Krakow. Now known as Auschwitz I, the site covered 40 square kilometers. In January 1942, the Nazi party decided to roll out the “Final Solution”. Camps devoted only to the extermination of Jews had been created before, but this was formalized by SS Lieutenant General Reinhard Heydrich in a speech at the Wannsee conference. The extermination camp Auschwitz II (or Auschwitz-Birkenau) was opened in the same year.

On January 27, 1945, Soviet soldiers entered the gates of the Auschwitz concentration camp complex in south-west Poland. The site had been evacuated by the Nazis just days earlier. Thus ended the largest mass murder in a single location in human history. According to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, the German SS systematically killed at least 960,000 of the 1.1-1.3 million Jews deported to the camp.

The death toll includes 960,000 Jews (865,000 of whom were gassed on arrival), 74,000 non-Jewish Poles, 21,000 Roma, 15,000 Soviet prisoners of war, and up to 15,000 other Europeans. Those not gassed died of starvation, exhaustion, disease, individual executions, or beatings. Others were killed during medical experiments.

More people died at Auschwitz than at any other Nazi concentration camp and probably than at any death camp in history. The Soviet troops found terrible evidence of the horror. About 7,000 starving prisoners were found alive in the camp. Millions of items of clothing that once belonged to men, women and children were discovered along with 6,350kg of human hair. The Auschwitz museum holds more than 100,000 pairs of shoes, 12,000 kitchen utensils, 3,800 suitcases and 350 striped camp garments.

According to the numbers provided by the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, Auschwitz was the site of the most deaths (1.1 million) of any of the six dedicated extermination camps. By these estimates, Auschwitz was the site of at least one out of every six deaths during the Holocaust. The only camp with comparable figures was Treblinka in north-east Poland, where about 850,000 are thought to have died.