The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) on Tuesday bashed Rep. Randy Weber (R-Texas) for his tweet that evoked Adolf Hitler to criticize President Obama.
Josh Schwerin, a committee spokesman, called Weber’s tweet about Obama’s absence at a Paris rally over the weekend “beyond vile and insulting.” He added that the tweet makes a bigger point about the GOP, lumping the issue in with House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) and his recent admission that he spoke to a white supremacist group in 2002.
“Congressional Republicans like Weber are clearly catering to the most extreme elements — first refusing to condemn Steve Scalise’s inexcusable affiliation with KKK members, and now this,” Schwerin said in a statement.
“Speaker [John] Boehner [R-Ohio] and Republican leaders need to step forward and condemn Congressman Weber and his toxic brand of politics.”
Weber tweeted last night that “Even Adolph Hitler thought it was more important than Obama to get to Paris. (For all the wrong reasons.) Obama couldn’t do it for right reasons.”
The Texan stood by his tweet in an interview with The Dallas Morning News and said that he finds it “appalling” that Obama is more concerned with political correctness than showing solidarity.
“Hitler reminds us that there’s evil in the world. Obama doesn’t seem to get it. This is about his foreign policy, his actions or lack thereof,” Weber told the newspaper Tuesday.
Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.), a former DCCC chairman, said on Twitter that Weber’s comment “desecrates [H]olocaust victims.”
Many politicians have criticized Obama and White House officials for failing to send a prominent representative to a solidarity rally in Paris last weekend. Press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters Monday that the White House “should have sent someone with a higher profile” than the U.S. ambassador to march with dozens of world leaders.
The march honored the victims of a string of terrorist attacks in France, where gunmen attacked a satirical newspaper and later took hostages in a kosher grocery store. Sixteen people died in those attacks.