Two Republican Congressmen Hobnob With an Alleged Holocaust Denier. Again.

(From Mother Jones)

Reps. Matt Gaetz and Dana Rohrabacher just can’t quit Charles C. Johnson.

A Republican congressman who earlier this year got into trouble for hobnobbing with an accused Holocaust denier held a small fundraiser this summer, and the attendees included, yes, the very same alleged Holocaust denier. Also at the event was another GOP congressman who, too, had previously been criticized for associating with this fellow.

In January, Rep. Matt Gaetz, a conservative Republican firebrand from Florida, invited right-wing troll Charles C. Johnson to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union speech. Johnson, a notorious social media figure accused of being a white nationalist, had been permanently banned from Twitter for declaring that he wanted to “take out” a leader of Black Lives Matter. And in early 2017, Johnson had come under fire for denying the Holocaust. During an “Ask Me Anything” session on Reddit’s alt-right section, Johnson had been queried, “what are your thoughts on the Holocaust, WW2, and the JQ in general?” (“JQ” is neo-Nazi shorthand for the Jewish Question.) Johnson replied, “I do not and never have believed the six million figure. I think the Red Cross numbers of 250,000 dead in the camps from typhus are more realistic. I think the Allied bombing of Germany was a ware [sic] crime. I agree…about Auschwitz and the gas chambers not being real.”

Eight months later, these remarks caused a political stir. In October 2017, news reports revealed that Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) had welcomed Johnson to a Capitol Hill meeting with Sen. Rand Paul. In response, the Anti-Defamation League urged Rohrabacher to “discontinue any association with Johnson and repudiate his views.” The ADL, citing Johnson’s “Ask Me Anything” statements, noted that it considered him a Holocaust denier. (In August 2017, Johnson had helped arrange a meeting between Rohrabacher and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, and weeks later he donated $5,400 in Bitcoin to Rohrabacher’s reelection campaign.)

Rohrabacher did not heed the ADL’s call to disassociate himself from Johnson. In a letter to the ADL, he said Johnson had been “allowed to sit in [on the Paul-Rohrabacher meeting], only in the sense that no one said no and told him to go.” Rohrabacher noted that he “strongly” disagreed with Johnson on some issues—including “those same beliefs you mention in your letter”—and that he hoped to have a “positive influence” on Johnson.

Continue reading at Mother Jones: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/09/alleged-holocaust-denier-chuck-johnson-attends-matt-gaetz-fundraiser-dana-rohrabacher/