'Socialist Playbook': State Rep. From Western Pennsylvania Compares Governor Tom Wolf's Administration to Nazis
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- A member of the House of Representatives from western Pennsylvania compared Governor Tom Wolf's administration to Nazi Germany during a committee meeting.
On Monday, Representative Cris Dush, a Republican serving Jefferson County and part of Indiana County, criticized Wolf and his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
"The press has been having a very difficult time fulfilling its responsibilities to the public, getting information out, because this governor has repeatedly refused all sorts of information," said Dush. "It's not just on the waivers, which this bill covers, it's on things ... the numbers of recovered cases. More and more, I go back to the Democratic National Socialist Party, the Nazi Party, I go to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the USSR. This is a socialist playbook."
Gov. Wolf's business shutdown waiver program is being audited amid complaints it was managed unfairly,
State Representative Kevin Boyle, a Democrat from Philadelphia, interrupted Dush with sharp criticism of his comments.
"Chairman, this is outrageous. Stop it with the Nazi references. It is offensive and wrong, stop this," Boyle said.
Dush responded to Boyle, defending his comments by saying "It is a statement of history."
"I have to say that it's important for the people of this state to start having access to information, rather than having it blown off to the side and hidden for an agenda," Dush said.
PennLive reports Dush apologized on the House floor for the comment.
State Representative Dan Frankel, an Allegheny County Democrat, issued the following statement, saying:
"I was horrified to learn today that my colleague drew a comparison in a committee meeting between the Nazi Party and Gov. Wolf's efforts to slow the spread of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.
"The Nazi Party and its leaders systematically murdered more than 6 million Jews and many others in an attempt to create a dominate race. Any effort to muddy that history dishonors all of the innocent lives lost, and it frankly feeds the ugly resurgence of hate-based groups that are actively using COVID-19 to foment their message of intolerance throughout the country.
"I appreciate that Representative Dush acknowledged his mistake, but no amount of back peddling changes the fact that there are very active and dangerous anti-Semitic groups out there that read his comments as encouragement."
