The stepsister of Anne Frank said in an interview published Thursday that she believes former President Trump “obviously admired Hitler.”
Eva Schloss, 91, co-founder of The Anne Frank Trust UK which seeks to preserve Frank’s memory as well as educate others on the Holocaust, spoke with The Daily Beast reporter Marlow Stern to discuss her history and touched on what she thought of Trump.
Stern noted there was a rise in anti-Semitic hate crimes during the Trump administration and that he once praised a group of people that included neo-Nazis as “very fine people.”
“Trump wasn’t just against the Jews—he was against the Mexicans, and many others. He was a racist. Full-stop, he was a racist,” Schloss responded.
“His son-in-law is a Jew, and his daughter converted to Judaism. You know, he’s said so many silly things,” Schloss continued. “I’ve compared him to Hitler. I even heard that he studied Hitler’s speeches and things like that, so he obviously admired Hitler and just copied him with his anti-Semitism.”
The Hill has reached out to Trump’s office for a response.
During the interview Stern also noted that other well-known GOP lawmakers have made anti-Semitic remarks or conveyed an admiration for Adolf Hitler. He pointed to Reps. Madison Cawthorn (N.C.) who said his visit to Hitler’s vacation house had been on his “bucket list for awhile,” and Marjorie Taylor-Greene (Ga.), who claimed “Jewish Space Lasers” control the weather.
“Anti-Semitism is nothing new, and I’m afraid it will always be there. I don’t know why it is, but it is a fact—ever since Jewish people became a people, there has been prejudice,” Schloss said. “We have to be alert and try to give the message that it is wrong. But the Black people are suffering as well. We have to shake hands with anyone who is racist against anybody and try to change the attitudes of people.”
Trump received a great deal of backlash following his first presidential debate with then-Democratic candidate Joe Biden when he refused to denounce white supremacy.
Debate moderator Chris Wallace asked Trump, “Are you willing, tonight, to condemn white supremacists and militia groups and to say that they need to stand down.”
“Proud Boys, stand back and stand by! But I’ll tell you what, somebody’s got to do something about antifa and the left,” Trump said after being continually pressed by both Wallace and Biden to denounce white supremacy.
During an interview a few days after the debate, Trump said, “I condemn all white supremacists. I condemn the Proud Boys. I don’t know much about the Proud Boys, almost nothing. But I condemn that.”