Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez infuriated many Americans, including some Holocaust survivors when she compared U.S. immigration detention facilities to “concentration camps.”
The conservative group Turning Point USA interviewed two Holocaust survivors, both of whom panned Ocasio-Cortez’s comparisons. (RELATED: Donald Trump Jr. Mocks Freshman Democrat ‘Clown Show’ After Omar’s ‘Concentration Camp’ Comment)
“I was in four concentration camps,” survivor David Tuck said. “We have no concentration camps here. This is just a political comment.”
“How can you looking at my face tell me that the camps we have in the south are concentration camps,” survivor Sami Steigmann asked. “What you are doing, you are insulting every victim of the Holocaust.”
WATCH:
.@AOC claims America runs Concentration camps.
We spoke to the experts.
David and Sami survived the Holocaust.
They were beaten and starved.
They watched their loved ones die.
Sami was experimented on.
David still has his numbers from Auschwitz.@AOC — listen for once. pic.twitter.com/w8Dk14m3x6
— Turning Point USA (@TPUSA) June 22, 2019
Ocasio-Cortez took heat earlier this week when she evoked images of Nazi Germany to express her discontent with President Donald Trump’s immigration policies, referring to detention centers that house illegal immigrants near the border as “concentration camps.” (RELATED: Trump Will Delay Deportations To Work On ‘Solution’ With Congress)
The Holocaust research center Yad Vashem criticized Ocasio-Cortez’s comments, urging her to learn about the history of concentration camps.
“Concentration camps assured a slave labor supply to help in the Nazi war effort, even as the brutality of life inside the camps helped assure the ultimate goal of ‘extermination through labor.’ Learn about concentration camps,” they said in a tweet directed at Ocasio-Cortez.
Even as criticism has mounted, Ocasio-Cortez has continued to defend the comparison, saying that detention facilities at the southern border fit within the dictionary definition of concentration camps.