Another GOP congressional candidate running in November’s midterm election has neo-Nazi ties. John Fitzgerald, a Republican who received 36,279 votes in last month’s California 11th District “jungle primary” and advanced to face Democratic incumbent Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, is an anti-Semite and Holocaust denier.
Media Matters reported on Tuesday that since advancing to the November election, Fitzgerald appeared on a podcast hosted by a vocal neo-Nazi who has claimed Hitler was “the greatest thing that’s happened to Western civilization.” On that podcast, the GOP candidate alleged “Jewish control and supremacy” and also vowed to expose “the truth about the Holocaust and how it’s an absolute fabricated lie.”
Fitzgerald’s two most recent news posts on his campaign website are one entitled “Why Are Powerful Jews Pushing Mass-Immigration And Forced-Multiculturalism Throughout The U.S. And Europe?” and another lamenting the decline of civility.
This news comes as Republicans continue to reckon with how to deal with increasing visibility of the neo-Nazis, neo-Confederates, and other forms of bigots within the conservative movement. In Virginia, Republicans nominated Corey Stewart, a strong Confederacy enthusiast who has appeared with Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally organizer Jason Kessler, for U.S. Senate. White supremacist Paul Nehlen is seeking the open seat of House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI). And in Illinois, more than 20,000 Republicans voted for a literal Nazi — former American Nazi Party head Arthur Jones — as he became their nominee for a Chicago-area U.S. House seat in March. (On Tuesday, Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner (R) refused to endorse Jones’ Democratic opponent).
All of this comes as the nation’s top Republican, President Donald Trump, has pushed the party to become more racist and xenophobic. During the 2016 campaign, Trump feigned ignorance about former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard (and vocal Trump supporter) David Duke and, after violent crashes between white nationalists and counter-protesters last August, opined that there were “very fine people, on both sides.”