Lawmaker likens vaccine passports to Nazi ID cards, blasted by Auschwitz Museum

A Republican Congressman who compared vaccine passports to Nazi ID cards and was called out by Auschwitz Museum has apologized to Jews and others he offended.

Warren Davidson, 51, who represents Ohio’s 8th congressional district, on Wednesday likened vaccine passports to segregation in Nazi Germany. He claimed that Nazis made Jews carry identification cards.

‘Let’s recall that the Nazis dehumanized Jewish people before segregating them, segregated them before imprisoning them, imprisoned them before enslaving them, and enslaved them before massacring them,’ Davidson wrote after retweeting Washington DC Mayor Muriel Bowser’s post on vaccine passport requirements.

‘This has been done before. #DoNotComply.’  

It is not known whether Davidson is vaccinated.

The Auschwitz Museum in Poland then slammed Davidson’s remarks as ‘exploiting the tragedy of all the people’ who ‘suffered’ from 1933 to 1945. 

‘Exploiting of the tragedy of all people who between 1933-45 suffered, were humiliated, tortured & murdered by the totalitarian regime of Nazi Germany in a debate about vaccines (and) covid limitations in the time of global pandemic is a sad symptom of moral and intellectual decay,’ the museum wrote.

Despite facing criticism, Davidson stood by his remarks, saying that he ‘opposes mandates and passports’, not vaccines.

‘Cliff Notes: opposition to vaccine mandates ≠ opposition to vaccines ≠ opposition to vaccine passports,’ Davidson tweeted later on Wednesday.

But on Thursday, Davidson apologized to his ‘Jewish friends’.

‘(I) feel terrible that I have offended anyone,’ he tweeted. ‘For my Jewish friends, and all others, my sincere apologies.’ 

In an additional longer statement, Davidson quoted American writer Mark Twain saying, ‘History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes’.

‘I had hoped to point that out,’ Davidson wrote. ‘Bad things happen when governments dehumanize people.

‘Sometimes, there is a next step – to systematically segregate them. Unfortunately, any reference to how the Nazis actually did that prevents a focus on anything other than the Holocaust.’ 

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