Just when you thought the political sector couldn't get any worse, the Chicago Sun Times has reported that a Nazi is the Republican candidate for Illinois' Congress in the state's 3rd district.
You read that right.
Arthur Jones has a long anti-Semitic history, referring to the Holocaust as a "racket" and the "biggest blackest lie in history."
Jones is the only republican candidate on the ballot; the deadline for candidates to file passed weeks ago.
“Well first of all, I’m running for Congress not the chancellor of Germany. All right. To me the Holocaust is what I said it is: It’s an international extortion racket,” said Jones.
The 70-year-old retired insurance agent has previous campaign experience, having unsuccessfully run for elected offices in the Chicago and Milwaukee areas in the 1970s. Jones is a former member of the American Nazi Party, and currently heads a group called the America First Committee.
“Arthur Jones, who proudly displays Holocaust denial, xenophobia and racism on his blog and website, has a long history of hateful, extremist and anti-Semitic views,” noted Lonnie Nasatir, the regional director of the Anti-Defamation League Chicago-Upper Midwest Region. Nasatir pointed out that Jones protested the opening of Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in 2009.
“He has spoken publicly at numerous neo-Nazi rallies and events, expressing xenophobic policies based in racial and religious hatred. He is, by every definition, an anti-Semite and unrepentant bigot,” Nasatir continued.
Illinois Republican Party chairman, Tim Schneider, isn't here for Jones' run, or the possibility of him representing the GOP. “The Illinois Republican Party and our country have no place for Nazis like Arthur Jones. We strongly oppose his racist views and his candidacy for any public office, including the 3rd Congressional District,” said Schneider.
Jones will be running against democratic incumbent representative, Dan Lipinski.