Rabbis Call On Congressional Candidate To Stop Comparing Abortion To The Holocaust

Kansas state Sen. Steve Fitzgerald. Image by Kansas Legislature
(JTA) — A group of rabbis is urging a Republican politician from Kansas City to stop comparing abortion to the Holocaust.
The Rabbinical Association of Kansas City wrote a letter to State Sen. Steve Fitzgerald saying his words “abuse the memory of the murdered victims of the Nazi regime,” the Kansas City Star reported Thursday.
Fitzgerald, who is running to be the Republican nominee for a House seat in Kansas’ 2nd District, has compared Planned Parenthood to a Nazi concentration camp and brought up infamous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele in a Kansas senate debate over an amendment involving aborted fetal tissue.
Fitzgerald made the Planned Parenthood comments last year after he was informed someone made a donation to the organization in his name. He compared the logic of a moderate Republican to that of Mengele in a contentious debate last month.
The conservative Republican from Leavenworth said he would take the rabbis’ words “into consideration and under advisement” but would not commit to stop bringing up Holocaust topics during abortion debates.
“I don’t think anybody should accept arbitrary limits placed upon the exercise of their freedoms,” he told the Star.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion My Jewish moms group ousted me because I work for J Street. Is this what communal life has come to?
- 2
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 3
Fast Forward Suspected arsonist intended to beat Gov. Josh Shapiro with a sledgehammer, investigators say
- 4
Politics Meet America’s potential first Jewish second family: Josh Shapiro, Lori, and their 4 kids
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture Actor Ben Platt says his Jewish identity is ‘not defined’ by Israel, showing a gap between him and his influential family
-
Fast Forward Shapiro house fire suspect targeted Jewish governor over pro-Israel stances, search warrant says
-
Fast Forward Jewish family killed in New York plane crash
-
Fast Forward Israelis can no longer enter the Maldives after Palestinian-solidarity ban goes into effect
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.