Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

‘Hitler Was Right’ Republican Wins Missouri Primary

(JTA) — A Missouri Republican who has made anti-Semitic and other bigoted statements handily won a primary for the state’s House of Representatives.

Steve West, who promotes anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on a radio show he hosts, defeated three other candidates Tuesday in the bid for a seat representing Clay County. He won with 49.5 percent of the vote.

“Looking back in history, unfortunately, Hitler was right about what was taking place in Germany. And who was behind it,” West said on KCXL radio in January 2017, The Kansas City Star reported Thursday.

He has spoken of “Jewish cabals” that are “harvesting baby parts” from Planned Parenthood, abuse children and control the Republican Party. West also has a YouTube channel on which he has made homophobic, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic and racist statements, according to The Star.

West will face Democratic incumbent Jon Carpenter in November.

On Thursday, the Missouri Republican Party denounced West’s “shocking and vile” comments.

“West’s abhorrent rhetoric has absolutely no place in the Missouri Republican Party or anywhere. We wholeheartedly condemn his comments,” the party told The Star.

West said his comments were taken out of context, but went on to criticize both Judaism and Islam.

“Jewish people can be beautiful people, but there’s ideologies associated with that that I don’t agree with,” he said. “Jews today are a remnant of the tribe of Judah that rejected Christ.”

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

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 credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link 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.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.