Topline
The controversy swirling around Florida’s new slavery curriculum expanded Tuesday, as the White House condemned Fox News host Greg Gutfeld for defending the state’s education standards by claiming Holocaust survivors also needed “useful” skills in order to survive the Nazis.
Greg Gutfeld hosts “Gutfeld!” at FOX Studios on October 12, 2022 in New York City. Photo by Slaven … [+] Vlasic
Key Facts
On an episode of The Five talk show Monday, Gutfeld referenced a book written by Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl and said “you had to survive in a concentration camp by having skills. You had to be useful… Utility kept you alive.”
The comments were part of a segment on Florida’s new history standards that imply slaves benefited from their servitude by learning skills that could “be applied for their personal benefit.”
White House spokesperson Andrew Bates said in a statement to The Hill Tuesday that Gutfield’s comments were “an obscenity” and criticized Fox News for failing to condemn the host.
The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum in Poland has also criticized the comments for failing to add the context that “the Holocaust was a systematic genocide with the ultimate aim of exterminating the entire Jewish population… We should avoid such oversimplifications in talking about this complex tragic story.”
Key Background
Historians have said Florida’s new standards diminish the real experiences of slaves and Black people in the United States, but Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis refused to back down and on Friday continued to defend them when he said some slaves “eventually parlayed… being a blacksmith into doing things later in life,” the Washington Post reported. White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre condemned the curriculum in the briefing room Monday, when she said they’re “inaccurate, insulting. It’s hurtful and prevents an honest account — an honest account of our nation’s history.” They’ve also been slammed by Vice President Kamala Harris, who is South Asian and Black. She orchestrated an impromptu visit to Florida last week to speak against the education standards, and asked, “How is it that anyone could suggest that in the midst of these atrocities, that there was any benefit to being subjected to this level of dehumanization?”
Tangent
Gutfield, who now has a 10 p.m. weeknight prime time slot after a programming shuffle at Fox News, has a history of controversial comments. On his now-ended satirical talk show “Red Eye,” which aired at 3 a.m., he regularly introduced guests with “absurd, sexually suggestive hypotheticals that were meant to be flattering,” the New Yorker reported. He also was forced to issue an apology to the Canadian military in 2009 after offending troops and their family members, and musician Dave Brockie called his tenure on the show “nauseating.”
Further Reading
White House condemns Fox host Gutfeld’s Holocaust comments (The Hill)
Jesse Watters Takes Tucker Carlson’s Spot In Revamped Fox News Lineup (Forbes)
