John Boehner To Campaign With Rich Iott, Candidate Who Dressed As SS Officer

WASHINGTON -- House Minority Leader John Boehner will campaign this weekend with Rich Iott, the Ohio Republican congressional candidate who found himself embroiled in controversy several weeks ago when photos surfaced of him dressed in a Nazi SS uniform.

The Iott campaign confirmed to the Huffington Post that the two will appear together at the Lucas County Republican Party headquarters. It is, if nothing else, a risky stop for Boehner to make just days before the election.

Iott's chances at winning the seat were seemingly downgraded after photos of him dressed in Nazi garb surfaced. But Boehner's visit suggests that Republicans feel the seat is within their grasp. Iott claimed that he was merely partaking in a historical reenactment and not out of latent sympathies for the Third Reich. Still, his candidacy became somewhat symbolic for the extremities of the GOP.

Boehner, through it all, stood by his fellow Ohioan. The House Minority Leader didn't seek a return of the campaign funds he had sent to Iott. The campaign swing on Saturday is, however, a step towards an even fuller embrace of Iott's candidacy. A spokesman for Boehner did not immediately return a request for comment, but the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee did.

"Not only has John Boehner recruited, embraced, and financed a disgraced Nazi enthusiast running for Congress, but now Boehner is pouring gasoline on the fire by throwing a campaign rally for him," said DCCC spokesman Ryan Rudominer. "Thumbing his nose at our nation's veterans, women, and people of the Jewish faith, all the while refusing to stand up for basic American values in order to try and win an election, apparently this is what Boehner meant when he said, 'We're not going to be any different than what we've been.'"

UPDATE: Don Seymour, a Boehner spokesman, emails the Huffington Post with the following:

Leader Boehner will be rallying Republican volunteers at the Lucas County Victory Center to support the local Republican Party's get-out-the-vote efforts. Boehner has been on the road headlining rallies for Republican candidates in Ohio and across the country, and he'll continue his busy campaign schedule into the final weekend before Tuesday's referendum on Democrats' jobs-killing policies.

Comments

[Eric Langston]

05:01 AM on 11/03/2010

I seem to remember a certain member of the British royal family dressing up in a Nazi uniform for a party. And I know of people who dress up in Union and Confederate clothing to do re-enactments doesn't mean they're really Union soldiers or Confederates.. Kinda hard to DO a re-enactment unless someone wants to play the bad-guys. Unless you just make cardboard stand-ups of Nazis. ALSO, lets face it - as foul as their morals were, their military fashion sense was MUCH better than the Allied forces. Ditto on their cameras, tanks, and their propaganda posters.

[Bellwether Ohio]

08:48 AM on 11/02/2010

Rich Iott is a Nazi … maybe so or maybe no.

Did Iott himself “Richi-Leak” his Nazi knee-high boot marching persona so as to parley it into a major political publicity coup to capture major network airplay, front page news print and Internet Web site coverage and You Tube video play?

If true, such an outlandish Nazi war maneuver by Iott to get name recognition would even make Adolph Hitler, himself, a proud political propaganda manager for the tea-bagging Third Reich voter round-up.

And Iott and his Nazi reenactment campaign marketing soldiers would certainly deserve a round of machine gunfire and an academy award for “best of show” in getting Iott’s name out attached to the weekend reenactment of despicable war-crimes wherein the Nazis planned and implemented the Holocaust, the mass murder of the Jews. The world will never forget the horrors of Hitler’s hard-line, unabated, unapologetic socialist soldiers and the war crimes they committed against the human race.

Unfortunately for Iott … there will never be a way for him to ever detach his name as one of Hitler’s Nazi weekend reenactment soldiers.

Iott has branded himself with a permanent swastika tattoo – and removing that ink as linked to his run for Ohio’s 9th District Congressional seat is history.

There are museums; films; documentaries and books about Hitler and his Third Reich … Nazi reenactment by an aspiring U.S. political candidate is simply unacceptable by any United States political party.

[wmramlal]

12:13 PM on 10/29/2010

"Not only has John Boehner recruited, embraced, and financed a disgraced Nazi enthusiast running for Congress, but now Boehner is pouring gasoline on the fire by throwing a campaign rally for him," said DCCC spokesman Ryan Rudominer".

I cannot say that I am the least bit surprised that Boehner has embraced, financed and now campaigning for this Nazi enthusiast. Iott represents a lot of the beliefs and shared values of many Rethugs and Tea Party Members.

[jcopsey9]

09:21 AM on 10/29/2010

Stay classy, John Boehner.

My Grandfather got to tell the horror stories of segregation and socially acceptable racism. My Dad got to tell stories about how we, as a community overcame bigotry and embraced equality. I really do not want the story I tell my son to be about how we sat by as the rest of the country overcame equality to once again embrace bigotry and socially acceptable racism.

VOTE.

[cincinnati]

11:37 PM on 10/28/2010

I wish the HP moderators would lighten up.....sometimes they reject comments for really nothing....it's one thing to want a civil debate, another to be paranoid about it.....

As far as Boehner, his district north of Cincinnati is mostly a bunch of hillbilly's.....especially
in Hamilton, Ohio.....far right wing police and courts and yet it is infamous for very hard drugs
and crime, some say even retired Mafia......and this is from a law and order guy ?

[nicole473]

10:27 PM on 10/28/2010

You have to wonder what the children of these people will be like.

[Fred Hubner]

08:01 AM on 10/29/2010

Probably two-headed goats ...

[Fred Hubner]

08:44 PM on 10/28/2010

John Boehner To Campaign With Rich Idiott, Candidate Who Dressed As SS Officer ...

[Patriot86]

06:18 AM on 10/29/2010

'During the Ardennes Offensive (Battle of the Bulge) the Combat Group of the 1st SS Panzer Division, led by SS Major Joachim Peiper, was approaching the crossroads at Baugnes near the town of Malmédy. There they encountered a company of US troops (Battery B of the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion) from the US 7th Armoured Division. Realizing that the odds were hopeless, the company's commander, Lieutenant Virgil Lary, decided to surrender. After being searched by the SS, the prisoners were marched into a field adjacent to the Cafe Bodarwé. The SS troops moved on except for two Mark IV tanks Nos. 731 and 732, left behind to guard the GIs. A couple of GIs tried to flee to the nearest woods and an order was given to fire. SS Private Georg Fleps of tank 731 drew his pistol and fired at Lary's driver who fell dead in the snow. The machine guns of both tanks then opened fire on the prisoners. Many of the GIs took to their heels and headed for the woods. Incredibly, 43 GIs survived, but 84 of their comrades lay dead in the field, being slowly covered with a blanket of snow. No attempt was made to recover the bodies until the area was retaken by the 30th Infantry Division on January 14, 1945, when men from the 291st Engineers used metal detectors to locate the bodies buried in the snow.'

[Fred Hubner]

08:07 AM on 10/29/2010

"Together with 42 other defendants, Joachim Peiper was sentenced to death by hanging on 16 July 1946." ... I would like to see you reenacting the afore quoted historic event ...

[pennlady]

07:56 PM on 10/28/2010

My question is will they both appear on stage in SS uniforms?

[Fred Hubner]

08:46 PM on 10/28/2010

I hope so ...

[nicole473]

10:26 PM on 10/28/2010

At least that way, they'd be showing their true colors. heh.

[Fred Hubner]

09:22 AM on 10/29/2010

Yeah ... their monochromatic color ...

[Nanny12]

07:40 PM on 10/28/2010

Well i guess we starting to look like the communists countries we are trying to liberate.I wonder when the world sees our politicians dress up like this,what would they be thinking?Nice manning up Rich Lott.

[Fred Hubner]

08:11 AM on 10/29/2010

So you're still living in the 20th century ... I'm really sorry for your kids ...

[Nanny12]

03:15 PM on 10/30/2010

You don't have to feel for my kids,feel sorry for yourself.

[Duppy]

07:38 PM on 10/28/2010

Boehner is a real life one.

[Johnnyash]

07:34 PM on 10/28/2010

Looks like Boehner and the Rethugs are planning to launch a Media Blitzkrieg to convince Ohio voters that Rich Iott really isn't a fascist nazi sympathizer - he just like to pretend he's one on weekends....

[Rangergirl]

07:33 PM on 10/28/2010

I want to see the pictures from this one....PLEASE......If they are in Nazi uniforms........PLEASE.....Those pictures would be priceless. and hopefully meaningful.

[cargofuzz]

05:41 PM on 10/28/2010

There was a time in this country when people understood it was unacceptable to share their r_acist and big_oted views unless they were in their own home, or surrounded by those with similar values.

Those days are gone, I'm afraid. Now, those on the right wear their r_acism and big_otry like badges of honor. They're LOUD and PROUD. It's up to the rest of us to continue to fight the good fight.

Get out and vote Dem!

[Patriot86]

04:44 PM on 10/28/2010

We may actually see the tan man defeated...he is an incumbent and not well liked here in Ohio.

[nicole473]

10:26 PM on 10/28/2010

I wish it were so.

[raven119]

04:35 PM on 10/28/2010

Reenactor. Great word, very politically correct considering it defends someone on the right. How about war enthusiast? He seems to be. Why not call Iott that? Or history buff?

No, that wouldn't do...then he'd have to know the history behind the SS uniform and still embrace it.

Reenactor. Great word. Iott makes no moral judgement of those he enacts. But how do you reenact a Holocaust?

Ah, what these GOP kids get up to on weekends! Such a lark

[cargofuzz]

05:43 PM on 10/28/2010

Didn't he also refer to himself as a 'soldier' even though he's never served in the US Armed Forces?