Holocaust comments prompt apology

OLYMPIA – State House Minority Leader Bruce Chandler apologized Friday for remarks other Republicans made earlier in the week comparing embryonic stem cell research to the Holocaust.

“The references made to the Holocaust were regarded by some, understandably, as insensitive and inappropriate,” Chandler, R-Granger, said on the House floor.

However, one of the representatives who made such a comparison said he did not mean to disparage the mass murder of Jews in Hitler’s Germany, and saw no reason to apologize personally.

Chandler said he’d spoken with Jewish community leaders about the stem cell debate. “I offer my apologies to them and to people who have committed their lives to using science to improve humanity.”

Rep. Shay Schual-Berke, D-Normandy Park, who sponsored the bill endorsing embryonic stem cell research and who is Jewish, said she believed Chandler’s apology was heartfelt, sincere and appropriate.

“We need to take this as an opportunity now to continue to educate and inform,” Schual-Berke said.

“I don’t know anyone who thinks the horrible events of the Holocaust were anything but an affront to humanity,” she added. Comparing the murder of 6 million Jews to stem cell research, she said, “is just unthinkable.”

Schual-Berke’s bill passed by a vote of 59-36 in the House after an emotional, sometimes tearful debate late Tuesday night. A couple of Republican representatives – not Chandler – referred very obliquely to the Holocaust, but Rep. Glenn Anderson, R-Fall City, drew the most direct comparison.

“Life sciences, biotech research – it sounds warm, sounds progressive. The potential is there, we hope, we’re betting on it,” Anderson said Tuesday on the House floor. “But the cold look of history really does require sobriety. Sixty years ago in Nazi Germany, it was state policy in order to perfect humanity it would be required to destroy humanity. And the medical experiments at Auschwitz were carried out for that explicit purpose. We all say no, that’s not us, that would never happen, that’s not why we’re doing this.”

Schual-Berke leapt to her feet and objected, and House Speaker Frank Chopp, D-Seattle, quickly called for a break to let both sides cool off. They returned about 15 minutes later and passed the bill after more debate.

The embryonic stem cells in question come from human embryos created through in-vitro fertilization. The embryos are destroyed when stem cells are extracted. Researchers believe this research may someday lead to cures for diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and diabetes.

Anderson did not apologize on Friday, and told reporters he saw no need to do so. He voted for the stem cell bill, and said he meant his comments as a warning that as Washington state encourages stem cell research with its possible applications of genetic engineering, it should not “drift down that road” that led to the Holocaust.

“This is not about any diminishment of that experience,” Anderson said. “It’s about actually honoring that experience as we move forward.”

Comments such as Anderson’s trivialize the Holocaust, said Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. The Holocaust was a uniquely horrific event, he said, so any comparison inevitably cheapens the memory.

“I understand people use it to get the shock effect,” Foxman said. “Either they are totally ignorant about what the Holocaust was all about, or they’re insensitive, or they’re bigoted.”

Foxman said he believes inappropriate references to the Holocaust are becoming more common as the event recedes into history and connections to actual Holocaust survivors and victims fade over time.

Earlier this month the Anti-Defamation League criticized U.S. Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., for comparing a Senate GOP plan to block Democrats from filibustering to the tactics Hitler used in his rise to power.

Washington state Jewish leaders plan a news conference at the Capitol on Tuesday to emphasize that the Holocaust shouldn’t be used as a rhetorical device.

“We’re going to try to use this as an educational opportunity,” said Remy Trupin, lobbyist for the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle.