The Kansas governor has asked a Republican county president to remove a cartoon from his newspaper’s Facebook page calling on the Holocaust to criticize his order that requires Kansans to wear masks to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
The cartoon, posted on the Facebook page of The Anderson County Review, shows the state’s Democratic governor, Laura Kelly, wearing a mask stamped with the Star of David against the background of people loaded into a cattle car.
“Lockdown Laura says: put on your mask … and get on the cattle cart,” reads a caption for the cartoon, which was published Friday, the same day an order from Ms. Kelly went into effect that required the Kansans to wear masks in public spaces and in places where social distancing is not possible.
The Anderson County Review is owned by Dane Hicks, Chairman of the Anderson County Republican Party. Hicks defended the cartoon, which he said he had made himself and planned to publish in the newspaper on Tuesday.
“Political editorial cartoons are rude over-caricatures designed to provoke debate and response, which is why newspapers publish them, fodder for the market for ideas,” he wrote in an email. “The issue here is government overreach that has been the hallmark of Governor Kelly’s administration.”
He scoffed at the idea of an apology.
“Excuse me: Who exactly?” he wrote. The criticism on the Facebook page? Facebook is a cesspool and I only participate to develop readers. ” He added that he “did not intend to disapprove” of Jews or Holocaust survivors.
Ms. Kelly said the cartoon should be removed.
“Sir. Hicks’s decision to post anti-Semitic images is deeply offensive and should be removed immediately,” he said in a statement. “While disappointing to see it, on the fourth of July every day, I know that Mr. Hicks’ views they are not shared by the people of Anderson County or Kansas in general. “
The Kansas Democratic Party also denounced the cartoon.
“Sir. The recent Hicks post is a vile attempt to deceive Kansans and an embarrassment to our entire state,” party executive director Ben Meers said in a statement. “It has been extremely disappointing to see the Republican leadership in Kansas politicize the current public health crisis to advance their own agenda.”
The Kansas Republican Party and its president did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment Saturday.
Rabbi Moti Rieber, executive director of the Kansas Interfaith Action, said the cartoon was “an absurdly extreme version of the hyperbolic reaction we’ve seen to measures taken to tackle the virus.”
“Using Holocaust imagery to make a political point is almost never acceptable,” he said. “Kelly is taking life-saving measures, so comparing it to mass murder is hateful.”
Masks have become, for some, a divisive point of cultural division, despite evidence that they are a simple and effective way to help prevent transmission of the virus. Particularly to the right, the decision not to wear a mask has turned into a rebellion against what some consider a foray into personal freedom.
In May, an emergency proclamation in Stillwater, Oklahoma, requiring covering his face, sparked so much verbal abuse in its first three hours, and a threat involving a weapon, that officials quickly amended it. The masks there were encouraged, not required.
The Anderson County Review cartoon was released when the pandemic continues in many parts of the country, with cases tending to increase in 39 states, including Kansas, and regularly hitting new one-day records.
Nationwide, more than 53,000 new cases were reported daily in the United States on Friday, according to a New York Times database. That number surpassed all previous daily counts, aside from 55,595 new cases on Thursday, the first time the number exceeded 50,000.
In Kansas, the number of cases has increased in the past two weeks. There have been at least 15,919 cases and 277 deaths reported statewide, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
The Anderson County Review calls itself the eighth oldest continuously published newspaper in Kansas, serving the Anderson County communities since 1865. Published weekly, it has a circulation of 2,117, according to the Kansas Press Association.
