Facebook takes down Trump ads
In its online salvo against antifa and ‘‘far-Left mobs’’, United States president Donald Trump’s re-election campaign is displaying a marking once used by the Nazis to designate political prisoners in concentration camps.
The red inverted triangle was first used in the 1930s to identify communists, and was applied as well to social democrats, liberals, freemasons and other members of opposition parties. The badge forced on Jewish political prisoners, by contrast, featured a red inverted triangle superimposed on a yellow triangle.
A spokesman for the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The symbol appeared in Facebook ads run by Trump and vice-president Mike Pence, as well as the ‘‘Team Trump’’ account on Facebook, which has since removed them for violating their rules against ‘‘organised hate’’.
It was featured alongside text warning of ‘‘Dangerous MOBS of far-Left groups’’ and asking users to sign a petition about antifa, a loose collection of anti-fascist activists whom the Trump Administration has sought to tie to recent violence, in spite of arrest records showing their involvement is trivial.
Other variations of the ads use a yield sign, which has the same shape and a similar colour scheme but is notably distinct in only featuring a red outline and a white interior. Some of the material also features a stop sign.
‘‘It’s a highly problematic use of a symbol that the Nazis used to identify their political enemies,’’ said Jacob Eder, a historian of modern Germany at the Barenboim-Said Akademie in Berlin.
‘‘It’s hard to imagine it’s done on purpose, because I’m not sure if the vast majority of Americans know or understand the sign, but it’s very, very careless to say the least.’’
Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, a progressive advocacy group, condemned the use of the notorious symbol in campaign advertising.
‘‘This isn’t just one post,’’ the group wrote on Twitter. ‘‘This is dozens of carefully targeted ads from the official pages of Mike Pence, Donald Trump, and Team Trump. All paid for by Trump and the Republican National Committee. All spreading lies and genocidal imagery.’’
Some of the ads featuring the inverted red triangle, which began running on Wednesday (Thursday, NZ time), were still active on
‘‘I think it’s a highly problematic use of a symbol that the Nazis used to identify their political enemies.’’
Jacob Eder
Historian of modern Germany
Trump’s page on Thursday morning. They had gained as many as 950,000 impressions from the president’s Facebook account alone. Identical ads on Pence’s account, which were also still active, had gained as many as 500,000 impressions.
Trump has made antifa – a label associated with anti-fascist protesters – a centrepiece of his response to recent demonstrations over the killing of George Floyd.
The effort to rally his supporters using the spectre of a marauding horde resembles the emphasis he placed on the threat of a migrant caravan heading to the US border in the lead-up to the midterm elections in 2018.
However, the alleged menace has been mostly nonexistent – a focal point of online alarm not reflected in scenes of mostly peaceful protest across the country.
Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment but later removed the ads.
During the 2016 campaign, Trump tweeted, and then deleted, a graphic showing Hillary Clinton alongside $100 bills and a sixpointed Star of David – the type of star that Jews were forced by the Nazis to wear on their clothing.
The then-candidate insisted in a statement that the insignia was not anti-Semitic because it represented a sheriff’s badge, not the stigmatised Star of David.
– Washington Post