The US Holocaust Memorial Museum pushed back against Minnesota Governor Tim Walz this week after he compared victims of ICE raids in his state to Anne Frank, a Jewish girl who was killed in a concentration camp during the Holocaust.
Following the killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis by Border Patrol agents over the weekend, Walz held a press conference in which he said, “We have got children in Minnesota hiding in their houses, afraid to go outside. Many of us grew up reading that story of Anne Frank. Somebody’s going to write that children’s story about Minnesota.”
On Monday, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum then issued its own statement in response. “Anne Frank was targeted and murdered solely because she was Jewish,” the museum wrote on social media. “Leaders making false equivalencies to her experience for political purposes is never acceptable. Despite tensions in Minneapolis, exploiting the Holocaust is deeply offensive, especially as antisemitism surges.”
The museum’s statement did not mention ICE, the organization whose raids have targeted immigrants across the nation. Many have claimed those raids involve the usage of excessive force, especially after the killings of Pretti and Renee Nicole Goode in Minneapolis, which spurred a cascade of protests. President Donald Trump, meanwhile, has continued to seek what he called “absolute immunity” for ICE.
The statement came as the nation continues to watch Minneapolis, where local museums have even been impacted by the protests against ICE and its tactics. The Minneapolis Institute of Art, which is located close to the site of Pretti’s killing, closed for two days before reopening on Tuesday.
