IL Rep. Mary Miller hasn’t explained Hitler comment. Who is she and why did she say it?
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Editor’s note: U.S. Rep. Mary Miller apologized Friday morning for her comments citing Hitler. The updated story is here.
Illinoisans condemned comments by freshman Congresswoman Mary Miller citing Adolf Hitler at a Washington D.C., rally Tuesday, but she had yet to address her decision to quote him two days later.
Miller, a Republican farm owner from Oakland in east central Illinois, paraphrased the genocidal German dictator in her speech at the “Save the Republic” and “Moms for America” rally: “I believe in a few elections, we’re still going to be losing unless we win the hearts and minds of our children. This is the battle. Hitler was right on one thing. He said, ‘Whoever has the youth has the future.’”
Her quote was a paraphrase of his original statement at a 1935 Nazi rally: “He alone who owns the youth gains the future.”
Miller is a political newcomer, who stuck mostly to her family farming business until 2019. Her first term in public office was enabled by conservative political action committees and a far-right student activist organization that has been flagged by the Anti-Defamation League for racist language and previous references to Hitler.
Republican and Democratic lawmakers called on the 15th District representative to apologize, and 9th District Democratic Rep. Jan Schakowsky demanded that she resign, as did the Illinois Legislative Jewish Caucus and other lawmakers.
Miller’s fellow Republican House members from southern Illinois also condemned her language.
U.S. Rep Mike Bost, Miller’s Republican colleague to the south in the 12th District, said her statements made for “a very hurtful situation.”
“Under no circumstances should anybody even try to bring Hitler into a conversation, and definitely not use the words, ‘he got one thing right,’ because he never got one thing right,” Bost said.
Bost and Miller both voted late Wednesday in a joint session of Congress to object to Electoral College results certifying Joe Biden as president. He called her after hearing about her comments and said she will “handle it in her own way with press.”
The congressman has represented southernmost Illinois since 2015, and says he has inadvertently offended people in the past with insensitive comments.
“I did apologize. There are times when you overstep your bounds when speaking. We all make mistakes, and saying apologies is not necessarily a bad thing, ... and the faster you do it the better it is,” Bost said. “I would not have said what she said.”
U.S. Rep. Rodney Davis, a Republican representing the 13th District, said her language was “unacceptable.” He spoke with her after the session was interrupted by violent rioters who breached the U.S. Capitol building.
“As a newly elected member of Congress, Congresswoman Miller must understand that words matter and they have consequences,” Davis said. “I know yesterday was a difficult time for the country, and Mary and I happened to be evacuated off the House floor together and placed for hours in a safe location. Because of these circumstances, I fully expect Congresswoman Miller to offer an apology and a retraction of her comments soon.”
Former Congressman John Shimkus, Miller’s predecessor, said he would have never quoted Hitler. Instead, he suggested Proverbs 22:6 from the Bible as a better choice.
“’Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it,’” Shimkus said. “She would’ve been best to use Proverbs in talking about raising the next generation.”
U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Iraq War veteran and Purple Heart recipient from Illinois, called on Miller to resign, saying her remarks were “repugnant, obscene and unacceptable.”
“To say that the perpetrator of the greatest genocide in world history should be a model for any type of behavior, much less the indoctrination of children with hatred, racism and fascist ideals, is disqualifying for an American elected official,” Duckworth said. “I cannot condemn in harsher terms Mary Miller’s despicable comments in the run-up to yesterday’s coup attempt, and I call on her to resign immediately so that someone who better understands the sacrifices our brave service members made during World War II can more effectively represent our state.”
Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton also demanded Miller’s resignation in a tweet: “Invoking Hitler is repulsive. He was right about nothing. He was evil. Rep Miller: you crossed a line, and now instead of apologizing and owning up to it, you lied. You are not fit for office and need to resign.”
The president of Miller’s alma mater, Eastern Illinois University, said Miller’s statement violated the university’s value of respecting “democratic traditions and ideals of our nation.” Miller studied business management and elementary education at EIU.
“EIU denounces the words of recently elected regional representative Mary Miller and further condemns any reference to Hitler or his methodologies as a paradigm for American progress,” David Glassman said.
Miller’s office did not reply to multiple requests for comment, but a tweet posted Wednesday afternoon to the congresswoman’s account said her decision to quote Hitler was actually “a denunciation.”
“Congresswoman Miller’s statement was a denunciation of evil dictators’ efforts to re-educate young people and similar efforts by left-wing radicals in our country today,” the tweet stated.
The tweet replaced another that was deleted: “Let me be clear. I would never glorify a genocidal dictator. It’s the left’s propaganda that controls the youth and social media is utilized as a machine to do this,” The Chicago Sun-Times reported.
“That’s a dance,” said Karen Aroesty, regional director of the Anti-Defamation’s League Heartland office. “As a new member of Congress, it would be a good idea to make sure when you say things you are very clear.”
The Heartland office, which covers southern Illinois, Missouri and eastern Kansas, partners with the St. Louis Holocaust Museum. One of the atrocities the museum covers is horrific Nazi experiments on children.
“Does she understand that when talking about youth and Hitler? Does she understand some of the nuance?” Aroesty said.
Regardless of whether Miller was talking about “left-wing radicals” or not, saying Hitler was right about anything is “insensitive and diminishes the memory of survivors and disrespects the value of Holocaust education,” she added.
“Hitler taught how to hate others, how to kill. Is that really the kind of education of youth you want to talk about?” Aroesty said.
Event organizers defended Miller’s comments, the Associated Press reported. “Truth is truth regardless of the source,” the rally hosts said.
Who is Illinois Congresswoman Mary Miller?
Miller is a 61-year-old farm owner from rural central Illinois. Prior to her election to the 15th Congressional District, the mother of seven and grandmother of 17 never held public office.
She and her husband own Miller Brothers Farm, which raises Angus cattle and grows corn, soybeans, oats, wheat and hay, according to the farm’s website. Her husband, Chris Miller, serves as state representative for Illinois’ 110th District.
Miller became an early favorite among high-profile conservative politicians and political action committees in the 15th District race. President Donald Trump endorsed her, and she received $421,852 from 130 PACs in 2019 and 2020. She collected even more from individual donors. Over $435,000 came from 340 individuals, roughly half of them from Illinois.
During the rally in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, Miller says she never considered herself a politician. But William Montgomery, the founder of a pro-Trump student group, Turning Point USA, personally asked her to get involved, she said in her speech. Montgomery died at age 80 of COVID-19 complications in July.
“Bill Montgomery, who was instrumental in getting Turning Point USA started, said, ‘Mary, we need you to represent the family,’” the congresswoman said.
Montgomery helped executive director Charlie Kirk found the group in 2012 after Montgomery heard the then 18-year-old give a speech at Benedictine University in Lisle, Illinois. Kirk leads the organization along with Candace Owens, who gained attention in 2019 after making comments about Hitler’s politics.
The Anti-Defamation League flagged Turning Point USA for “racist or bigoted comments” made by the organization’s leadership.
Miller and Kirk appeared in interviews on New Tang Dynasty Television at the group’s “action summit” in December. Known as NTDTV in the United States, Kirk appeared before Miller on the station’s “The Nation Speaks” show from the summit in West Palm Beach, Florida.
“This is a pivotal point in our country and I am concerned our children won’t be able to recognize the country that I grew up in,” Miller said.
New Tang Dynasty was established in 2001 by practitioners of Falun Gong, a politically charged Chinese spiritual discipline founded in the 1990s by its leader, Li Hongzhi. The Chinese government suppressed the movement in the late 90s because of its growing popularity and anti-Communist rhetoric. NTDTV is part of Epoch Media Group, which also operates The Epoch Times, a far-right newspaper that aligns itself with Trump and European nationalists.
The Nation Speaks also interviewed Miller’s husband at the summit. In the interview, Chris Miller said he became interested in politics after nearly 50 years of farming because of tax increases.
“The Democrats continue to have no answers. All they want to do is tax more, borrow more and spend more and, as we all know, that has been a disaster every place it has been tried,” he said.
At a “Save America” rally in Washington, D.C., this week, the state representative said the United States is in “a culture war.”
“We’re engaged in a great culture war to see which world view will survive, whether we will remain a free people under free market capitalism or whether they will put us into the tyranny of socialism, communism and dangerous Democrat terrorists that are trying to destroy our country,” Chris Miller said.
This story was originally published January 7, 2021 at 5:05 PM.
