Candace Owens says 'if Hitler just wanted to make Germany great and have things run well - OK, fine' at Turning Point UK event

US conservative Candace Owens has sparked controversy after footage of her emerged defending Adolf Hitler at a Turning Point UK event in December.

Owens, who is often associated with the so-called alt-right and has been championed by Kanye West, spoke at the launch event for the right-wing student movement, with ties to Trump, in London before Christmas.

As reported by BuzzFeed, the event was attended by many prominent members of the UK right wing, including Rod Liddle, James Delingpole, Andy Wigmore and Tory MP Andrew Rosindale and others.

During the event, where the primary focus was said to be further exposing the anti-semitism claims aimed at Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Owens was asked by a member of the audience about nationalism in western politics.

Without prompt, Owens, standing alongside Turning Point founder Charlie Kirk, chose to bring up Adolf Hitler and essentially made an excuse for Nazi dictator and his global aims.

I actually don’t have any problems at all with the word ‘nationalism’ I think that the definition gets poisoned by elitists that actually want globalism. Globalism is what I don’t want. …

Whenever we say nationalism, the first thing people think about, at least in America, is Hitler. He was a national socialist.

But if Hitler just wanted to make Germany great and have things run well, OK, fine. The problem is that he wanted, he had dreams outside of Germany. He wanted to globalise.

He wanted everybody to be German, everybody to be speaking German. Everybody to look a different way. To me, that’s not nationalism.

In thinking about how we could go bad down the line, I don’t really have an issue with nationalism. I really don’t.

Owens is basically saying here that Hitler's policies were acceptable as long as they didn't go beyond Germany's borders.

Twitter users have been quick to jump on these quotes to point how problematic they are.

The writer Mike Stuchbery put together an indepth thread on why Owen's words on Nazism and fascism were so misguided.

In response to the backlash, Owens has said that she stands by her statements and that she was trying to change the assocociation of nationalism with Hitler.

HT Someecards

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