A group with alleged links to Nazi Germany was “proud” when President Trump aide Sebastian Gorka wore its medal to an Inauguration Day event, according to NBC News.
Gorka wore an honorary medal from Hungarian nationalist organization Vitezi Rend to Trump’s Inaugural Ball, which prompted NBC News to travel to Hungary and dive deeper into his ties to the group that allied with Nazi Germany in 1938.
“When he appeared on U.S. television … with the medal of the Vitez Order… it made me really proud,” Vitezi Rend spokesman Andras Horvath told NBC News.
Gorka denied connections to the group, but NBC reported that three people claim he was a well-known member of Vitezi Rend. The group was founded in 1920 to award medals to Hungarian veterans of World War I.
Gorka told the news organization that the medal was once was awarded to his Hungarian-born father, but that has not stopped Jewish groups from speaking out. World Jewish Congress vice president Andras Heisler told NBC that wearing the medal “isn’t a good message for a democratic society.”
Gorka has denied he has ever been a sworn-in member of Vitezi Rend — whose name translates to “valiant order,” according to NBC News.
The Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect offered the following statement to NBC News: “How many ducks in the Trump White House must walk, talk and quack Anti-Semitically before our country wakes up and sees the greater problem?”
2020 Presidential Candidates, Ranked by Vegas Odds (Photos)
Donald Trump won't take office until Jan. 20, but gambling site Bovada is already thinking about the next election. Here are its top candidates to win the presidency in 2020, ranked from worst odds to best.
John Kasich 40/1 odds
Bovada ranks several Republicans, which means they would have to replace Trump as the Republican nominee. Ohio's governor famously skipped the GOP convention there because he didn’t support Donald Trump. Maybe Bovada thinks he could take on Trump in the 2020 Republican primary?
Note that several people are tied at 33-to-1 odds. Rubio, a Florida senator, famously feuded with Trump during the 2016 primaries, earning the nickname “little Marco.” Bovada has longshot odds on him replacing Trump.
The first Democrat on our list, she was just elected as a California senator after previously serving as the state’s attorney general. She'll only have four years of experience in 2020, but President Obama only had four years.
The Democratic senator-elect from Nevada will be the first Latina senator. Like Harris, she will only have had four years of Senate experience in 2020.
The outgoing vice president considered running against Hillary Clinton in 2016 but decided not to after the 2015 death of his son Beau. Biden is popular, particularly with working-class voters whom Trump lured from the Democrats. He'll be 77 in 2o20, which would make him the oldest person to win the presidency, if he won.
After coming losing the Democratic nomination in 2008 to Obama and coming so close in 2016, does the former secretary of state have it in her to try again? She'll turn 73 in 2020, but Trump is eight months older.
The New Jersey senator is a talented campaigner and speaker and one of the most prominent African-American Democrats. The New Jersey senator is also popular among his peers.
The Massachusetts senator could pick up supporters of the Sanders movement. She has feuded with Trump, but also expressed a willingness to work with him on certain issues.
The House Speaker is a star among traditional conservatives, but it will take a TV drama worth of surprises for him to somehow replace Trump as the presidential nominee, but that's true of every other Republican on this list, too.
Gambling site Bovada is already thinking about the next election
Donald Trump won't take office until Jan. 20, but gambling site Bovada is already thinking about the next election. Here are its top candidates to win the presidency in 2020, ranked from worst odds to best.