Obama admits reference to Auschwitz was wrong | U.S. | Reuters
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrat Barack Obama admitted on Tuesday he was wrong to say his uncle helped liberate the Nazis‘ Auschwitz concentration camp after Republicans said Soviet troops freed the camp.
Obama‘s campaign said the candidate meant to say that his great-uncle, Charlie Payne, had helped liberate a part of the Buchenwald camp, not Auschwitz.
„Yesterday he mistakenly referred to Auschwitz instead of Buchenwald in telling of his personal experience of a soldier in his family who served heroically,“ said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.
Burton said in the statement that Obama‘s great uncle served in the 89th Infantry Division that entered Germany in 1945 and on April 4 overran Ohrdruf, a subcamp of the Buchenwald concentration camp.
Obama had made the Auschwitz reference in a Memorial Day speech on Monday.