U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy defended Fascist war criminals

A more troubling theory popular with his critics holds that McCarthy’s actions regarding Malmedy were driven by anti-Semitism. As evidence, they pointed to his casual and frequent use of anti-Jewish slurs, which even his closest friends acknowledged to biographers. […]

And, according to Army General Counsel John Adams, the senator repeatedly referred to a Jewish staffer he disdained as a “no good, just a miserable little Jew.” Then there was the support McCarthy got from notorious Jew-haters like radio commentator Upton Close, and the backing McCarthy gave to fascist activist William Dudley Pelley. “There was scarcely a professional American anti-Semite who had not publicly endorsed the senator,” said Arnold Forster, who followed the situation in real time as the general counsel at the Anti-Defamation League.

For years, friends recounted how McCarthy would pull out his copy of Hitler’s Mein Kampf, saying, “That’s the way to do it.” But, they were quick to add, that was just Joe being provocative. Now, the Malmedy hearings suggested a deeper-seated anti-Semitism. Why else would this one senator among 96 crusade to save the worst of [Berlin’s] shock troopers? Why single out Jewish investigators who, McCarthy claimed during the hearings, “intensely hate the German people as a race” and had formed what amounted to a “vengeance team?”

(Friendly reminder: although most moderate anticommunists do find Joseph McCarthy embarrassing, plenty of militant anticommunists still like him.)