A post uploaded by the Michigan GOP Twitter account linking the Holocaust to a contemporary gun rights debate. Source: Twitter

Michigan Democrats on Thursday demanded that the Michigan GOP apologize for a post linking the Holocaust to a contemporary gun rights debate.

“Before they collected all these wedding rings…they collected all the guns,” the GOP’s original post said on Wednesday over an image of wedding rings discovered by US troops at Buchenwald in 1945.

Responding to the post, Michigan Democrats demanded that the GOP apologize.

“This vile rhetoric comparing commonsense gun safety legislation to the Holocaust is disgraceful,” said Lavora Barnes, the Michigan Democrats’ chairwoman. “Similar laws have worked in states like Florida and Indiana. Everyone across the political spectrum should come together to denounce the hate that was on full display yesterday.”

Kristina Karama, the Michigan Republican chairwoman, said she would make no apology and appealed to her own family background and America’s history of government-sponsored violence as proof that the comparison was justified.

“My ancestors were enslaved, and my great-great grandfather was lynched by a white mob in front of his entire family,” she wrote. “Government abuse of citizens has not only happened in world history, but American history. We will not be silent as the Democratic Party, the party who fought to enslave Black Americans, and currently fights to murder unborn children, attempt to disarm us. Our 2nd Amendment was put in place to protect us from aspiring tyrants. MIGOP stands by our statement.”

Jewish groups also condemned the post.

“[The Michigan GOP] should be ashamed of themselves,” the Anti-Defamation League wrote Wednesday. “Using the Holocaust as a way to score cheap political points in the debate over gun control is unacceptable and trivializes the memory of millions murdered by the Nazis.”

The Michigan legislature is currently debating a slate of 11 gun bills following a mass shooting at Michigan State University in February that killed three innocent people. The regulations include three gun safety measures, including gun storage, universal background checks, and red flag laws allowing judges to temporarily confiscate guns from dangerous individuals.