Conservative provocateur Candace Owens has been raked over the Twitter coals after comments she made about nationalism and Hitler during a launch event for Turning Point UK were dredged up by BuzzFeed.

Owens spoke up for nationalism against what she characterized as Americans’ knee-jerk association of the term with Hitler, claiming the Nazi leader wasn’t a nationalist at all, since he’d set his sights beyond Germany’s borders and “wanted to globalize.” Her comments, while arguably bizarre, were less a defense of Hitler than a defense of nationalism – answering the question she’d been asked by someone in the audience.

BuzzFeed framed her words as an enthusiastic defense of Hitler, whose only mistake – according to Owens, in their telling – was getting too greedy for lebensraum. The controversy-courting outlet claimed that, in Owens’ mind, “it would have been ‘fine’ if Adolf Hitler ‘just wanted to make Germany great’ and that the problem with the Nazi dictator was that ‘he had dreams outside of Germany.’”

Here is video of Candace Owens' full answer on nationalism and Hitler pic.twitter.com/NfBvoH8vQg — John Whitehouse (@existentialfish) February 8, 2019

A deluge of attacks from Twitter and the media unsurprisingly followed.

Even Steve King knows only to go part Hitler — Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) February 8, 2019

Candace Owens is a farcically stupid person and the fact that she has any platform whatsoever is a testament to the enduring power of conservative grift culture — Michael Tracey (@mtracey) February 8, 2019

Hey, good to know that @RealCandaceO would have been cool with Hitler, if only he had stuck to just murdering all the Jews and Gypsies in Germany.These are the dumbest people alive. — Ian Whetstone (@IanWhetstone) February 8, 2019

Candace Owens isn't the first to offer a(n accidental?) defense of Hitler. And she isn't the first person who needs to read up on history, rather than lash out over her self-inflicted screw-up. Sometimes mouths move faster than brains. And sometimes, it is good to just admit it. https://t.co/VBOEWCORDq — Eric Pape (@ericpape) February 8, 2019

Prior to annexing the Sudetenland, Hitler pursued a policy of mass discrimination against blacks, barred them from education, restricted them from marriage and sex with whites, and encouraged their sterilization. It was inside Germany, so @RealCandaceO is cool with that, I guess. https://t.co/KNgAe5ZtoX — Mike Selinker (@mikeselinker) February 8, 2019

"Stalin was tight before he signed with a major label." - Candace Owens at some point — Johnny Taylor, Jr. (@hipsterocracy) February 9, 2019

Owens’ defenders on the Right immediately pounced on BuzzFeed, accusing them of taking her words out of context,

It's sad that what the media is doing to Candace Owens today isn't unusual It's what they do every day Take a clip out of context, lie about it, affix a label to someone, and repeat forever This is who they are — Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) February 8, 2019

and attempting to correct the record,

That rare moment when the full context of something makes that person look even worse.And the person promoting it look like a stooge. — Jonny 5ive (@JonNYC5ive) February 8, 2019

while Owens tried to clear the air with a second video calling Hitler a “homicidal psychotic maniac.”

Was Hitler a nationalist? (And Leftist journalists are still insane). https://t.co/ulxZXCWquh — Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) February 8, 2019

(which her detractors promptly held up as proof of whatever they had already written about her)

More from Candace Owens on Hitler:"I would name my baby 'Hitler'. Maybe 'Baby Hitler', although that would make less sense as she got older. 'The Littler Hitler' has a nice ring to it and is timeless if you think about it. Basically, bottom line: I want a Hitler baby." — joey alison sayers (@joeyalison) February 8, 2019

Just in case you don’t want to watch the video here is a synopsis...“So I didn’t say what I said and even though the left saw what I said I didn’t say it even though it came out of my mouth MAGA!” — Tony Posnanski (@tonyposnanski) February 8, 2019

so my takeaway from this is that you like Hitler? — Rob Rousseau (@robrousseau) February 8, 2019

Others were reminded of another young conservative who couldn’t risk sticking his foot in his mouth about Hitler…

So if I understand correctly, Ben Shapiro would save baby Hitler, and Candace Owens would just leave adult Hitler to his business as long as the genocide stayed in Germany? If time machines ever get invented, we should all agree to never tell conservatives. — Tuxedo Mask (@TheLoveBel0w) February 8, 2019

So I guess Candace Owens would only kill baby Hitler if he started invading the other cribs. — Charles Gaba (@charles_gaba) February 9, 2019

Even Chelsea Clinton stopped by to attack Owens

Good afternoon Andrew - Ignorance about Hitler’s evil regime must always be confronted. That burden should not fall on Holocaust survivors. There was nothing, using @RealCandaceO own words, “great” about the Third Reich before it began annexing & invading its neighbors. https://t.co/Pq8vdtirly — Chelsea Clinton (@ChelseaClinton) February 8, 2019

Don’t you ever in your miserable life have the the audacity to tweet at someone who educating blacks on the nasty, racist, harmful “evil regime” policies inflicted by your soulless mother and father. There will be a #BLEXIT. And your trash parents will be alive to witness it. https://t.co/6OOl4S8OK9 — Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) February 8, 2019

…who gained a moment of respite by fighting back.

You don’t get to separate yourself from the HORRORS your parents inflicted worldwide through the Clinton Foundation. You were on payroll. But wishing you a life full of love, health, and—of course, happiness. #LockHerUphttps://t.co/GSeX8NJUPj — Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) February 8, 2019

But hey, not everyone disagreed!

#CandaceOwens makes an obvious point; Hitler minus the Holocaust and war would have been one of the greatest statesmen in history. He turned Germany from a Marxist cesspool to a national super-power in only 4 years. He was TIME'S 1938 Man of the Year because of the German Miracle pic.twitter.com/Iv5mqtDGL6 — Angelo John Gage (@AngeloJohnGage) February 9, 2019

Only stupid people can’t understand history. And push back on people that do understand history. You statement is absolutely correct. Had Hilter not condemned the Jewish people and tried to take all of Europe he could have made Germany a strong and wealthy country. — CommonSense (@commonsenseAL) February 9, 2019

Some thought they’d uncovered a grand conspiracy...

The nationalist project is to establish borders and then ethnically cleanse inside them. Candace Owens went to the UK and endorsed Hitler's vision for ethnically cleansing Germany, i.e., making it great. — David M. Perry (@Lollardfish) February 8, 2019

@BrandonLewis@Jacob_Rees_Mogg@halfon4harlowMP@StandWithUs@colrichardkemp@Dannythefink I cannot sound the alarm bell hard enough, nobody should associate with Steve Bannon’s Turning Point UK, please watch the video and see the quote. Pure antisemitism pic.twitter.com/5hdBMjEiLc — Louise Mensch (@LouiseMensch) February 8, 2019

…and others wondered if they’d fallen for another kind of conspiracy altogether, having retweeted Owens to the #1 topic on Twitter Friday night.

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