Jon Husted fires political director over SS profile photo, Rhodesia playlist

Woytek’s exit follows pattern of Republican aides dismissed over extremist online activity

Republican Sen. Jon Husted of Ohio fired political director Stephen Woytek after the Washington Post reported that his Facebook profile picture depicted Nazi SS soldiers and that he had curated a public Spotify playlist that, according to the Guardian, hailed the former racist white-minority Rhodesian regime. Woytek, 25, had been appointed to the post about a month earlier in Husted’s competitive re-election race against former Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown.

In a statement, a Husted campaign spokesperson said the campaign had “ended its relationship” with Woytek. “While he denies negative intent, his social media activity displays a complete lack of judgement and disregard for its impact on others,” the spokesperson said. “Senator Husted demands better of those who represent him. Upon learning about the social media posts today, Senator Husted made the immediate decision to part ways.” The campaign did not respond to the Post’s questions about whether and how Woytek’s social media activity had been vetted before his appointment last month, the newspaper reported.

Woytek, who serves in the National Guard and graduated from the Citadel military academy in Charleston, South Carolina, issued a statement of regret. “I want to be unequivocal: I reject the racist and antisemitic ideology the SS and Nazi Germany represented,” Woytek said. “I believe it is important to educate our younger generations, which is why I participate in historical reenactments.” He added that he wished he had “exercised better judgment when posting about my activities online.”

Woytek’s Facebook profile listed him as a follower of the LAH Living History Unit, a military re-enactment group that portrays the 1st SS Panzer division. According to the group’s website, LAH depicts the Leibstandarte, a Waffen-SS armored division that began as Adolf Hitler’s bodyguards, and describes it as symbolizing “the highest dedication to duty and individual as well as collective loyalty.” The group says it is “non-political” and disavows “political and religious persecution” that occurred during the second world war.

A Flickr account operated by LAH posted a 2018 photograph showing Woytek, then 16, wearing an SS uniform and marching in an area adorned with Nazi flags. Woytek’s Facebook page also follows several suppliers of SS uniforms. On a Quora account bearing his name, Woytek answered a question about whether anything good occurred under Hitler in 2017, writing that “Hitler started an anti-smoking campaign.”

Woytek also created a public Spotify playlist titled “Tales from Rhodesia” and captioned “Homesick for a place that no longer exists,” which, according to the Guardian, features songs praising the former British colony’s white-minority government. Rhodesia has been used by white supremacists as a symbol of the supposed superiority of white rule, the Guardian reported. The former British colony’s white-minority government fought a long war against guerrilla groups after issuing a unilateral declaration of independence in 1965; the country was officially recognized as Zimbabwe under black majority rule in 1980, a year after the minority government accepted its rule was unsustainable and entered peace negotiations. One song on the playlist uses a slur to refer to African troops.

Woytek’s departure follows a series of damaging episodes in which young Republican groups have been discovered expressing pro-Nazi sympathies in group chats and internet forums. In Georgia, Rep. Mike Collins’s Senate campaign was shaken this summer by controversies involving his staff’s online activity; Collins replaced top aide Kip Talley after Slate reported Talley had been part of a group chat with white supremacists.

The Guardian characterized Husted’s re-election contest against Brown as a knife-edge race.