WASHINGTON — Donald Trump’s former campaign manager said Sunday the hubbub over his ex-boss tweeting an anti-Hillary Clinton image — a Star of David over a pile of money — was much ado about nothing.
“The bottom line is this is political correctness run amok. If this were to be a star next to Hillary Clinton didn’t have the cash behind it, no one would be questioning this,” Corey Lewandowski told CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Trump’s tweet was a picture of Clinton over a background of $100 bills and the red six-pointed star saying “Most Corrupt Candidate Ever.” The tweet drew a social media firestorm as anti-Semitic.
Lewandowski said the star could represent a sheriff’s badge, not necessarily the Jewish symbol.
“You can read into things that aren’t there. This is a simple star,” he said.
The website Mic reported Sunday that the meme was first created by a white supremacist and first posted to a racist message board.
The image was previously featured on /pol/ — an Internet message board for “the alt-right, a digital movement of neo-Nazis, anti-Semites and white supremacists” as early as June 22, Mic reported.
The author who posted the graphic named the image “HillHistory.jpg” in a potential nod to “Heil Hilter,” the former Nazi dictator who forced Jews to brand their clothes with the Star of David, Mic reported.
A Twitter account linked to the image’s author had frequent racist, anti-immigrant and anti-Clinton posts.
Memes posted to that account include Clinton in dreadlocks with the hashtag “#AfroPandering” and a cartoon of a dark-skinned man hacking off the head of a freckled-faced blonde who held a sign saying “Refugees Welcome.”
“Welcome Islamists!” was the caption.
The Twitter account of the author has since been deleted.
After the social media firestorm Saturday, Trump’s campaign deleted the controversial tweet. Trump later tweeted the corrupt Hillary graphic again, but with a red circle instead of the star.