Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, in an argument against gun control, said Jews might have survived the Holocaust if they had been armed.
"How many millions of people were shot and killed because they were unarmed? Fifty million in Russia," Young said. "How many Jews were put in the ovens because they were unarmed?"
Young was responding to a question about school safety from Democrat Dimitri Shein, who is running for Young's seat, Alaska Public Media reported.
Gun rights advocates have long argued that gun control allowed Adolf Hitler to rise to power.
CNN's Wolf Blitzer challenged then-presidential candidate Ben Carson after he invoked the Holocaust, arguing that it could have been "greatly diminished" if Jews had been armed with guns.
"I'm telling you there is a reason these dictatorial people take guns first," Carson said.
" ... So what is your point: If there had been guns in Germany, there might not have been a Holocaust?" Blitzer asked.
"That was only one of the countries I mentioned," Carson said. "There were a number of countries where tyranny reigns and before it happened they disarmed the people."
The Anti-Defamation League has said it's outlandish to believe that armed Jews could have stopped the Third Reich.
"It is mind-bending to suggest that personal firearms in the hands of the small number of Germany's Jews (about 214,000 remaining in Germany in 1938) could have stopped the totalitarian onslaught of Nazi Germany when the armies of Poland, France, Belgium and numerous other countries were overwhelmed by the Third Reich," Jonathan Greenblatt, national director of the Anti-Defamation League wrote in an opinion piece for the Huffington Post.
Young is a National Rifle Association board member and is in favor of arming teachers.
His office did not respond to a request for comment.
