Their wedding carriage was an old Volkswagen Beetle with a huge swastika painted over the front and sides. The groom emerged dressed as a German soldier with the emblematic Nazi double S bolts on his wristbands. On April 29, the same day Adolf Hitler married Eva Braun 77 years ago, a Mexican couple had a Nazi-themed wedding in the central Mexican state of Tlaxcala, sparking outrage from a Jewish human rights organization.
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“People don’t know the real story,” the groom, Fernando, who didn't share his last name, told Mexican newspaper Milenio in an interview at the wedding. “He [Hitler] was a vegan, got his country out of poverty, and regained the German territory lost during World War I.”Fernando and his new wife, Josefina, had children before they were married this week, according to reporting. They named their first son Reinhard, after SS leader General Reinhard Heydrich, and their daughter Hanna Gertrud, after Hanna Reitsch, a German pilot who allegedly rescued Hitler from a bunker during the war. According to Milenio, the wedding party was crowded with fellow Nazi admirers, some even dressed as German soldiers. Fernando admitted receiving hate mail and even death threats because of his longtime support for Hitler.“My dad and my uncles are followers of NS [National Socialism], and since I was a kid I’ve had to face people. I’ve been hit, spit on, and one time a man even pointed a gun in my face while shouting ‘Nazi,’” he said.No Mexican authority or organization has publicly addressed the Nazi-themed celebration.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human rights organization based in Los Angeles, called on the Mexican government this week to “take appropriate measures” against the newlyweds.
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“Mexico has voted for the United Nations resolution that condemns the distortion of the Holocaust and all forms of racism,” Dr. Shimon Samuels, director for international relations at the center, said in a press release. “However, there has been no reaction by the state or human rights organizations condemning this outrage.”This isn’t the first time Nazi symbols have been used in Mexico.In 2015, a university in Guadalajara hosted a Nazi-themed dance contest with German classical music and recordings of Adolf Hitler’s voice. The video of the performance went viral on YouTube and sparked outrage across the country. And in 2020, Volkswagen cut all ties with a distributor in Mexico City after someone posted several photos on Twitter showing a wall from inside the business decorated with the image of a VW Beetle coupled with swastikas.