S.C. GOP Invokes Jewish Stereotype

Two Republican county chairmen from South Carolina invoked a Jewish stereotype about money management to defend U.S. senator Jim DeMint (pictured) from charges that he had failed to obtain enough federal funding for his state.

State senator Bakari Sellers attacked DeMint in The State, a South Carolina newspaper last week, for his inability to procure federal funds. On Sunday, Bamberg County GOP chairman Edwin Merwin and Orangeburg County GOP chairman James Ulmer fired back, and "resorted to the stereotype of penny-pinching Jews to make their point," according to CBS News.

"There is a saying that the Jews who are wealthy got that way not by watching dollars, but instead by taking care of the pennies and the dollars taking care of themselves," Ulmer and Merwin wrote in The Times and Democrat. "By not using earmarks to fund projects for South Carolina and instead using actual bills, DeMint is watching our nation's pennies and trying to preserve our country's wealth and our economy's viability to give all an opportunity to succeed."

Ulmer apologized in a statement late Monday, according to CBS News.

"In one of the paragraphs which I wrote," he said, "I quoted a statement which I have heard many times in my life, truly in admiration for a method of bettering one's lot in life."

"I meant absolutely nothing derogatory by the reference to a great and honorable people," he said. "I hope that anyone and all who were offended by my comment will accept my humble apology."

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