Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan called out GOP presumptive nominee Donald Trump on Tuesday over a controversial tweet posted Saturday which used what some have called anti-Semitic imagery to criticize likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
The tweet, which reads “Crooked Hillary Makes History” features a picture of the former Secretary of State superimposed over a pile of cash, next to a red six-pointed star with the words “Most corrupt candidate ever!”.
After a public outcry highlighted the star’s resemblance to the Star of David, Trump deleted the image.
"Donald Trump should stop playing the blame game and accept that his campaign tweeted an image with obvious anti-Semitic overtones and that, reportedly, was lifted from a white supremacist website," said ADL chairman Jonathan Greenblatt, citing claims that the image originated on an anti-Semitic internet forum.
"It's long past time for Trump to unequivocally reject the hate-filled extremists orbiting around his campaign and take a stand against anti-Semitism, bigotry, and hate."
The Trump campaign has denied that the image is anti-Semitic or originated on a white supremacist website.
"The social media graphic used this weekend was not created by the campaign nor was it sourced from an anti-Semitic site," said Trump campaign social media mainager Daniel Scavino. "It was lifted from an anti-Hillary Twitter user where countless images appear."
But on Tuesday House Speaker Paul Ryan, who endorsed Trump in June, blasted such denials, saying the image was anti-Semitic, and called upon the Trump campaign to clean up its social media campaign.
Despite his endorsement of Trump, Ryan has castigated the GOP nominee’s campaign in the past.
“Look, anti-Semitic images, they’ve got no place in a presidential campaign,” Ryan said during a radio interview with WTMJ’s Charlie Sykes.
“Candidates should know that. The tweet’s been deleted. I don’t know what flunky put this up there. They’ve obviously got to fix that".
Ryan called Trump’s tweets a distraction, and called on the campaign to focus in on policy prescriptions.
"We’ve got to get back to the issues that matter to the public."