French parliamentarian is facing expulsion from his party after giving racist remarks against the country’s travelling community

A French parliamentarian is facing expulsion from his party after giving racist remarks against the country’s travelling community.

Gilles Bourdouleix, a Member of Parliament and mayor of the western city of Cholet, said the remarks on Sunday while overseeing a dismantlement of a temporary camp set up by French Travelers.

During the police action, a journalist recorded Bourdouleix saying, “the law has to be implemented” and added, “Just goes to show that Hitler maybe didn’t kill enough of them (Travelers).”

Bourdouleix, who belongs to the center-right Union of Democrats and Independents (UDI), was condemned by party leader Jean-Louis Borloo.

The party leader said he would convene with the party’s executive committee to decide on the “inevitable consequences” to be given to Bourdouleix.

Also, Jean-Christophe Lagarde, the secretary general of the party, said “The only possible sanction is his exclusion from the UDI which should be adopted by the executive committee next Wednesday.”

There is a growing hostility in France towards travelling communities – both “les gens du voyage” (travelling people) as French nomadic communities are known, and Roma people from Eastern Europe.

On July 7, Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi, urged French mayors to join a “revolt” against so-called illegal camps set up by nomadic peoples on public lands.

Meanwhile, France has recently come under fire by the EU, United Nations’ human rights arm and other watchdogs, which constantly question the legality of France’s policy of systematically tearing down the camps as well as sending back Roma people to Bulgaria and Romania.

Traveling communities were persecuted by Nazi Germany during the Second World War and at least 200,000 were killed. However, some experts put the death toll as high as 1,500,000.