A college football coach on the job for less than a week has been suspended after telling a student newspaper he'd like to have dinner with former Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, according to reports.
Morris Berger, who was hired Jan. 20 as the offensive coordinator at Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan, was placed on administrative leave Monday.
“You can’t deny he wasn’t a great leader,” Berger said of Hitler in the interview.
The school is investigating.
Berger gave the interview last Thursday to The Grand Valley Lanthorn sports editor, who asked which three historical figures Berger would most like to have dinner with.
“This is probably not going to get a good review, but I’m going to say Adolf Hitler,” he responded. “It was obviously very sad and he had bad motives, but the way he was able to lead was second-to-none. How he rallied a group and a following, I want to know how he did that. Bad intentions of course, but you can’t deny he wasn’t a great leader.”
Under Hitler's rule in Germany from 1933 to 1945, the Nazi regime was responsible for the genocide of at least 5.5 million Jews and millions of other victims.
As the interview continued, Berger also mentioned former President John F. Kennedy and Christopher Columbus as his other two choices.
Much of the interview, however, focused on football and his background in coaching.
The school said in a statement that Berger's comments “do not reflect the values of Grand Valley State University.”
Berger holds a bachelor’s degree in history and a master’s in educational psychology, according to the school's athletic department website.
Previously, he was the tight ends coach at Texas State University and also coached at Oklahoma State University.
CNN reported that two days after the interview was published, an administrator in the athletic department asked the paper's staff to remove the comments about Hitler from the interview.
“He said it would make their life a whole lot easier," Lanthorn editor in chief and third-year student Nick Moran told the Detroit Free Press, according to CNN. “It's intimidating when someone in power reaches out to you ... and you're a student, and it's a professional here on campus saying to take it down.”
The paper initially removed the comments but later republished the full interview.
“We’re proud that we stood by our work, upheld journalistic integrity and the work that has been shared reflects that,” Moran told CNN.
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