Tag: Trump fascism

How Trumpism has become outright ‘fascism’

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Although conservative journalist David Frum has been a blistering critic of Donald Trump, he has been reluctant to use the word “fascist” to describe the former president. The words “fascist” and ‘fascism,” Frum has stressed in the past, should never be used casually simply to attack policies one does not like. But in an article published by The Atlantic on July 13, the Never Trump conservative lays out some disturbing reasons why Trumpism does, in fact, fit the definition of fascism.

“Through the Trump years, it seemed sensible to eschew comparisons to the worst passages of history,” Frum explains. “I repeated over and over again a warning against too-easy use of the F-word, fascism: ‘There are a lot of stops on the train line to bad before you get to Hitler Station.'”

Frum continues, “Two traits have historically marked off European-style fascism from more homegrown American traditions of illiberalism: contempt for legality and the cult of violence. Presidential-era Trumpism operated through at least the forms of law. Presidential-era Trumpism glorified military power, not mob attacks on government institutions. Post-presidentially, those past inhibitions are fast dissolving.” Continue reading.

The Memo: The pre-Trump ‘normal’ is gone for good

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One big question about former President Trump now has an answer — and it’s an alarming one for his critics.

In the later days of his presidency, his foes debated whether politics would snap back to normal if he lost his bid for a second term.

Some feared he had wrought permanent change on the political landscape. Others viewed his tumultuous presidency as a toxic aberration that might be neutralized soon after he left the White House. Continue reading.

Author of ‘How Democracies Die’ reveals why the US is in worse shape than he thought

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During the 2020 presidential race, a wide range of Donald Trump critics — including arch-conservative columnist/author Mona Charen (who worked in the Reagan White House) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a self-described “democratic socialist” — slammed Trump as dangerously authoritarian. They warned that U.S. democracy itself was on the line. Now-President Joe Biden won the election, but the threat of authoritarianism was evident when Trump tried to overturn the election results and a violent far-right mob attacked the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6. Four months into Biden’s presidency, journalist Susan B. Glasser examines the state of American democracy this week in an article for The New Yorker — and she warns that there is a lot to be worried about.

“Far from embracing Biden’s call for unity,” Glasser explains, “Republicans remain in thrall to the divisive rants and election conspiracy theories of their defeated former president. As a result, Congress is at such a partisan impasse that it cannot even agree on a commission to investigate the January 6 attack by a pro-Trump mob on its own building.”

Glasser notes that during Biden’s 2020 campaign, he “carried around” a copy of the 2018 book “How Democracies Die” — which was written by Harvard University professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt and warned that authoritarianism was prevailing over liberal democracy in many countries. And Biden has stressed that the United States needs to set a positive example for the world by showing how well democracy can work. But many Republican Trump supporters, according to Glasser, are showing themselves to be overtly anti-democracy. Continue reading.

Evidence in Trump supporter’s trial suggests he espoused Nazi ideals

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NEW YORK — An impassioned supporter of former president Donald Trump, on trial for allegedly advocating the “slaughter” of influential Democrats after the U.S. Capitol riot, also espoused Nazi ideology and suggested to his father that Trump should override the election results and declare the United States a dictatorship as Adolf Hitler did in Germany generations ago, according to evidence presented by federal authorities in a Brooklyn courtroom Thursday.

Brendan Hunt, that evidence suggests, was fixated on extremist ideas and conspiracy theories — including that Democrats falsely portrayed covid-19 as a deadly epidemic to gain political advantage over Trump — when on Jan. 8 he posted a video titled “KILL YOUR SENATORS: Slaughter them all.”

Hunt’s trial is believed to be the first related to the insurrection since the Justice Department opened its sweeping investigation into the attack and the domestic-extremist threats suspected of fueling the bid by hundreds of Trump supporters to prevent Congress from counting the electoral college votes affirming his defeat. It is seen as a test of how far free speech can go before it violates constitutional protections. Continue reading.

Ex-Republican explains she now believes her former party is filled with ‘enemies of democracy’

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In 2020, conservative columnist Mona Charen did something that would have shocked her readers back in the 1980s, 1990s or 2000s: she voted for a Democratic presidential nominee. Charen is among the veteran conservatives who — like Washington Post columnists George Will and Max Boot, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and The Bulwark’s Bill Kristol — was a blistering critic of Donald Trump’s presidency. And in an op-ed published by Haaretz on February 8, the former Nancy Reagan speechwriter lays out some of the reasons why she is glad to see President Joe Biden in the White House and considers pro-Trump Republicans enemies of democracy.

“Like progressives, conservatives believe in reform, but are more likely to stress gradualism, small-scale experimentation and prudence,” Charen, now 63, explains in her op-ed. “From the very outset of his run for the presidency, Donald Trump smashed those understandings of what conservatism was. His lies alone were enough to signal his unfitness. Flagrant lying is a key feature of authoritarianism.”

Charen, contrary to what many Trumpistas claim, hasn’t turned into a liberal or a progressive — her views are still decidedly right-wing. But Charen views Trumpism as a radical departure from the Reagan conservatism she embraced during the 1980s and 1990s. And although Charen has some policy differences with Biden, she applauds him for believing in the rule of law. Continue reading.

Professor explains how Trump’s ‘Save America’ rally contained not-so-subtle elements of fascist propaganda

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Hours before a mob of far-right insurrectionists — including members of the Proud Boys, QAnon supporters, White nationalists and members of various militia groups — violently stormed the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, then-President Donald Trump held a “Save America” rally in Washington, D.C.’s Ellipse Park. Trump and his allies showed a propaganda video at that event, and according to Yale University professor Jason Stanley — author of the book “How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them” — that video was full of fascist themes.

Stanley has made no secret of the fact that he considers Trumpism a fascist movement. In an article published by Just Security on February 4, the Yale professor identifies some of the overtly fascist themes in the video presented at the Save America Rally.

“On January 6,” Stanley explains, “Trump supporters gathered at a rally at Washington D.C.’s Ellipse Park, regaled by various figures from Trumpworld, including Donald Trump, Jr. and Rudy Giuliani. Directly following Giuliani’s speech, the organizers played a video. To a scholar of fascist propaganda, well-versed in the history of the National Socialists’ pioneering use of videos in political propaganda, it was clear, watching it, what dangers it portended. In it, we see themes and tactics that history warns pose a violent threat to liberal democracy. Given the aims of fascist propaganda — to incite and mobilize — the events that followed were predictable.” Continue reading.

Opinion: Trumpism is American fascism

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It is revealing how a political movement that claims to be dedicated to the recovery of national greatness has so readily and completely abandoned many defining national ideals. Donald Trump’s promise of American strength has involved the betrayal of American identity.

One of the most important strands of our founding ideology is civic republicanism. In this tradition, the common good is not automatically produced by a clash of competing interests. A just society must be consciously constructed by citizens possessing certain virtues. A democracy in particular depends on people who take responsibility for their communities, show an active concern for the welfare of their neighbors, demand integrity from public officials, defend the rule of law, and respect the rights and dignity of others. Without these moral commitments, a majority is merely a mob.

What type of citizen has Trump — and his supportive partisan media — produced? Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) still holds her job in Congress because she is representative of ascendant MAGA radicalism. Those who reflect her overt racism, her unhinged conspiracy thinking and her endorsement of violence against public figures are now treated as a serious political constituency within the Republican Party. Trump has come down firmly on Greene’s side. One participant in the Jan. 6 attack sent a video to her children saying: “We broke into the Capitol. . . . We got inside, we did our part. We were looking for Nancy [Pelosi] to shoot her in the friggin’ brain, but we didn’t find her.” The detail that gets to me? She sent this to her children. She was living in a mental world where vile, shameful things are a parent’s boast. And she saw her actions as the expression of a public duty — an example of doing her part. Continue reading.

Trump jumps into a divisive battle over the Republican Party — with a threat to start a ‘MAGA Party’

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PALM BEACH, Fla. — Former president Donald Trump threw himself back into politics this weekend by publicly endorsing a devoted and divisive acolyte in Arizona who has embraced his false election conspiracy theories and entertained the creation of a new “MAGA Party.”

In a recorded phone call, Trump offered his “complete and total endorsement” for another term for Arizona state party chairwoman Kelli Ward, a lightning rod who has sparred with the state’s Republican governor, been condemned by the business community and overseen a recent flight in party registrations. She narrowly won reelection, by a margin of 51.5 percent to 48.5 percent, marking Trump’s first victory in a promised battle to maintain political relevance and influence after losing the 2020 election.

In recent weeks, Trump has entertained the idea of creating a third party, called the Patriot Party, and instructed his aides to prepare election challenges to lawmakers who crossed him in the final weeks in office, including Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Rep. Tom Rice (R-S.C.), according to people familiar with the plans. Continue reading.

Is the Republican Party fascist? An expert explains the 7 themes that dominate fascism movements

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Writing in the Washington Post four years ago, journalist Michael Kinsley gave this blunt assessment of the man about to become president:

“Donald Trump,” Kinsley wrote, “is a fascist.”

Four years later, it’s fair to ask: Is the Republican Party fascist?

It’s an incendiary question. It’s also a serious one. Even after the assault on the U.S. Capitol, eight Senate Republicans and 138 Republican members of the House of Representatives still voted to overturn a free and fair presidential election. It is just the latest example of a party that is well to the right of most conservative parties in the democratic world.  Continue reading.

Fascism Unmasked — With A Trump Trademark

Nearly a year before he accepted the Republican nomination for president, Donald Trump’s authoritarian impulses already were too obvious to be ignored. By then he was encouraging physical attacks on undocumented immigrants, demanding the deportation of millions more, and constantly appealing to hatred and bigotry. He bragged of being the “most militaristic” candidate and denigrated the free press. So extreme was his rhetoric during those months that prominent conservatives — including several who now spinelessly truckle to him – warned of what his rise to power might portend.

His campaign reeked of an ideology that today can be named without hesitation. Trump has cultivated a constituency for fascism in America — and his most fanatical followers may soon pose a real threat to the republic.

Having lost a fair election by millions of votes and an Electoral College margin that Trump himself has defined as a “landslide,” he has mounted a campaign to discredit democracy with false allegations of fraud. Defeated repeatedly in courts and counting rooms run by Republicans, he has refused to desist from these debunked claims. Even as his followers threaten GOP election officials with mayhem, Trump has continued to stoke their rage. And now we are entering the darkest dimension of politics, as his henchmen predict “civil war” and demand that he impose “martial law.”