As Donald Trump surprised many by eviscerating his Republican primary competitors in 2016, a number of intellectuals with a good grasp of history raised the alarm that his beliefs and political strategies were disturbingly reminiscent of Adolf Hitler and the brand of fascism that ruled the day in Germany after World War I. En masse, Republicans argued comparisons of Trump to Hitler were over the top, wrongheaded, and dangerous. They weren’t alone. Many Democrats and media pundits also shied away from discussions that tied Trump to Hitler, and more disturbingly, early 21st century America to early 20th century Germany. Slaves to capitalist greed, many argued Americans didn’t want to hear about fascism at all. They were more concerned about the economy and if Trump was good for their pockets. All else be damned! They largely dismissed the intellectuals and did so at the country’s peril.
He’s a “fascist to the core”
The Trump-Hitler conversation once again bled into the public sphere most recently when Jeffery Goldberg wrote an October 2024 article in The Atlantic titled, “Trump: I need the kind of generals that Hitler had.” A few weeks earlier, legendary journalist Bob Woodward released his latest book, “War.” In it, he quoted retired Army general Mark Milley, who served as chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Trump and damningly opined the former American president is a “fascist to the core.”
Milley stated, “He is the most dangerous person ever. I had suspicions when I talked to you about his mental decline and so forth, but now I realize he’s a total fascist.”
Two weeks before the election of 2024, John Kelly, a former four-star Marine general who served as Trump’s chief of staff, agreed with Milley in interviews with the New York Times. “Looking at the definition of fascism: It's a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy,” Milley said. He continued, “So, certainly, in my experience, those are the kinds of things that he [Trump] thinks would work better in terms of running America.”
Like all societies in the throes of anti-intellectualism and trending towards authoritarianism, intellectuals are attacked. They are often silenced, dismissed, and discredited. In some instances, they may be jailed, deported, or even killed. That’s what happened in places like Hitler’s Germany, Mussolini’s Italy, and Mobutu’s Zaire. Despite this, in an America tilting more and more away from true democracy and equality, some intellectuals never stopped monitoring, researching, discussing, and writing about the similarities between Trump, Hitler, and the countries that gave them power. The reflections of people like Woodward, Milley, and Kelly simply raised the issue again before an increasingly distracted, numb, and racially hostile American public.
As the facts become too stark to ignore, more people are (at least momentarily) open to seriously considering the similarities between Trump and Hitler. Unfortunately, they are still not equally receptive to comparisons of America to Germany. That is a mistake, because that problem will remain whether Trump wins or loses.
Make Germany Great Again: Adolf Hitler wasn’t a con man. Neither is Donald Trump.
Donald Trump was born a little over a year after German Chancellor and Führer Adolf Hitler committed suicide on April 30, 1945 as Soviet troops closed in on his Berlin bunker. Twenty-six years earlier, the 1919 Treaty of Versailles officially ended World War I and inadvertently set the stage for World War II. The Allied powers held Germany solely responsible for starting the first world war and meted out severe punishments. They required Germany to disarm, pay massive reparations, and relinquish vast amounts of land close to home and abroad. Post-war humiliation tossed many German citizens into an angry, hopeless place that opened the door for a perceived national savior. The charismatic Adolf Hitler happily walked through it.
There is a popular belief that Germans were conned into supporting Hitler. That is untrue. In reality Hitler was clear about his beliefs and vicious intentions, including in his two-volume autobiography Mein Kempf (“My Struggle”). Hitler wasn’t a con man; he was an overt political strongman - and many German citizens pulled him to their bosoms largely because of the country’s refusal to come to grips with its own demons. They wanted to make Germany great again and thought Hitler was the man to do it. In many respects, America is repeating Germany’s mistakes. As intellectuals warned, comparisons of Trump to Hitler are not hyperbolic. Neither are the more mature analyses that examine what made post-World War I Germany open to Hitler and what now makes a significant number of 21st century Americans bullish on Trump.
Faith in American religious, economic, educational, and political institutions has long been in decline and is currently in freefall. As their democracy limps along, Americans now usually vote against terrible candidates rather than for good ones, if they vote at all. To be sure, a good percentage of people will cast a ballot for her but by no means believe Kamala Harris will be the transformational leader America now so desperately needs. Like most politicians from both Machiavellian parties, she is ambitious, opportunistic, and willing to change political positions when convenient to gain and maintain position and power. That is now the norm in America - and it is not only tolerated, it is expected and celebrated.
Harris brings legitimate concerns, but on the other side stands a madman. It is not necessary to argue Donald Trump is the reincarnation of Adolf Hitler to acknowledge the disturbing similarities between the two men and their supporters. Hitler praised and partnered with authoritarians such as Italian strongman Benito Mussolini, who was executed by the Italian resistance movement two days before Hitler’s death in 1945. Germans accepted the admiration. Trump openly praises despots like Hungary’s Viktor Orbán. Trump’s American supporters accept it.
Hitler attempted a coup in 1923 Germany and was jailed before being legally elevated to national leadership 10 years later. Through different means, Trump also attempted a coup, now seeks a return to national leadership, and is once again competitive. Though short-lived and fragile, Germany was a democracy. That ended with Hitler. American democracy is also increasingly fragile. Trump called the “January 6thInsurrection” a “day of love.” He blusters about deploying the military against his political and ideological enemies within. He encourages police brutality and intimates voting will no longer be needed if he’s brought back to power.
Hitler’s politics and popularity were rooted in openly expressed white supremacy, nativism, and antisemitism. Germans supported it all and it eventually led to genocide. Trump is also a nativist who traffics in wild anti-immigrant rhetoric and retrograde racial sensibilities. Many Americans share his beliefs. Republican political leaders know what Trump is, but most continue to stand with him. Ohio Senator J.D. Vance once called Trump “America’s Hitler.” Vulgar careerism prompted him to later eat those words and become Trump’s running mate. Powerful Republican Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky opined that Trump was “stupid [and] ill-tempered,” a “despicable human being,” and a “narcissist” in 2020. Despite that, he is supporting him once again in 2024. Millions of Americans will join him.
Trump isn’t the disease, he is a symptom
Hitler did not come to power on his own. Germans loved and supported him. History has not been kind to them for doing so. Donald Trump did not militaristically seize power in 2016, he was elected. Like Hitler, he did not con Americans. He was open about who and what he was, and they still chose him because he fed into their twisted vision of what it means to be an American and make the country “great again.” Many want him back in 2024.
At the end of the day, Donald Trump, a felon who cannot vote in many states, may be a problem, but he isn’t the problem. He isn’t the disease, he is a symptom. Whether he wins or not, America is more of an existential threat to itself than Trump could ever be. Let us see how fast and far down this mad path the country is willing to travel. The Germans were willing to take it all the way. Is America? Only time will tell.
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Dr. Ricky L. Jones is the Baldwin-King Scholar-in-Residence at the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute and Professor of Pan-African Studies at the University of Louisville. Follow him on Facebook, LinkedIn, Threads, and X. Read his Substack columns here.
An additional note seems to pertain. The political group previously called republican seems now to be the white supremacist misogynist party. If they succeed in purchasing the presidency we may be forced to say welcome to the fourth reich.
In my youth I often wondered about Germany; how could they have fallen for this guy, a failed artist and mediocre soldier.
I no longer have to wonder. And it scares me.