When elected Democrats are on the precipice of losing, they resort to name-calling not grounded in reality.
VP Kamala Harris has transitioned from a campaign of joy, vibes, and “Brat Summer” to one of stoking fear and fear-mongering about fascism. A hit piece in The Atlantic, claiming former President Trump wanted military generals like Hitler’s, is failing to land as an October surprise. But Harris echoed the unsubstantiated claims and likened 45 to a fascist.
“I believe Donald Trump is a danger to the well-being and security of the United States of America,” the VP said.
Former Secretary of State and 2016 Democrat nominee Hillary Clinton told CNN host Kaitlin Collins that Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally harkens back to a 1939 rally hosted by the German American Bund- a pro-Hitler group.
“Sadly, here in America, the term fits,” Clinton remarked. “And you know, one other thing you’ll see next week, Kaitlin, is Trump actually reenacting the Madison Square Garden rally in 1939.”
This ridiculous comparison prompted a Holocaust survivor and Trump supporter, Jerry Wartski, to condemn the Nazi-Trump comparisons in a new political ad.
“Adolf Hitler invaded Poland when I was 9 years old. He murdered my parents and most of my family,” the 94-year-old Auschwitz survivor said in a story reported by The New York Post. “I know more about Hitler than Kamala will ever know in a thousand lifetimes.”
“For her to accuse President Trump of being like Hitler is the worst thing I ever heard in my 75 years living in the United States,” he continued. VP Harris, he added, “owes my parents and everybody else who was murdered by Hitler an apology for repeating this lie.”
Mr. Wartski said Jewish American voters should support former President Trump, given his pro-Israel record, and declared “...he’s a mensch.”
VP Harris and HRC aren’t the first Democrats to falsely paint Republicans as Nazis or fascists. But they won’t be the last.
Who was the first elected Democrat to smear their Republican opponent as a Nazi? That honor belongs to President Harry Truman. An October 1948 article in the New York Times printed the following headline: PRESIDENT LIKENS DEWEY TO HITLER AS FASCISTS' TOOL; Says When Bigots, Profiteers Get Control of Country They Select 'Front Man' to Rule DICTATORSHIP STRESSED Truman Tells Chicago Audience a Republican Victory Will Threaten U.S. Liberty TRUMAN SAYS GOP PERILS U.S. LIBERTY.
Although behind a paywall, readers will see this:
A Republican victory on election day will bring a Fascistic threat to American freedom that is even more dangerous than the perils from communism and extreme right "crackpots," President Truman asserted here tonight.
This definitely will change your view of Truman. It certainly has changed mine–and not for the better.
Since I got involved in politics 15 years ago, I heard that the political party I’ve voted for - the Republican Party - is made up of Nazis and fascists. Because of my Jewish ancestry, I was told I’d not be welcomed. That was patently false because I saw, for myself, the GOP is very pro-Israel and anti-authoritarianism.
Every time a major Republican or conservative who has been labeled a Nazi or fascist wins, that prediction never pans out while they serve in office, which brings me to President Trump and his alleged Nazi likeness. Suffice to say, he’s not Hitler. Not even close.
Unless you were living under a rock between 2017-2021, there were no extermination or death camps a la Adolf Hitler built by the Trump administration. I don’t recall millions of American Jews being deported to faraway places to die. Do you know which American president was anti-Semitic and didn’t allow Jews fleeing the Holocaust to land on our shores? Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a progressive Democrat admired and actively emulated by President Joe Biden.
Anti-Semitism, under the Trump administration, was kept at bay–unlike the Biden administration, which tolerates and excuses it in the wake of October 7th, 2023. Mr. Trump also has a daughter, son-in-law, and three grandchildren who are practicing Orthodox Jews.
Pray tell: Why would the most pro-Israel American president in modern history be Hitlerian? Why would Israel, the ancestral homeland for Jews and a refuge from the Holocaust, name a city in his honor if Trump is a Nazi? And if he is a threat to democracy and Hitler 2.0, why would vulnerable Senate Democrats suddenly positively feature him in ads?
Democrats crying wolf about Trump being Hitler, naturally, isn’t working in their favor. The opposite effect is occurring. By using Nazism in contexts outside the Holocaust, the American public is becoming desensitized to actual instances of anti-Semitism and contributing to the growing Holocaust denial we see in our country.
If you want to learn about actual Nazis and the carnage they leave behind in society, go visit former Nazi death camps. I recently visited Auschwitz-Birkenau - where one million Jews were massacred - this month and reported about it here at Townhall:
Equally chilling was walking into Block 11, where the Nazis first experimented with Zyklon-B gas used to murder Auschwitz victims in gas chambers. To also see where Jews were selected and later killed in gas chambers won’t ever escape my mind.
Democrats need to tone down the Nazi rhetoric and clean their house of Hamas sympathizers before screeching about Republicans and supposed fascist ties. Reserve the Hitler and Nazi talk for the dictator, his evil regime, and world leaders who actually echo his genocidal tendencies.