Is Trump a Fascist?
From "Drain the Swamp" to the leader cult to "the enemy within," Trump renews Fascist ideology and methods
There Trump stood, eyes closed, swaying to the music, as the minutes ticked by and his handlers tried to salvage the situation, likely wondering what on earth had happened to him. He had started his Oct. 14 town hall in Oaks, Pennsylvania, a town hall being an opportunity for people to ask him questions. Then people started to faint in the overheated room.
“Personally, I enjoy this, you know,” Trump commented callously, as medical personnel wheeled people out on stretchers. “We lose weight. We can do this, lose four or five pounds, it’s okay with me.” Then he abruptly shut down the questions, telling his aides to put on some music. For the next half hour, he remained mostly silent, surrounded by his followers, as his favorite tunes played.
Many observers felt that Trump was having some kind of episode, and the incident sparked a new round of questions about his stability and mental capacity. “It shows that he is increasingly detached from reality,” posted Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI).
That is certainly true. Yet I also read this as Trump, knowing he is in the fight of his life, taking refuge in plain sight of everyone into a specific kind of reality that is familiar from the history of authoritarianism: the artificial reality he has created with his fortress of lies. During this musical “pause,” he was basking in a cocoon of adoration, standing in a protected environment of his own design. His eyes closed, his favorite music playing, he was in his safe space.
As I write in Strongmen, “who would the strongman past and present be without those crowds that form the raw material of his propaganda? His secret is that he needs them far more than they need him.”
The bond that Trump has constructed with his followers, and the durability of his personality cult, is one measure of Trump’s deployment of the Fascist arsenal.
I stand by what I wrote in 2021: in some ways, the label of Fascism is too reductive for Trump, who praises Communist dictators as much as he praises the Fascistic leaders Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orban. More recently, with his suggestion that the U.S. military could be used on “the enemy within,” i.e. for domestic repression, Trump channels Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet more than Adolf Hitler or Benito Mussolini, who had their blackshirt and brownshirt militias and paramilitaries and secret police for domestic operations.
Yet it is beyond doubt that Trump has provided a new stage and a new context for Fascist ideologies and practices, many of which have roots in American extremist traditions and histories as well.
Tracing these inheritances has been a theme of Lucid essays. From his corruption-concealing slogan “Drain the Swamp,” borrowed from Il Duce, to his elevation of neo-Nazis and platforming of anti-Semites and Holocaust deniers, to the Fascist spectacles that have marked his campaign from the kickoff event in Waco, TX, onward, Trump has intentionally drawn on the enduring appeal of Fascism.
And so we return to Trump’s behavior at the Oaks, PA rally: the demagogue listening to his crowd acclaiming him is a staple of Fascist history. After Joseph Goebbels discovered that Hitler was a wooden and boring speaker in the recording studio and came alive only when encountering the energy and adulation of crowds, he recorded Hitler’s speeches at rallies and other public occasions.
As for Mussolini, he would often pause during speeches to let the roar of the crowd wash over him, jutting his chin out and nodding at the visual and aural spectacle. Trump had a similar self-satisfied and beatific expression at the rally. It is perhaps no accident that behind the former president was a banner that read: “Trump Was Right About Everything.” Mussolini’s slogan? “Mussolini Is Always Right.”
The similarities are myriad, and it was my knowledge of the history of Fascism that allowed me to see how dangerous Trump was from the start. It is telling that those who know the most about the threats Trump represents, because of their access to intelligence and national security information, are now speaking out and labeling Trump as “fascist to the core.”
That is a quote from Gen. Mark Milley, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as cited in a new book by Bob Woodward, to consider alongside former Secretary of State, Senator, and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s labeling of Trump’s recent rhetoric about immigrants and other “enemies” as “blatantly fascist.”
Trump is what a Fascist demagogue looks like in 2024 America, and Trumpism aims to defeat our democracy and establish a form of governance that would have strong similarities with Fascism as well as other experiences of authoritarianism. Those are the stakes of this election.
We compared Trump's attacks on minorities, vilifying the LGBTQ, threats of violence and deportation against those of Hitler. Check this interactive chart "Who’s Trump Demonizing Next? Check the Fascist Project 2025 Playbook."
https://thedemlabs.org/2024/10/14/trump-demonizes-immigrants-minorities-fascist-project-2025-playbook/
Especially noteworthy are the words of - Pastor Niemoller poem (adapted) who spoke out against the Nazis at the time.
First they came for the Transgender and I did not speak out, because I was not Transgender.
Then they came for the Jews and I did not speak out, because I was not a Jew
Then they came for the Muslims and I did not speak out, because I was not a Muslim
Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me...
I was waiting to hear your thoughts on this! I’d appreciate anything more you might say about the significance of “spectacle” in the making of an autocrat. I watched the clips of this recent episode and felt uneasy because it had overtones of a religious service at some points the music, the swaying, the hands raised and I just … 😬.