By Ruth Ben-Ghiat
Trump has long kept the Fascist flame burning in America. He started his 2016 campaign by retweeting a racist meme from the Nazi outlet The Daily Stormer (the publication of neo-Nazi Andrew Anglin).
Trump brought Mussolini admirer and far-right operative Steve Bannon into the White House to launch his own “revolution of reaction.” In 2017 his administration gave Holocaust deniers a big gift: a Holocaust Remembrance Day statement that made no mention of Jews.
The GOP politicians who now feign outrage at Trump's association with Nazis such as Nick Fuentes had no problem with his mainstreaming of extremism, perhaps because some of them are extremists themselves (Paul Gosar and Marjorie Taylor Greene have appeared with Fuentes).
It’s time to accept that the GOP, which was complicit with Trump's Jan. 6 attempted authoritarian takeover, has become a party that furthers Fascist values and practices. That means the hate crimes that have skyrocketed in America since 2016 will likely continue to expand.
However we define Fascism, remembering that its essence is violence is more important than ever.
More on the history of Trump and MAGA's fascist violence from Heather Cox Richardson: HCR on MAGA Violence.
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