A New Kind of Fascism
I’ve resisted using the word until now, but something menacing and novel is taking shape with the possibility of a second Trump term.
For some years, a variety of news commentators and academics have called Donald Trump a fascist. I was one of those who resisted using that term. I thought it had long been abused by casual, imprecise applications, and as a historian of Nazi Germany, I did not think Trumpism was anywhere close to crossing the threshold of that comparison. I still deny that Trump’s presidency was fascist—but I’m concerned that if he wins another trip to the White House, he could earn the label.
Fascism was most fully exemplified by the regimes of Benito Mussolini and Adolf
