Already during Trump's first tenure, he gained importance the alt-right movement, gathering the utmost right of white supremacy. His leader, Richard B. Spencer, is known for his neo-Nazi views. He promoted the conspiracy explanation of the large Replacement, according to which white Americans are to be disposed of by cultural minorities, called for cultural cleansing and the creation of a racially unified state. Celebrating Trump's victory, during the 2016 alt-right conference in Washington, D.C., he shouted “Heil Trump!” and the crowd answered him with a Roman salute.
“One Nation Subject to God”
Trump's first word coincided with a fresh wave of right-wing extremism. Paramilitary organisations specified as Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, 3 Percent or Boogaloo Boys. Among another things, they took part in the attack on Capitol 6 January 2021, erstwhile Trump refused to admit the results of the losing presidential election. This event was widely compared to the Munich Regiment.
The second word gives even more reason to compare with the 1920s in Europe. During the first 3 months Trump signed nearly 100 executive decrees, 23 on the first day of office. There are mass deportations of illegal immigrants, even those surviving in America for decades. The kidnapping of people by the ICE and keeping them in detention centers, as symbolized by the “disappearance” of pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil. Sending people without court sentences to concentration camps in El Salvador. Abolition of the Constitution's "earthright" granting citizenship to all persons born in the United States.
The victims are mostly blacks, Hispanics and people from the mediate East. Their position is irrelevant. They may be illegal immigrants, or they may be citizens of the United States. The crucial thing is that they have the incorrect skin color.
Let us add to this the withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, the return to fossil fuels extraction, the dismantling of national agencies under the pretext of seeking savings – what he does Elon Musk and appointed by him DOGE department – whether at last conservative backlash, fight against the "ideology of woke“ and the elimination of all equality programmes. The cherry on the cake is the establishment in the White home of the authoritative Office of Faith, whose task is to "root anti-Christian prejudices".
Trump has consistently implemented the script included in Project 2025 – counting almost a 1000 pages of publication of the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation. It is based on a bulwark explanation of the Constitution, according to which the president of the United States exercises full executive power, the alleged executive theory, ruling by decrees omitting the institutions of the state, the legislature, and even the ultimate Court, now planted by Trumpists. The aim is to remove from the U.S. political strategy all fuses and control and balance mechanisms (check and balances) and focus in hands A Trump of all power, giving him de facto dictatorial or even royal powers.
The goal is to transform the United States into a quasi-authoritarian state in the spirit of Christian nationalism. Without abortion and divorce, without sex ideology, critical race explanation and "cultural Marxism", without any restrictions on access to arms. There are only 2 sexes and “one nation subject to God.”
Taking into account besides territorial claims against Canada and Greenland, plans for military intervention to take over the Panama Canal, customs wars made under any pretext, bombastic gestures specified as the transformation of the Gulf of Mexico into the Gulf of America, treatment of Ukraine as a banana republic, threats directed by Vice president J. D. Vance The 47th president of the United States is an orange incarnation of Benito Mussolini.
The symbol of America's fascism is the Roman salute that Elon Musk performed at Trump's inauguration. erstwhile advisor to the president supported the German AfD Party, which openly refers to Nazism, calling it “the top hope for Germany”. any effort to defend Musk, persuading that he was not hazing, but doing Bellamy’s salute, deluded by a Roman greeting. Since the late 19th century, this motion has accompanied a pledge of allegiance to the flag which American children inactive recite at the beginning of the lesson. The problem is that Bellamy himself was a Christian socialist, and in 1942 legislature replaced the "salut to the flag" with a motion at his heart due to association with fascism.
Silver Shirts and German-American Bund
It may seem that the U.S. was infected by an external Fascism virus. We associate them with the defence of democracy and human rights. These values were, of course, treated instrumentally – as during the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan. The states supported right-wing dictatorships, including fascist dictatorships around the world, but this was explained by the cold war, the necessity to fight totalitarianism. There was quite a few hypocrisy behind it, for which American imperialism was hidden, but according to the maxim of Prince de La Rochefoucaulda, “hypocrisy is simply a tribute to virtue by transgression.” America can be accused of a lot, but I don't think it's flirting with fascism – she's the 1 who beat Hitler. Right?
In fact, fascism is an integral part of the past of the United States. In the 1930s, there were 2 organizations in the United States that could be described as clearly fascist – the Silver Legion of America and the German-American Bund. The Silver Legion of America, besides called Silver T-shirts, was founded in 1931, on the day of Hitler's swearing-in as Chancellor of the Reich, by a spiritist and movie script creator, William Dudley Pelley. Pelley wanted to make a fascist organization like Italian and German, but taking into account American specificity. Legionaries wore silver shirts with the red letter “L” sewn at their heart. It meant love, loyalty and liberation (loyalty, love, libation). Pelley's goal was to make a Christian theocracy based on white Protestants, in which there would be no area for Jews and coloreds. During the highest period, the organization had 15,000 members, and Pelley himself competed in the 1936 presidential election – however, he suffered a defeat, scoring only a fewer 1000 votes per country.
While the Silver Shirts were expected to carry out an American version of Fascism, the German-American Bund (German-American Society) was simply a national socialist organization, consisting exclusively of Americans of German origin. It was formed in 1936 as rebranding the Friends of fresh Germany, the authoritative wing of the NSDAP for America, uniting various fascist organizations. However, it was not the Nazi V column in the US. The German-American Bund promoted the ideas of German-American relationship based on a common "Aryan origin". During a large rally at Madison Square Garden in the mediate of the stage, a multi-meter image of George Washington was set up, whose Bunds considered the icon of their movement, the “first fascist”.
Silver shirts and the German-American Bund were not disbanded until 1941, after the nipponese attacked Pearl Harbor erstwhile the Americans joined planet War II against the Axis. It's like Fascism isn't the problem, it's the suspicion of collaboration with the enemy.
Ku Klux Clan
The US did not gotta import Fascism from Europe. They had their own tradition, rising from the frustrated mediate class, proclaiming the superiority of the white race, fighting conservatism, spiritual fanaticism, and cultural nationalism. The most apparent typical of this tradition is Ku Klux Clan. Founded in 1865, erstwhile the civilian War ended, he concentrated southerners opposed to the regulation of the North and the abolition of slavery. The group, called “the first terrorist organization in the United States”, attacked freemen, Jews, Catholics and representatives of the national authorities. KKK was broken by Ulysses S. Grant's efforts in 1871.
He was reborn in 1915. His resurrection was the wandering preacher William Joseph Simmons, who had nothing to do with the first Clan – inspired by the movie The birth of a nation, He left a fewer months earlier. The painting, considered to be 1 of the most influential in the past of cinematography, tells the communicative of 2 families torn apart by the civilian War, which, in the face of the emancipation of blacks, unite through marriage, reuniting a divided nation – in a white guess. Simmons not so much led to the rebirth of KKK as the spirit of KKK was reborn in Simmons. The organization, exclusively a group of white Protestants, grew into nostalgia behind the Confederate times and opposition to immigration. An crucial component was besides anti-Catholicism and anti-Semitism, resulting from Protestant fundamentalism and aimed at immigrants from Europe, mainly from Catholic countries and judaic communities.
The second Ku Klux Clan was a powerful and influential organization. In the 1920s, he could have had up to 5 million members, so all political forces had to number on him. It was the force from the KKK that led to the passing of the anti-immigration bill in 1924. interior divisions and criminal scandals caused the clan to lose importance in the 1930s, but it operated until 1944. It was only by defeating Hitler by the US that it was essential to dissolve an organization proclaiming the superiority of the white race – not due to the thought itself, but due to its compromise by Nazi Germany.
The 3rd Clan was revived after the war as a consequence to the civilian rights movement. This time actively fought by the national authorities, he did not regain his erstwhile strength. However, sustaining the legacy of white supremacy and American chauvinism, it was an inspiration for subsequent fascist and neo-Nazi groups in America from the second half of the 20th century until today.
Eternal Fascism
If America under Trump's regulation is Fascist, then it's not a repeat of history. Rather, we are dealing with the continuation of American "eternal fascism", utilizing the word Umberto Eco. Trumpism, of course, uses the “conquer” of Fascism and the right-wing authoritarianism of the 1920s and 1930s, as well as the post-war one. He besides draws handfuls from contemporary conspiracy theories, from ideology specified as “dark enlightenment”, 4chan and manosphere. However, the core remains unchanged. It is simply a worldview founded on the genocide of the indigenous people of America, the slavery of black people and the exploitation of migrants from all over the world. Its main elements are expentialism, or belief in the uniqueness of the United States against the background of another nations, fundamentalist Protestantism, primacy of private property, and yet – belief in the superiority of the white race.
The problem with Fascism in America won't end with Trump. American fascism erstwhile gets stronger, erstwhile in reverse, but is always present. And this fact, not analogies to the 1920s, should be the most worrying.
