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‘Pretty Explicit White Nationalism’: Trump National Security Strategy Document Leaves Critics Aghast
One critic described the document as "a pretty explicit defense of using the state as a means of enforcing white supremacy."
Dec 05, 2025
The Trump administration on Thursday released its official National Security Strategy, and many critics noted that it was loaded with rhetoric frequently used by white nationalists.
Some of the most inflammatory rhetoric in the document is aimed at US-allied European countries that supposedly face "the real and more stark prospect of civilizational erasure" within the next 20 years.
In particular, the document accuses the European Union of enacting policies "that undermine political liberty and sovereignty, migration policies that are transforming the continent and creating strife, censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition, cratering birthrates, and loss of national identities and self-confidence."
The document goes on to claim that "should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less," while emphasizing that US policy is to help "Europe to remain European, to regain its civilizational self-confidence, and to abandon its failed focus on regulatory suffocation."
Jon Henley, Europe correspondent for the Guardian, noted in a Friday report that the document "appears to espouse the racist 'great replacement' conspiracy theory, saying several countries risk becoming 'majority non-European.'" Henley added that the document "underscores the Trump administration's clear alignment with Europe’s far-right nationalist parties, whose policies centre on attacking supposed EU overreach and excessive non-EU migration."
Scott Horton, legal affairs and national security contributor to Harper's and an adjunct professor at Columbia Law School, wrote on Bluesky that the document "reads like something written by Vladimir Putin," given its depiction of Europe as being "degenerate and... racially adulterated through the in-migration of dark-skinned people."
Progressive activist Max Berger argued that the document "contains some pretty explicit white nationalism." He pointed to the document's support for dismantling diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives as a way to restore "a culture of competence."
Berger also flagged a section in the document that named "ending mass migration" as the top US national security priority, which he described as "a pretty explicit defense of using the state as a means of enforcing white supremacy."
Edmund Luce, a columnist for the Financial Times, also took note of the administration's emphasis on "competence and merit" in the document. This is ironic, Luce continued, because "this administration personifies the opposites" of those traits.
Journalist Michael Weiss argued in a post on X that the document shows that it is now official US policy to promote and assist far-right parties in Europe.
"[US Vice President] JD Vance's intervention in Germany's election, on behalf of [far-right party Alternative für Deutschland], was not a one-off," he wrote. "It is now ingrained in the U.S. National Security Strategy... Europe is be treated as enemy terrain to be destabilized by America's enabling of far-right parties."
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US Bishops Issue Rare Message Denouncing Trump's 'Indiscriminate Mass Deportation' Campaign
"Not since the civil rights era—and never with such unanimity—have American bishops so directly challenged a president’s policies," wrote one chronicler of the Catholic Church.
Nov 14, 2025
More than 200 Catholic bishops joined in condemning the Trump administration’s attacks on immigrants in an extraordinary statement on Wednesday.
The "special message" was issued at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' (USCCB) annual fall plenary, at which a majority of the nation's bishops were in attendance. They denounced the administration's "indiscriminate mass deportation" campaign, and called for an end to "dehumanizing rhetoric and violence."
Such a message is exceptionally rare. It was the first time in 12 years that the USCCB has issued such a joint statement, which it says is reserved for cases it deems "particularly urgent."
The statement was passed with 216 votes of approval, while just five bishops voted against it and three abstained. There are around 270 actively serving bishops in the US, meaning the vote represents the vast majority opinion among these high-ranking church officials. After the vote passed, the declaration was met with sustained applause.
The bishops laid out a litany of ways the Trump administration has violated the rights of immigrants over the past year and engaged in dehumanizing rhetoric directed at them.
"We are disturbed when we see among our people a climate of fear and anxiety around questions of profiling and immigration enforcement," the bishops said. "We are saddened by the state of contemporary debate and the vilification of immigrants. We are concerned about the conditions in detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care. We lament that some immigrants in the United States have arbitrarily lost their legal status. We are troubled by threats against the sanctity of houses of worship and the special nature of hospitals and schools. We are grieved when we meet parents who fear being detained when taking their children to school, and when we try to console family members who have already been separated from their loved ones."
The White House often claims that the immigrants it targets for deportation are violent criminals and terrorists. But the latest immigration data shows that around 72% of current detainees have no criminal convictions. Previous data from the libertarian Cato Institute has shown that 93% of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) book-ins were for non-criminals and nonviolent offenders.
Members of the Trump administration often engage in openly hostile rhetoric toward immigrants, including Vice President JD Vance, whose wife's parents immigrated from India, and who is a recent Catholic convert who often speaks about the role of faith in his politics.
Vance has described immigration to the US as a “historic invasion” of the nation. He has admitted to spreading false rumors about Haitian asylum seekers, who’d fled violence and instability in their home countries to settle legally in the US; during the 2024 presidential campaign, he amplified baseless claims that the migrants were eating the pets of their American neighbors. Vance has derided the idea of people from "different cultures" moving to the US, saying it's "totally reasonable and acceptable for American citizens to look at their next-door neighbors and say, 'I want to live next to people who I have something in common with,'" including speaking the same language.
The bishops thoroughly repudiated this worldview in their statement.
"Despite obstacles and prejudices, generations of immigrants have made enormous contributions to the well-being of our nation. We, as Catholic bishops, love our country and pray for its peace and prosperity. For this very reason, we feel compelled now in this environment to raise our voices in defense of God-given human dignity," they said. "Catholic teaching exhorts nations to recognize the fundamental dignity of all persons, including immigrants."
The bishops called for “meaningful reform of our nation’s immigration laws and procedures,” adding that “human dignity and national security are not in conflict” and that “both are possible if people of goodwill work together.”
"We recognize that nations have a responsibility to regulate their borders and establish a just and orderly immigration system for the sake of the common good," they said. "Without such processes, immigrants face the risk of trafficking and other forms of exploitation. Safe and legal pathways serve as an antidote to such risks."
The bishops' statement follows a call by Pope Leo XIV last week for "deep reflection" about the way immigrants are treated in the United States. The Chicago-born Pope, the first American to ever serve as the church's patriarch, said that "many people who have lived for years and years and years, never causing problems, have been deeply affected by what is going on right now.”
According to the American Immigration Council, more than 80% of the undocumented immigrants in the US in 2022 had been living in the country for over a decade. Meanwhile, numerous studies have found that both undocumented and documented immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native-born citizens.
The bishops’ denunciation comes at a time when Americans have turned considerably against Trump’s immigration policies: Where he had double-digit approval on the issue near the start of his presidency, at the beginning of November, net support for his immigration policy was at -7 according to polls from The Economist/YouGov.
As Christopher Hale, a writer who has chronicled Leo's papacy, wrote, the bishops' statement may be the strongest collective denunciation of a US president ever made by the Catholic hierarchy.
"Not since the civil rights era—and never with such unanimity—have American bishops so directly challenged a president’s policies," Hale said.
Also at the plenary, El Paso Bishop Mark Seitz, the chair of the USCCB's migration committee, announced the launch of the conference's "You Are Not Alone" Initiative, which aims to provide support and accompaniment to migrants at risk of deportation under the Trump administration.
"Our immigrant brothers and sisters… are living in a deep state of fear,” Seitz said. “Many are too afraid to work, send their children to school, or avail themselves to the sacraments.”
He added: "Because we’re pastors… we care about our people, and we care particularly for those who are most vulnerable and those who are most in need.”
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GOP Vermont State Senator Sam Douglass Resigns Over Hate-Filled Group Chat
Many social media users had the same reaction to Douglass' resignation: "Good riddance!"
Oct 19, 2025
Vermont state Sen. Sam Douglass is set to step down Monday after being exposed as a participant in a Young Republican group chat in which members—including at least one Trump administration official—exchanged hate-filled messages.
Douglass, a Republican, said in a statement Friday: “I must resign. I know that this decision will upset many, and delight others, but in this political climate I must keep my family safe.”
“If my governor asks me to do something, I will act, because I believe in what he’s trying to do,” the 27-year-old freshman lawmaker added, referring to Republican Vermont Gov. Phil Scott's call for him to step down.
“I love my state, my people, and I am deeply sorry for the offense this caused and that our state was dragged into this," Douglass added.
Douglass is the only known elected official involved in a leaked Telegram chat first reported by Politico on Tuesday in which members of Young Republican chapters in four states exchanged racist, anti-LGBTQ+, and misogynistic messages, including quips about an "epic" rape and killing people in Nazi gas chambers.
Group chat participants included Michael Bartels, a senior adviser in the office of general counsel at the US Small Business Administration.
The chat included one message in which Douglass equated being Indian with poor hygiene, and another exchange in which his wife, Vermont Young Republican national committee member Brianna Douglass, admonishes the organization for “expecting the Jew to be honest.”
Prominent Republicans have rallied in defense of what Vice President JD Vance called the private jokes of "young boys"—who are apparently all in their 20s and 30s.
The fallout from the group chat leak has cost a majority of participants in the Telegram chat their jobs or employment offers.
Most prominently, ex-New York State Young Republicans chair Peter Giunta—who posted "I love Hitler"—was fired from his job as chief of staff to New York Assemblyman Michael Reilly (R-62).
Many social media users had the same reaction to Douglass' resignation: "Good riddance!"
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