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militarization
Hitler's First 100 Days — And Trump's
In the evening of January 30, a bitterly cold winter day, the victorious Nazis staged a massive torchlight parade through Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate which lasted over four hours and included some 30,000 uniformed Storm Troopers (SA). Perhaps as many as 1 million Berliners, around one-fourth of the city population, turned out to witness the Nazi spectacle. Among them were a few protestors who were summarily beaten up by the SA, a small taste of what was in store for dissenters. The march ended at the Presidential Palace and Reich Chancellory where Hitler and President Hindenburg stood together as a symbol of national reconciliation in what was portrayed as the “rebirth of the nation.” Among the songs echoing from the massive crowd was the Song of Germany with its infamous opening refrain of “Deutschland, Deutschland Über Alles.” Several other large pro-Nazi rallies were held across Germany in subsequent days, as were a few sporadic counter-demonstrations organized by Social Democrats and Communists.
By contrast, the parade celebrating Trump’s second inauguration, also on a bitterly cold day, was held indoors at the Capital One Arena. The inauguration ceremony itself was also held indoors, at the Capitol Rotunda, the site of a violent Trump-inspired putsch attempt four years earlier. Several major corporations and individual billionaires donated $1 million each to help fund the extravaganza attended by a number of authoritarian foreign leaders, including the co-leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. Similar to the nationalistic themes sounded at Hitler’s installment, Trump claimed his presidency marked the “beginning of a Golden Age for America.” As was also the case for the Führer, Trump gave voice that day to the Messiah myth claiming that his life was spared from an assassin’s bullet because he “was saved by God to make America great again.”
Fascist Laws and Orders
Within a week after he moved into the Reich Chancellory, Hitler reportedly declared “I’m never leaving here,” and then promulgated a series of anti-democratic orders to ensure fascist rule in perpetuity. The first major one came on the day after the convenient burning of the Reichstag on February 27, which provoked Hitler to declare at the scene of the crime, “We will show no mercy anymore; whoever gets in our way will be slaughtered.” The “Reichstag Fire Decree for the Protection of the People and State” nullified many civil liberties; expanded protective custody; and sanctioned removal of state governments. It was used to imprison anyone considered an opponent of Nazism and suppress publications deemed unfriendly to the Nazi cause. Significantly extending the repression was the “Malicious Practices Act” of March 21 and the “Enabling Act” of March 23. On April 7, six days after a nationwide boycott of businesses owned by Jews, the Hitler regime enacted the “Law for Restoration of Professional Civil Service,” which purged all Jews as well as those German citizens considered disloyal from civil service and teaching positions. Thousands of Germans immediately lost their jobs and others lost government contracts, as the mythical “peoples community” (Volksgemeinschaft) was systemically converted into a racist Aryan “community of blood” (Blutgemeinschaft), exemplified by the “Law for the Prevention of Genetically Damaged Offspring” enacted in mid-July.
Within a week after he moved into the Reich Chancellory, Hitler reportedly declared “I’m never leaving here,” and then promulgated a series of anti-democratic orders to ensure fascist rule in perpetuity.
May Day 1933 in Nazi Germany was anything but a celebration of labor militancy and liberation from capitalist class rule. The Hitler regime declared this “Day of National Labor” to be a grand celebration of a rejuvenated nation, one which attracted the active participation of millions throughout the country. On the next day, the Nazis outlawed all free trade unions and integrated all German workers into a newly created German Labor Front led by a rabid anti-communist. By May 9, day 100 of the Hitler dictatorship there was no democracy or viable open opposition left in Germany; any resistance was driven underground or in exile. The fascist regime of terror proceeded triumphantly with a massive book burning on its 101st day in power.
Similar to Hitler’s stated intent to protect the German people from “criminals” with the draconian Reichstag Fire Decree and Enabling Act, Trump resorted to the 18th century Alien Enemies Act to protect the American people from allegedly vicious criminal gangs of foreigners, particularly Venezuelans. With the approval of SCOTUS, despite due process violations and cases of mistaken identity, those rounded up under provisions of the AEA were sent to the notorious concentration camp, CECOT, in El Salvador, likely never to return. Trump’s intense antagonism toward immigrants manifested itself on his first day in office when he announced his intent to end birthright citizenship; declared a national emergency on the U.S.-Mexican border; and barred asylum for people arriving through the southern border.
In mid-February, he fired 18 immigration judges; eliminated federal funds for undocumented immigrants; and proposed using U.S. military bases to detain targeted immigrants. In early March, he designated English as the official U.S. language, and announced plans to send an additional 3,000 troops to the southwestern border. Underscoring the racist nature of his immigration policies, he offered White South African farmers expedited U.S. citizenship, but expelled the Black South African ambassador after his government criticized Trump’s policies. In late March, Homeland Security revoked temporary protected status (TPS) for 532,000 people of color (Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans) and ordered their exit by late April. In early April, he revoked visas held by South Sudanese passport holders. Especially harshly targeted for deportation were pro-Palestinian students, activists whom Trump’s Attorney General Bondi ominously called “domestic terrorists.”
A demonstrator holds a placard showing a picture of US President-elect Donald Trump modified to add a swastika and an Adolf Hitler-style moustache during a protest outside the US Embassy in London November 9, 2016 against Trump after he was declared the winner of the US presidential election. - (Photo by Ben Stansall / AFP via Getty Images)
Purging the federal government of employees deemed disloyal was a nearly daily occurrence during Trump’s first 100 days, as was seeking retribution from law firms and officials critical of Trump’s actions. In late January, Trump fired the NLRB general counselor, a Democratic board member; fired dozens of Inspector Generals; and removed Democratic EEOC members. In early February, he fired 60 State Department contractors; fired the Director of CFPB; ordered AG Bondi to lead a task force designed to “eradicate anti-Christian bias” in the federal government; fired the head of the FEC; appointed loyalists as members of an independent advisory board on espionage; fired the inspector general for USAID; fired several workers at FEMA; directed that all Biden-era U.S. Attorneys be terminated. In mid-March, he fired 19 workers at NASA; replaced the top lawyer for the IRS; and fired two Democratic managers at the FTC. In early April, he fired the Vice Admiral in Greenland who was critical of Vice President JD Vance; and he removed a DOJ lawyer who questioned the decision to unlawfully deport a Maryland man to El Salvador. After a meeting with far-right activist Laura Loomer, who claimed the head of NSA was disloyal, he fired him. In March, Trump targeted a series of law firms perceived as foes, including the one at which Kamala Harris’ husband worked.
Project 2025, euphemistically called “Mandate for Leadership” by its misanthropic composers, the far-right Heritage Foundation, is a handbook for dismantling democracy and undermining social welfare in America, and its notorious recommendations have been largely followed by the Trump regime during its first 100 days. On January 24, Trump reinstated an anti-abortion policy and revoked two Biden directives designed to improve access to abortion. On February 13, he asked RFK Jr. to study the safety of the abortion pill, mifepristone. Project 2025 calls for ending medication abortion, and the Nazis considered abortion (by Aryan women) to be murder. Also in accordance with Project 2025, Trump signed an executive order to abolish the Department of Education (which he identified as a “big con job”) on March 20, and sharply reduced staffing at NOAA in late February. On the chopping block erected by the Heritage Foundation were also the Head Start program; federal student loans; climate change protection; child labor protection; the EPA's Office of Environmental Justice; and food assistance programs.
Adding to the long list of draconian measures to be enacted were the anti-democratic recommendations of the Capital Research Center, a right-wing think tank with access to Trump’s White House. Founded during the Reagan years by a former Vice President of the Heritage Foundation and funded in large measure by the far-right Koch family, CRC drew up a hit list of 150 groups it considered “pro-terrorist” and recommended their dissolution. Exclusively included in its cross hairs are a good section of the American Left, such as National Lawyers Guild; Democratic Socialists of America; CAIR; Jewish Voice for Peace; Code Pink; Black Alliance for Peace; and Center for Constitutional Rights. Especially singled out for deportation are members of Students for Justice in Palestine, “the group by far most responsible for the current anti-Israel protest movement,” according to the CRC. After providing testimony before several Congressional hearings in 2024, CRC president Scott Walter briefed White House officials about his research findings and deportation recommendations in late March 2025. Shortly afterwards, several pro-Palestinian activists were arrested and deported.
Whitewashing History
The Nazi doctrine of Aryan supremacy necessarily denigrated other racial and ethnic groups as inferior, even subhuman, and also devalued the role of liberating ideals and revolutionary movements, such as The Enlightenment and the 1789 French Revolution. In April 1933, Hitler’s newly appointed Minister of Propaganda, Josef Goebbels, declared that the whole aim of the new regime was “to erase 1789 from memory.” To accomplish this monumental scrubbing of history and culture, books antithetical to Nazi ideology were routinely burned; non-Aryan educators banned; pedagogy restructured; and scholastic texts rewritten. Within its first year, the Hitler regime enacted a series of discriminatory laws directed against non-Aryans. On April 25, the “Law Against Overcrowding Schools and Institutions in Higher Education” severely restricted academic admission of non-Aryans. A few weeks later, an “Expert Committee on Questions of Population and Racial Policy,” a conglomeration of prominent Nazi white supremacists under Heinrich Himmler established the framework for marginalization of non-Aryans and implementation of eugenics. Within a month, the sterilization law was passed.
To accomplish this monumental scrubbing of history and culture, books antithetical to Nazi ideology were routinely burned; non-Aryan educators banned; pedagogy restructured; and scholastic texts rewritten.
On his first day in office, Trump issued an order “Restoring Names that Honor American Greatness” designed “to promote the extraordinary heritage of our Nation and ensure that future generations of American citizens celebrate the legacy of American heroes”; he then proceeded to rename the highest mountain in Alaska Mt. McKinley and declared that the Gulf of Mexico be called the Gulf of America. A week later, he issued an order “Celebrating America’s 250th Birthday,” which established Task Force 250, housed in the Department of Defense, to take “actions to honor the history of our great Nation, including the naming of 250 Americans to he honored in the National Garden of American Heroes. With the executive order “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” enacted in early April, Trump ironically asserts that over the past decade there has been “a concerted and widespread effort to rewrite our Nation’s history, replacing objective facts with a distorted narrative driven by ideology rather than truth,” and then proceeds to do exactly that. “It is the policy of my Administration,” the order states, “to restore Federal sites dedicated to history, including parks and museums, to solemn and uplifting public monuments that remind Americans of our extraordinary heritage, consistent progress toward becoming a more perfect Union, and unmatched record of advancing liberty, prosperity, and human flourishing.” To begin to accomplish this whitewashing of American history he ordered that all “improper ideology” be removed from the Smithsonian museums and National Zoo, and that funding for any exhibit or programs which “degrade shared American values” or “divide Americans based on race” be prohibited.
Restricting Sexuality
Nazi ideology regarded homosexuality as a disease on the national community and homosexuals as “enemies of the State.” Transgender and other gender-affirming identities were regarded as mental illnesses. In a 1928 survey, the Nazi Party (NSDAP) officially stated that “anyone who even thinks of homosexual love is our enemy.” Paragraph 175 of the German Penal Code, adopted in 1871, criminalized sexual relations between males; in 1935, the Hitler regime broadened the law to include any “lewd act” (e.g. mutual masturbation) and sharply increased penalties for violations. In February 1933, the Prussian Ministry of Interior ordered Berlin police to shut down all establishments catering to “persons who indulge in unnatural sexual practices,” an order which quickly spread to many other cities. On May 6, the SA raided and destroyed the Institute for Sexual Science in Berlin. Persecution of homosexuals and transgender persons sharply escalated in subsequent years. In 1936, Himmler established the Reich Central Office for Combating Homosexuality and Abortion. In the years between 1937 and 1939, some 95,000 German men were arrested for homosexuality and imprisoned, many in concentration camps to die.
On the first day of his second presidency, Trump announced recognition of only two sexes, male and female, and then repeatedly targeted the transgender community in the following weeks. In rapid succession, he required transgender women to be housed in prisons for men; ordered removal of third gender options on IDs; moved toward pushing transgender people out of the military; ordered federal agencies to end programs that recognize transgender people; aimed to prevent transgender students from participating in women sports; removed reference to transgender people from National Park Service websites; ordered the CDC to review gender ideology; denied student loans relief to workers aiding transgender youth; and moved to phase out gender-affirming medical treatment for veterans. In mid-April, Trump sued the State of Maine for allowing transgender people to participate in women’s sports. In late January, he rolled back protections for LGBTQ students and required federal workers to remove pronouns from their email signatures.
Celebrating Racism
Racism in Nazi Germany, much of it inspired by Jim Crow laws in America, directly or indirectly infested every action of the Hitler regime. Nazism had absolutely no tolerance for diversity, equity, and inclusion. Neither does the Trump regime. Unleashing his rancid racism with a vengeance, Trump took over 20 separate actions against DEI programs in the first 100 days of his reign. Terminating all DEI programs across the federal government was among his numerous orders on Day One. Ten days, later he even blamed DEI policies for a deadly midair crash between an Army helicopter and a commercial airline over the Potomac River. In his lengthy bombastic speech to Congress on March 4, Trump boasted that his regime “ended the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government and, indeed, the private sector and our military” and “we removed the poison of critical race theory from our public schools”.
Suppressing Dissent
Even before the 1933 passage of the Editor’s Law, which permitted only journalists who refrained from criticizing the Nazi regime to continue to work in their profession, the German press was systematically forced to conform to Hitler’s views. After the rigged election on March 5 and passage of the Civil Service Law on April 17, German newspapers increasingly self-censored themselves and remained silent about the unfolding atrocities. On March 9, a prominent anti-fascist journalist, Fritz Gerlich, was arrested and eventually ended up in the Dachau concentration camp, where he was murdered in late June.
America’s mainstream press, routinely identified by Trump as an “enemy of the people,” increasingly came under scrutiny and suppression in his second reign. Echoing the censorship sentiment of the Nazi Editor Law, Trump restricted the White House press pool to only those journalists hand-picked by him. In early February, he called for CBS to lose its broadcasting license, a charge he repeated two months later after the network aired a “60 Minutes” broadcast he disliked. On February 23, he called MSNBC a “threat to democracy,” and in mid-March he cancelled all contracts held by key news wire services (AP, Reuters, Agence France-Presse) with Voice of America. In late March, a manager of Trump’s re-election campaign sued The Daily Beast for defamation.
Echoing the censorship sentiment of the Nazi Editor Law, Trump restricted the White House press pool to only those journalists hand-picked by him.
In addition to a $20 billion lawsuit against CBS News, Trump has sued the Des Moines Register, CNN, and the Pulitzer Prize Board. In late January, Trump’s FCC Chairman ordered an investigation into NPR and PBS, public news outlets which a Trump devotee, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, labeled “communist.” In mid-April Trump asked Congress to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting by $1.1 billion. To make sure another liberal institution, The Kennedy Center, came under his far-right ideological control, he appointed himself as Chair and named two Fox News members to its Board. The National Endowment for Humanities had most of its grant programs cancelled, and its chair was forced to resign. Trump’s counterterrorism czar, Sebastian Gorka, asserted critics of the deportation actions of his boss are “on the side of the terrorists” and might be criminally charged for “aiding and abetting” terrorism.
Trump’s repression of dissent and criticism extended beyond the media to include judges, prosecutors, and law firms. After calling federal judge James Boasberg a “radical Left lunatic” for blocking his unlawful deportation scheme, Trump said he should be disbarred and impeached. He also suggested federal judges be removed from cases reviewing his policies. In late February, he fired prosecutors involved in cases against him or the January 6 rioters. In late March, he fired two longtime career prosecutors in Los Angeles and Memphis, and in mid-February he directed all Biden-era U.S. Attorneys be terminated. He also fired the directors of the Office of Special Counsel and Office of Government Ethics. In late April, the FBI arrested a judge in Wisconsin for obstructing a deportation case.
Militarization
Nazi Germany increased its military spending faster than any other state in peacetime, with the share of military spending rising from 1% to 10% of national income in the first two years of the Hitler regime alone. Just after his first 100 days, Hitler approved a financial budget for his growing war machine of 35 billion Reichmarks over eight years; the entire national income of Germany in 1933 was 43 billion Reichmarks. Military spending for his first year in office was budgeted three times larger than spending on all civilian work creation measures in 1932 and 1933 combined.
Within the first week of his second presidency, Trump issued militaristic orders for “Restoring America’s Fighting Force”; “The Iron Dome for America”; and “Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness.” That third order identified the U.S. military as the world’s “most lethal and effective fighting force,” and called for a “singular force on developing a warrior ethos” throughout the military. On March 21, he unveiled a new stealth bomber, the F-47. On April 10, he bragged that “we have a weapon that no one has a clue what it is, and this is the most powerful weapon in the world, which is more powerful than anyone even close.” Three days earlier, he announced a $1 trillion Pentagon budget for FY 2026, a 12% increase ($107 billion) over FT 2025. In its publication of all military-related expenditures, the War Resisters League claims Trump’s 2026 military budget constitutes 24% ($1.3 trillion) of all federal spending, and past military expenditures account for 26% ($1.4 trillion) of the federal budget. Accordingly, Trump’s real military spending accounts for 50% of the entire federal budget, a colossal military expenditure despite the fact that the Pentagon failed a 2024 audit, the seventh consecutive failure.
On June 14, the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army and his 79th birthday, Trump is reportedly planning to hold a massive 4-mile-long military parade in the nation’s capital. On February 4, he drafted instructions to obliterate Iran if the Islamic Republic assassinated him; the same day he proposed a U.S. takeover of Gaza. A month later, he issued an ultimatum to Hamas: “either free all hostages or die.”
Privatization
Despite its nominal commitment to socialism, an economic system based upon public ownership of means of production, the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), aka the Nazi Party, introduced a radical program of privatization of steel, banks, mining, shipping, railroads, and welfare organizations. Among the industries privatized within the early years of Hitler’s dictatorship were five major commercial banks; the United Steelworks, the nation’s second largest enterprise; German Railways; Upper Silesian coalminers; and the German Shipbuilding and Engineering Company. Privatization generated significant revenue for the Nazi war machine and also helped solidify political support from the super-rich.
Trump’s enthusiasm for privatization echoes the Nazi goals.
Trump’s enthusiasm for privatization echoes the Nazi goals. Following the Project 2025 playbook, he explored the possibility of privatizing the USPS, the Social Security Administration, and Medicare. With the confirmation of Dr. Oz, a fervent supporter of Medicare Advantage private alternative to traditional Medicare, as head of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services on April 4, the effort to privatize Medicare was significantly accelerated. Similarly, privatizing health services for veterans received a big boost with the appointment of a new Department of Defense chief, Pete Hegseth, who publicly promoted shifting more vets to VA-funded private care. Social Security remains in the crosshairs of privatization advocates in the Trump regime. DOGE cancelled leases for 45 Social Security offices and reduced its ten regional offices to four. In early April, the head of the Social Security Administration asserted that to streamline operations it would be necessary to “outsource nonessential functions to industry experts.” In early February, Trump fired more than 100 workers at Fannie Mae, and announced plans to privatize both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. A month later he proposed the privatization of Amtrak, the Transportation Security Administration, and the federal student loan program. Also on the auction block are public lands targeted for massive sell-offs to wealthy private investors and developers.
Synchronization
In a major push to consolidate more power, the Hitler regime enacted laws introducing a national policy of Gleichschlatung, coordination of all government operations and social organizations under Nazi control. As a result, state parliaments not under Nazi control were dissolved; every public expression of pluralism was disallowed; political parties critical of Nazism were abolished; all Jewish and Social Democratic officials were fired; and all cultural and judicial institutions were aligned with Nazi ideology or disbanded.
The real purpose of DOGE is to consolidate power, synchronize government operations, and privatize government services as well as dismantle agencies long hated by the Far Right.
Trump announced the formation of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) on his first day in office with the ostensible purpose of saving American taxpayers around a total of $2 trillion by rooting out alleged massive fraud, waste, and abuse in the federal government. Its purported purpose is itself a fraud. At most, only 15% of that savings goal is within its grasp. The real purpose of DOGE is to consolidate power, synchronize government operations, and privatize government services as well as dismantle agencies long hated by the Far Right.
Nine of the government agencies targeted by DOGE are highlighted in Project 2025. Its former co-chair, Vivek Ramaswamy, explicitly used the term “synchronizing” government operations when announcing a key purpose of DOGE. Elon Musk, the Nazi-saluting Chair of DOGE, revealingly used the same term in a bizarre podcast with Trump disciple Senator Ted Cruz. The Nazi policy of Gleichschlatung is commonly translated as synchronization. The executive order establishing DOGE directed its administrators to “work with Agency Heads to promote inter-operability between agency networks…and facilitate responsible data collection and synchronization.” Technological synchronization appears to be a prelude to sociological synchronization, i.e. Gleichschlatung.
Militant Protectionism
Although protectionism through tariffs had been an official policy of Germany since the late 19th century, Hitler’s regime escalated militant foreign trade relations to a new level in an attempt to achieve autarky, economic self-sufficiency. The seeds for this new economic policy, formally adopted in mid-1934, were laid during Hitler’s first 100 days. In a February 11 New York Times article entitled “Danes See Hitler Waging Tariff War,” a German official is quoted as saying “Tariffs are the only emergency defense of my country.” That “emergency defense” received a major boost a month later with the appointment of Hjalmar Schacht as President of the Central Bank; Schacht was widely credited with saving Germany from devastating hyperinflation during the Weimar Republic.
The aggressive use of tariffs by Hitler pales in comparison to what Trump unilaterally imposed on so-called Liberation Day.
Through various financial manipulations to generate funds without adding to the budget deficit and implementation of favorable trade agreements with countries in South America and southeastern Europe, this banking wizard set Nazi Germany in 1933 on the path toward self-sufficiency in a war economy. Further progress, however, depended upon conquest of other countries, something the Nazis with their stated need for Lebensraum viciously accomplished in subsequent years.
The aggressive use of tariffs by Hitler pales in comparison to what Trump unilaterally imposed on so-called Liberation Day, April 2. Virtually all US imports were smacked with a 10% tariff, and 57 countries were saddled with reciprocal tariffs between 17% to 49% in Trump’s tariff blackmail scheme. Singled out for especially harsh measures was Communist China. What started with a reciprocal tariff of 34% escalated to 125% and then, in the wake of China’s countermeasures, rose up to 245% by late April. By contrast, increased tariffs imposed upon all other nations were paused for 90 days, as Trump claimed many were “kissing my ass” to cut deals.
As was the case for Nazi Germany, trade wars initiated by tariff escalations relied upon expansion of national borders in order for the economic aggressor to achieve success. This may explain Trump’s persistent determination to acquire Greenland, and his repeated wish to make Canada the 51st state.
Disappearing People
Disappearing people deemed outside the Aryan Volksgemeinschaft, and later massively exterminating them, was a barbaric speciality of the Hitler dictatorship. The pernicious practice began in earnest in wake of the February 27 Reichstag fire, which was blamed on a foreign communist but, in fact, represented a false flag operation staged by the Nazis themselves. In the aftermath, tens of thousands of communists were rounded up and incarcerated without trial in makeshift concentration camps under great cruelty. The first official concentration camp, Dachau, opened on March 23 and it was designated by Himmler as “the first concentration camp for political prisoners” to be used to restore calm to Germany. Many of its political prisoners, which also included Social Democrats and “intellectual instigators,” were murdered shortly after arrival. Mass incarceration and execution of political prisoners during Hitler’s first 100 days was a harbinger of an institutionalized barbarism to come which collectively consumed the lives of millions of Jews, Roma, homosexuals, “asocials,” “professional criminals,” “Rhineland bastards,” and other “Untermenschen.”
The concentration camps of choice for Trump’s ruthless deportation actions are the U.S. Naval base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and the Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) in El Salvador. On February 12, over 50 Venezuelans labeled “high-threat illegal aliens” were deported to Guantanamo Bay and imprisoned in Camp 6. Since January, some 250 Venezuelan “gang members” have been sent to El Salvador under the auspices of the Alien Enemies Act; the bulk of these men, allegedly all members of the Tren de Aragua gang, were sent there on March 16 in defiance of a federal judge’s court order to halt the deportations. A day earlier, ICE deported Abrego Garcia, falsely claimed by Vice President Vance to be a “convicted member of the MS-13 gang” to CECOT where he remains, despite a unanimous ruling by SCOTUS that his deportation was illegal. The mass deportations in March have been denounced by the Venezuelan government as a “crime against humanity” reminiscent of Nazi behavior.
The mass deportations in March have been denounced by the Venezuelan government as a “crime against humanity” reminiscent of Nazi behavior.
Incarceration and/or deportation of political prisoners, specifically Palestinians or pro-Palestinian activists, have become routine under Trump’s reign. As of late March, the visas of over 800 international students have been revoked by the Trump regime’s policy of “catch and revoke.” Though reasons for this repressive action are often not given, participating in pro-Palestinian protests seems to be a common denominator.
The case of Mahmoud Khalil illustrates the extreme measures employed by ICE to rid the country of one legal resident deemed a threat. Khalil, a Palestinian student leader of protests at Columbia University against genocide in Gaza, was arrested by ICE agents on April 8 and sent off to a prison in Louisiana. No criminal charges were ever leveled against him; instead the Trump regime invoked a McCarthy-era law, Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, which provides for deportation of aliens if their presence is deemed potentially harmful to US foreign policy. The same law has also been used to set up many others for deportation. Instrumental in Khalil’s arrest was Betar, a far-right Zionist group hell-bent upon disappearing anyone it considers a Hamas supporter. Its executive director, Ross Glick, met in March with several senior government officials, including Senator Ted Cruz, and urged them to take action against Khalil and other “terror supporters.” Khalil, who has Algerian citizenship and was a green card holder in the U.S., is married to an American citizen who gave birth to their first child on April 21. Reflecting the callousness of current immigration policy, Khalil was not permitted to be present at his son’s birth. If the Trump regime has its way, Khalil and all others in his predicament will be disappeared.
Resistance
The parallels between the first 100 days of both tyrannical regimes are striking and chilling, with one big exception: the Resistance. The ferocity and velocity of Hitler’s NSDAP fascism had all but ended any open opposition by early May 1933. By sharp contrast, resistance to Trump’s MAGA machine tyranny slowly but steadily grew over the course of its turbulent first 100 days. The first significant outbreak of antifascist Resistance came in February, President’s Day, renamed “No Kings Day” and “Not My Presidents Day” by protestors who numbered in the hundreds of thousands and appeared in all 50 states.
The ferocity and velocity of Hitler’s NSDAP fascism had all but ended any open opposition by early May 1933. By sharp contrast, resistance to Trump’s MAGA machine tyranny slowly but steadily grew over the course of its turbulent first 100 days.
On April 5, which may eventually mark the beginning of the end of the Trump regime, an estimated 4 million protestors filled the streets at 1500 public sites throughout the nation in a massive display of resistance. Driven by outrage at Trump’s many repressive actions, they demanded “Hands Off” government agencies and services targeted for termination. Indicative of the stirrings of a sleeping giant at this historic protest is the fact that for many outraged participants, especially seniors, this was their first public protest. April 19, dubbed National Day of Protest and “We (the People) Dissent,” witnessed another massive demonstration. Over 800 local protests took place nationwide. Among the explicitly antifascist slogans displayed on a forest of signs were “Resist Fascism, Fight Oligarchy”; “Stop the Turd Reich”; and “The Trump Fascist Regime Must Go.” Capturing the sentiment of the growing Resistance was the popular sign present at all of these demonstrations: “We Refuse to Accept a Fascist America.”
A large balloon with an image of US President Donald Trump is seen above protesters holding signs during the nationwide "Hands Off!" protest against Trump and his advisor, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, in downtown Los Angeles on April 5, 2025. (Photo by Etienne Laurent/AFP via Getty Images)
That refusal also made its appearance at the ballot box as well as on the streets. Despite pouring in over $25 million to elect a MAGA candidate to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Musk’s chosen one lost by a 10-point margin (55% to 45%) to a liberal candidate, Susan Crawford, on April 1. On the same day, Republican candidates for Congress in a special election in Florida prevailed, but by a much narrower margin than previously for the same seat, portending problems on the horizon for Trump’s MAGA machine in the midterm elections.
However, those crucial elections are 18 months away, a period fraught with danger as well as opportunity. For Trump’s MAGA march to full-fledged fascism to triumph, executive orders and laws far more pernicious than enacted in the past 100 days will be required. Still available in his arsenal of repression are the Insurrection Act and a declaration of Martial Law. Either requires a qualitative shift in the status quo. A false flag operation, the functional equivalent of the Reichstag Fire, would suffice. So would a declaration of war against Iran or China. Alternately, any significant domestic escalation of violence by the Resistance (or agent provocateurs) may also provide the excuse for mass incarceration of dissenters and cancellation of midterm elections.
It is imperative that the growing resistance movement remains strictly nonviolent, for as the wise counsel of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. informs us: “The aftermath of non-violence is the creation of the beloved community, while the aftermath of violence is tragic bitterness.” Beloved community built on love, not a Volksgemeinschaft or MAGA dystopia built on hate, is within our reach beyond the present evil.
Correction: The initial version of this article misspelled Mahmoud Khalil's last name as Khalid. That typo has been corrected.
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