It’s a comparison that’s been made ever since Donald Trump arrived on the political scene in this country and began spelling out his vision of how he plans to “make America great again.”
Is Trump the American version of Adolf Hitler?
The latest to delve into that question is Terrence Petty in an op-ed he wrote for the Jewish newspaper Forward, which bills itself as “Jewish, independent, and nonprofit.”
In his examination of Trump and Hitler, Petty writes, “Trump has created an American version of Adolf Hitler’s ‘Dolchstosslegende,’ also known as the ‘stabbed-in-the-back’ lie.”
According to those who accepted the theory of Dolchstosslegende, Germany didn’t lose World War I. Instead, the country was led into loss and eventual surrender by Jews.
“Donald Trump has created an American version of the Dolchstosslegende, propagating a myth that the nation is being led to ruination by Joe Biden and the Democrats, prosecutors who go after Trump, judges who rule against him, non-MAGA news media, practitioners of ‘wokeism,’ and elite universities, among others,” Petty writes.
“All of this is utter nonsense, of course, but this American stabbed-in-the-back lie is at the core of Trump’s assaults on democracy.”
Someone is always to blame for whatever Trump perceives as being wrong with the United States. It’s the very same formula Hitler used to delude the German people into turning on each other at the height of Hitler’s regime.
Petty also compares Hitler’s first speech as chancellor on Feb. 10, 1933, to Trump’s second inaugural address, which “reads like a stabbed-in-the-back manifesto.”
“For many years, a radical and corrupt establishment has extracted power and wealth from our citizens, while the pillars of our society lay broken and seemingly in complete disrepair,” Trump said during the speech on Jan. 20, 2025.
So, what does the future hold for this country? Will we end up going down the same dark path as Hitler’s Third Reich? Not necessarily.
“There are some signs of hope,” the author explains. “Some law firms and universities are fighting back against Trump’s efforts to coerce them into bending to his will. Citizens are mobilizing, legions of them taking to the streets in protest of Trump’s power grabs. Courts have been ruling against his attempts to subvert the law. But none of this seems to faze him. And as appeals play out in rulings against him, he keeps using his authoritarian jackhammer against the foundations of American democracy.”
History doesn’t have to repeat itself, but making sure it doesn’t depends on each of us staying involved, making our voices heard, voting, and demanding accountability from every level of the government. We the people means each and every one of us.
