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Your guide to what the 2024 US elections mean for Washington and the world
(noun) political ideology — He was once thought dead — Which appears to be experiencing a global recovery
The 2024 US election was unusual because it included a lively debate over whether one of the candidates was a fascist. Gen. John Kelly, who served as Trump's chief of staff during his first term, ignited the discussion when he told reporters that his former boss matched a dictionary definition of fascism he found online: “a far-right, authoritarian, and extreme nationalist political ideology…characterized by a dictatorial leader, a centralized authoritarianism, militarism, forced suppression of dissent, and belief in a natural social hierarchy.
The Trump campaign responded to the accusation by saying that Kelly had “disowned himself” and repeated the false accusations. Some of Trump's more sophisticated defenders have claimed that the charge is misplaced because Trump is not a military man. In fact, the next president campaigned as a pro-peace candidate promising to end wars once and for all.
However, the Harris campaign seized on Kelly's accusations. Clearly, the Democrats believed that Americans would certainly reject any candidate tainted by fascism. But they may have overestimated the depth of the average voter's historical knowledge. Reporters during the election campaign found that most voters associated fascism with Hitler, and Hitler with the Holocaust. Since no one believed that Trump was planning to build an American Auschwitz, it was relatively easy for the Republican Party to dismiss accusations of fascism as liberal hysteria.
However, historians of the 1930s believe that Trump and some other world leaders – such as Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping – were reviving aspects of the fascist tradition. Extreme nationalism, leader worship, and disdain for liberal values are back in fashion around the world — not just in America.
