Is Trump Really a Fascist? Examining the Controversial Claim

Last week, former President Donald Trump’s longest-serving chief of staff, John Kelly, publicly described his former boss as a “fascist.” Trump, predictably, dismissed him as a “nut job,” though the sober, retired four-star Marine general seems anything but.

At a CNN town hall, Vice President Kamala Harris was asked if she agreed with the assessment that Trump is a fascist. Harris’s response? “Yes, I do.”

The term “fascist” has a particular resonance these days. Around the world, we are witnessing what some refer to as “democratic backsliding,” or a decline in democratic values and institutions. In Hungary, Viktor Orbán has transformed a once-vibrant democracy into a nationalist, quasi-authoritarian state. Meanwhile, in France, Marine Le Pen’s far-right party has moved from the margins to become an important player. In Germany, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has become the first far-right party to win a state-level election since World War II. In India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is attempting to turn the world’s largest democracy into a Hindu nationalist state. And in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has spent more than two decades chipping away at the country’s democratic institutions to create a more conservative, repressive nation.

Though it might evoke grainy newsreel footage of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in the 1930s, the “fascist” label is back in play. Given that the term has resurfaced ahead of the upcoming U.S. presidential election, it’s worth examining what “fascist” truly means and whether Trump might qualify.

For this, I consulted Anatomy of Fascism by Robert O. Paxton, a leading historian of fascist leaders and movements. Paxton’s 2004 book offers something of a handy checklist for what makes for a fascist movement and its leader—one that is still relevant two decades later. Several of these attributes seem to apply to Trump and Trumpism well. I outline them below.

• Cultivates “a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond the reach of traditional solutions”:
  Trump has consistently (and falsely) pushed the line that the U.S. is a “hellhole” where crime is “only going up.” Just last month, Trump claimed, “I don’t think there’s ever been a darkness around our nation like there is now,” despite low levels of unemployment and unprecedented stock market highs. In a second term, this sense of crisis might embolden Trump to use his powers as commander-in-chief to invoke emergency powers such as the Insurrection Act to use the U.S. military against his domestic political enemies.
• Exhibits “the superiority of the leader’s instincts over abstract and universal reason”:
  Put another way, it’s prioritizing intuition—or gut feeling—over logic. Trump routinely asserts the brilliance of his instincts, calling himself a “very stable genius” while dismissing the well-established science around climate change, which he has described as a “hoax.” The nonpartisan Covid Crisis Group found that in April 2020, Trump decided that COVID-19 wasn’t much worse than the flu, and he wanted to “reopen” the economy as he was also gearing up for his election campaign. As a result, the Covid Crisis Group concluded that “Trump was a co-morbidity” with COVID-19, meaning the nation was suffering from two chronic “diseases” simultaneously.
• Underscores “the need for authority by natural leaders (always male) culminating in a national chief who alone is capable of incarnating the group’s destiny”:
  This concept encapsulates Trump’s appeal to his followers quite well. Trump presents himself as the only man who can save this nation, and he recently told a group of his Christian followers that he was anointed by God, a claim they seem to believe. (It’s noteworthy that Trumpism doesn’t work without Trump himself, a lesson Florida Governor Ron DeSantis learned during his unsuccessful presidential run.)
• Ascribes to “the belief that one’s group is a victim, a sentiment that justifies any action, without legal or moral limits, against its enemies”:
  Trump has made a political career out of his purported victimhood, promising “retribution” for his followers who feel similarly victimized. He has also made it clear that if re-elected, he plans to go after his perceived enemies, even suggesting he could use the U.S. military against the “enemy within”—or those who are not loyal to him.
• Demonstrates “the need for closer integration of a purer community; by consent if possible, or by exclusionary violence if necessary”:
  Trump’s base is firmly against most immigrants. When Trump was in office, his administration separated thousands of migrant children from their families at the U.S.-Mexico border, a policy some of his followers accepted. If re-elected, Trump and his advisers have promised mass deportations of millions of migrants by the U.S. military. Mass deportations are supported by 88 percent of Trump supporters, according to a recent Pew Research Center poll. (That policy is also supported by three in 10 Harris supporters.)
• Promotes “the beauty of violence and the efficacy of will when they are devoted to the group’s success”:
  Earlier this month, Trump described the January 6 Capitol riot by his followers, during which 140 police officers were assaulted, as a day of “beauty and love.”

In short, working from Paxton’s fascism checklist, John Kelly’s assessment that Trump embodies fascist traits doesn’t seem too far off the mark. The debate around this characterization is all the more critical as we approach the U.S. presidential election. The Trump team has repeatedly said they will staff a second Trump term with loyalists and purge those who are perceived to be disloyal. Trump has also made it clear that the U.S. military should be loyal to him rather than the Constitution, which they have sworn an oath to protect. It is for these reasons that Kelly seems to have spoken out now as Election Day approaches, before it’s too late.

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