Is Trump Fascist? Yale Professor Jason Stanley on How Fascism Works

Is fascism on the rise under President Donald Trump? Jason Stanley, a professor of phi­losophy at Yale University and author of the bestselling 2018 book, How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them, discusses the fascist tactics used by Trump to maintain power. Demonizing immigrants, delegitimizing political opponents, mobilizing paramilitary groups, undermining experts, attacking the press, and lying incessantly until there is no accepted truth are all classic tactics used by fascist leaders throughout history. Stanley, a frequent contributor to the New York Times and Washington Post, says, “Normalization is what I fear most. …We’ve normalized law breaking in the White House on a stunning level, corruption on a scale we’ve never seen before.” He asserts, “Right now, the idea that we’re a law and order state is a dim memory.”

“We are at a tipping point:” Yale historian Timothy Snyder

Timothy Snyder is a professor of history at Yale and a world renowned scholar of authoritarianism. His 2017 international bestseller, On Tyranny: 20 Lessons from the 20th Century, is a roadmap to how autocrats rise and democracies fall. Snyder’s newest book is Our Malady: Lessons in Liberty from a Hospital Diary. He describes his near death experience following a missed medical diagnosis last year, and he eviscerates America’s failed coronavirus response. He calls on us to rethink the fundamental connection between health and freedom. “Other countries look at us and for the first time ever, they sincerely pity us, but also wonder, how can you have so much wealth… and kill so many people?” He observes, “We’re at a tipping point. To say that it can’t go on like this is an understatement. Things could get much worse than they are — and they might.” He notes that if Joe Biden is elected president, he will have to undertake “a redo of the 21st century.”

Timothy Snyder, Levin Professor of History, Yale University, author, On Tyranny and Our Malady