Comparing Trumpziism to Nazism makes Republican recoil like putting a cross in front of a vampire
Echo report published in Forward* by Jacob Kornbluh
“If you think I’m overreacting and sounding the alarm too soon, consider this,” he told lawmakers. “It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. All I’m saying is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.”
Republican lawmakers immediately criticized Pritzker’s remarks.
(Wow, comparing Trumpziism to Naziism is like putting a cross in the face of a vampire!"
“To call Trump and Republicans Nazis is dangerous political grandstanding and will only incite the violence he claims to condemn,” said Adam Niemerg, a Republican member of the Illinois House of Representatives.
Pritzker, who was on the shortlist for vice president last year and hosted the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August, called out GOP Holocaust analogies during his reelection bid in 2022.
In his Wednesday speech, the two-term Illinois Democrat, who helped create the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center before becoming governor in 2019, recounted the infamous 1978 attempt by neo-Nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois, then home to one of the largest populations of Holocaust survivors.
“The leaders of that march knew that the images of Swastika-clad young men goose-stepping down a peaceful suburban street would terrorize the local Jewish population – so many of whom had never recovered from their time in German concentration camps,” he said. But from that dark moment came resilience. Skokie residents mobilized to ensure the Holocaust’s memory was preserved, beginning with a storefront in 1981, and growing into a major institution for Holocaust education three decades later.
“Here’s what I’ve learned,” Pritzker said. “The root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed – a seed of distrust and hate and blame.”
*Founded in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily, the Forward soon became a national paper, the most widely read Jewish newspaper anywhere. By the 1920s, its circulation outstripped The New York Times. It chronicled the events that affected a population of immigrants eager to earn their place in American life, and published regional editions around the country before any other newspaper.
Illinois’ Democratic Governor, J.B. Pritzker, drew a parallel between the Nazi regime of the 1930s and the policies of the Trump administration in a State of the State speech warning against authoritarian tactics.
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Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie |
“The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight,” Pritzker, who is Jewish, said in his annual State of the State address. “It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.”
Pritzker said that although he does not “invoke the specter of Nazis lightly,” his deep understanding of history compels him to speak out against Trump’s actions since returning to the presidency, particularly his harsh immigration measures and mass deportation orders.
Pritzker said that although he does not “invoke the specter of Nazis lightly,” his deep understanding of history compels him to speak out against Trump’s actions since returning to the presidency, particularly his harsh immigration measures and mass deportation orders.
“If you think I’m overreacting and sounding the alarm too soon, consider this,” he told lawmakers. “It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. All I’m saying is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.”
Republican lawmakers immediately criticized Pritzker’s remarks.
(Wow, comparing Trumpziism to Naziism is like putting a cross in the face of a vampire!"
![]() |
For Trumpzi cult Comparing Trumpziism to Naziism is like putting a cross in the face of a vampire. |
“To call Trump and Republicans Nazis is dangerous political grandstanding and will only incite the violence he claims to condemn,” said Adam Niemerg, a Republican member of the Illinois House of Representatives.
Pritzker, who was on the shortlist for vice president last year and hosted the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August, called out GOP Holocaust analogies during his reelection bid in 2022.
In his Wednesday speech, the two-term Illinois Democrat, who helped create the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center before becoming governor in 2019, recounted the infamous 1978 attempt by neo-Nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois, then home to one of the largest populations of Holocaust survivors.
“The leaders of that march knew that the images of Swastika-clad young men goose-stepping down a peaceful suburban street would terrorize the local Jewish population – so many of whom had never recovered from their time in German concentration camps,” he said. But from that dark moment came resilience. Skokie residents mobilized to ensure the Holocaust’s memory was preserved, beginning with a storefront in 1981, and growing into a major institution for Holocaust education three decades later.
“Here’s what I’ve learned,” Pritzker said. “The root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed – a seed of distrust and hate and blame.”
Labels: Forward, Governor J.B. Pritzker, Holocaust, Illinois, Jacob Kornbluh, Skokie Illinois
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