Once upon a time, before he became Donald Trump’s running mate, JD Vance told his law school roommate he went “back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole…or that he’s America’s Hitler.” Obviously, the Ohio senator has since disavowed every negative thing he previously said about Trump. But he clearly shouldn’t have, particularly when it comes to the Hitler vibes, given all the wildly antisemitic remarks Trump has made on the campaign trail—including the comment he made last night re: whose fault it will be if he loses in November. Spoiler alert: It’s the Jews!
That’s right: At a campaign event on Thursday that was—wait for it—about denouncing antisemitism, the GOP nominee for president told the audience: “If I don’t win this election…the Jewish people would have a lot to do with a loss.” The ex-president baselessly claimed that Kamala Harris, who is married to a Jewish man, “hates Israel,” while he is “the best friend Jewish Americans have ever had in the White House.” He suggested that American Jews should be more grateful to him, saying, “With all I have done for Israel, I received only 24% of the Jewish vote…I really haven’t been treated very well, but that’s the story of my life.”
At another event the same day hosted by the Israeli American Council, Trump doubled down on blaming things on Jewish people, saying that if he loses the election to Harris, Israel will be destroyed and it’ll be the fault of Jews for “voting for the enemy.”
Blaming Jews for stuff was, of course, Adolf Hitler’s MO. The Nazi leader blamed German Jews for Germany’s defeat in World War I, claiming the tiny minority had “stabbed Germany in the back”—language that sounds not dissimilar to what Trump had to say yesterday, and not dissimilar to the things he’s said and done re: Jews for years now. As a reminder, those words and actions include but are not limited to:
Saying, “I think that any Jewish person who votes for a Democrat…should have their head examined.” (This is one of his go-to claims.)Declaring that a group of neo-Nazis had some “very fine people” among itHaving dinner at Mar-a-Lago with a Holocaust denierSaying a man known for going on antisemitic tirades had “a good heart”Hosting a White House Hanukkah party that featured an evangelical pastor who once said Jews were going to hellAllegedly claiming that Hitler “did some good things,” and having to be told by his then chief of staff, “Sir, you can never say anything good about the guy”Attacking “liberal Jews” on Rosh Hashanah, one of the holiest days of the yearTelling a room full of Jewish people that Jews who work in real estate are “brutal killers” and “not nice people at all”Suggesting Jews control the mediaReportedly saying that Jews are “only in it for themselves,” following phone calls with Jewish lawmakersSaying Jews who vote for Democrats “hate Israel” and JudaismReportedly wanting his military leaders to operate like “the German generals in World War II”Tweeting an image of Hillary Clinton’s face against a backdrop of $100 bills and a Star of David, along with the words “most corrupt candidate ever”Using Hitler-esque rhetoric, like calling his enemies “vermin” and claiming immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country”Suggesting that Jews only care about moneyKeeping a book of Hitler’s speeches next to his bedMeanwhile, during his blame-the-Jews tour on Thursday, Trump had nothing to say about Mark Robinson, the GOP candidate for governor in North Carolina whom the ex-president endorsed and who CNN reported yesterday once referred to himself as a “black NAZI” in comments online, among other things. (Robinson has denied he wrote the comments.)
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