The former president ate Thanksgiving dinner at Mar-a-Lago with Ye and Nick Fuentes, an avowed white supremacist whose views on women, Jews, racial minorities, the LGTBQ+ community, and democracy can kindly be described as cringe-worthy. More accurately and horrifyingly, his views are taken directly from the Nazi playbook. Elimination of elections, total subjugation of women, and comparisons of the slaughter 6 million Jews in Nazi crematoriums to “baking cookies” were some of the ideas put forth in podcasts and speeches.
We should not be surprised by “The Former’s” actions, as it is a continuation of his white supremacist racial animus and bigotry visible over decades. Department of Justice prosecutions over the Trump organization’s violations of the Fair Housing Act brought his racism into public view in 1973. His bigotry became much more visible with his infamous efforts to ban Muslims from the country and build a wall along the southern border. Relevant to this incident, he filled his administration with those, such as Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller, who share Fuentes’ world view.
We applaud Senator Mitt Romney for his clear denunciation of the former President’s embrace of these individuals. Accordingly, we call on our entire Congressional Delegation, Utah Legislators, elected officials at all levels of government, and ordinary citizens to speak out with equally clear denunciations—not only of this incident, but also of toxic culture of hate and bigotry fermenting in our society.
We have missed multiple opportunities to close this Pandora’s Box that Trump and his enablers opened—we elected him, failed twice to remove him through impeachment, and missed multiple opportunities to condemn the escalating bigotry, racism, White Christian Nationalism, and violence he has stoked. Please don’t pass on yet another opportunity to speak up and speak out.
Dr. Ellen Brady is the Issues Director for the Women’s Democratic Club of Utah
