Trump Channels McCarthyism, Cold War And Worst Period In U.S. History
As a lynchpin of his MAGA campaign to retake the presidency, trump is vowing to get rid of the Marxists and communists, taking a page out of one of the ugliest chapters in U.S. history, a time in the 1950s when countless careers were ruined, families destroyed and suicides were seen as the only alternative for some who were wrongly accused by a demagogue of being communists or communist sympathizers.
Trump is planning to revisit the shameful years when Sen. Joseph McCarthy, R-Wis., led a popular reign of terror as he claimed he was on a crusade to root out Communists from the government and the arts. In what could be a morality tale and warning about trump, McCarthy’s brief but horrible tenure ended in ruined careers and suicides of many of those who McCarthy publicly and falsely labeled as communists.
McCarthy’s lawyer during those shameful years was another trump teacher and political and business guru, Roy Cohn, who was known for his own vicious methods.
Trump has resurrected red baiting and the Communist bogeyman as he has promised to clean out political opponents from the government. His plans will likely include a return of loyalty oaths, a euphemism for pledges of endorsement much like George W. Bush required at his rallies during the 2004 presidential campaign, the campaign. Raids and arrests of suspected political enemies could easily be on trump’s agenda.
Today, trump is channeling McCarthy’s worst moments. Here is what trump said at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s “Road to Majority” event in Washington D.C. on Saturday, June 24.
“We are a failing nation. A nation in decline… This is the final battle,” trump said. “With you at my side, we will demolish the Deep State… drive out the globalists. We will cast out the Communists, Marxists and fascists. We will defeat crooked Joe Biden. We will liberate America from these villains once and for all.”
And here are the words of McCarthy, in perhaps his most notorious moments, at a time when a Gallup poll found that at McCarthy’s peak in January 1954, 50 percent of the American public supported him while 29 percent had an unfavorable opinion.
It was a speech McCarthy delivered on Feb. 9, 1950, in Wheeling, W. Va., a speech later known as McCarthy’s “Enemies From Within” speech.
“Today we are engaged in a final, all-out battle between communistic atheism and Christianity” said McCarthy, using the same prescient words expressed now by trump. “At war’s end, we were physically the strongest nation on earth and, at least potentially, the most powerful intellectually and morally. Ours could have been the honor of being a beacon on the desert of destruction, a shining living proof that civilization was not yet ready to destroy itself. Unfortunately, we have failed miserably and tragically to arise to the opportunity.”
McCarthy claimed, without evidence, that the State Department was “infested with communists” and that he had a list of the names of 205 members of the Communist Party and who were “still working and shaping policy in the State Department.”
“If this fight against Communism is made a fight against America’s two great political parties, the American people know that one of these parties will be destroyed — and the republic cannot endure very long as a one-party system,” McCarthy said. “Our job as Americans and as Republicans is to dislodge the traitors from every place where they’ve been sent to do their traitorous work.”
McCarthy attacked the intelligencia in much the same way trump blames Democrats for what trump claims is the nation’s downward spiral to destruction.
“The reason why we find ourselves in a position of impotency is not because the enemy has sent men to invade our shores, but rather because of the traitorous actions of those who have had all the benefits that the wealthiest nation on earth has had to offer — the finest homes, the finest college educations, and the finest jobs in Government we can give,” McCarthy said.
McCarthy was a Senator from 1947 until his death in 1957 from acute hepatitis, believed by many to be caused by alcoholism. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy gained infamy as the most vocal, public face of a time when Cold War tensions generated fears of widespread communist subversion. He alleged that communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated the federal government, universities, film industry and elsewhere. Ultimately, he was censured for refusing to cooperate with, and abusing members of, the Senate committee established to investigate whether or not he should be censured.
In February 1950, he claimed in a speech that he had a list of “members of the Communist Party and members of a spy ring” who were employed in the State Department. In succeeding years, McCarthy made more accusations of Communist infiltration into the State Department, the administration of President Harry S. Truman, the Voice of America, and the U.S. Army. He also used various charges of communism, communist sympathies, disloyalty, suspicion of being homosexual or sex crimes to attack politicians and other individuals inside and outside of government.
The number imprisoned as a result of McCarthy’s onslaught was in the hundreds, as 10,000 to 12,000 lost their jobs. In the film industry, more than 300 actors, authors, and directors were denied work through the unofficial Hollywood blacklist. The list of blacklisted artists ranged from actor Lucille Ball, conductor Leonard Bernstein and playwright Bertolt Brecht to actor Charlie Chaplin, composer Aaron Copland, author W.E.B. Du Bois and scientist, Albert Einstein.
Another pivotal influence on trump was the lawyer, Cohn, who was described at various times as “a snake,” “a scoundrel” and “a new strain of son of a bitch.” A mirror of trump, Cohn was indicted four times from the mid-’60s to the early ’70s — for stock-swindling and obstructing justice and perjury and bribery and conspiracy and extortion and blackmail and filing false reports. He was acquitted three times and a fourth trial ended in a mistrial.
Cohn was diagnosed as HIV-positive in October 1984 and died in 1985. He never acknowledged his homosexuality and insisted his illness was liver cancer. Soon before his death, Cohn was disbarred for “unethical,” “unprofessional” and “particularly reprehensible” conduct.
A reported 400 people attended Cohn’s memorial service, including former mayors, businessman Bill Fugazy; publishing magnate Rupert Murdoch; political dirty trickster and trump advisor, Roger Stone; and trump.
Trump spoke at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s “Road to Majority” event in Washington D.C. on Saturday, June 24. He said if re-elected he would move to prevent communists and Marxists entering the country, to “protect the integrity of [the] immigration system.”
The audience of right wing Republicans cheered loudly while trump’s comments were posted on Twitter and have been seen more than 900,000 times.
“Federal law prohibits the entry of communists and totalitarians into the United States. But my question is what do we do with the ones that are already here? I think we need to pass a new law for them,” trump said. “Using federal law section 212 F, of the Immigration and Nationality Act, I will order my government to deny entry to all communists and all Marxists. So, we are going to keep foreign Christian-hating communists and Marxists and socialists out of America. We are keeping them out of America.”
The day before trump’s speech, the less than, star-filled event featured Glenn Jacobs as a speaker. Jacobs is the mayor of Knox County in East Tennessee, and is better known to Americans as the former WWE wrestler Kane.
“It’s tempting to throw up our hands in despair, to lose hope,” Jacobs said. “I mean, good Lord, they just indicted a president. What chance do the rest of us stand?”
The 7-feet tall Jacobs was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2021 after having played various characters until 1997, when he was repackaged as Kane, half-brother of “The Undertaker” and son of “Paul Bearer” and sometimes partner of “The Brothers of Destruction.” Jacobs has been the Republican Mayor of Knox County, Tenn., since 2018.
Other Republicans also have raised the false specter of Democratic communists. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., last week tweeted what she called the “CORRUPT AND WEAPONIZED COMMUNISTS DEMOCRAT CONTROLLED DOJ.” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, trump’s closest rival for the GOP presidential nomination, and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, have argued the U.S. risks falling victim to “woke” ideology, which they have defined as “cultural Marxism.”
Cultural Marxism a slur to refer to those who support gender and racial equity but it also refers to a far-right anti-Semitic conspiracy theory that claims that there is an ongoing and intentional academic and intellectual Jewish effort to subvert Western society via a planned culture war that undermines the Christian values of traditionalist conservatism and seeks to replace them with culturally liberal values.
The conspiracy theory of a Marxist culture war is promoted by right-wing politicians, fundamentalist religious leaders, political commentators in mainstream print and television media, and white supremacist terrorists and has been described as “a foundational element of the alt-right worldview.”
Trump was the closing speaker of the conference on a day that marked the one year anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. The conference was the first time all 11 declared GOP presidential candidates had appeared together at an event.
North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who is running for governor, got a standing ovation when he endorsed trump, as did former Arizona gubernatorial candidate, Kari Lake, who has been rebuffed in her numerous claims of widespread fraud cost trump the 2020 presidential election and cost Lake her own campaign for governor.
Robinson, 54, has promoted conspiracy theories, which critics have described as anti-LGBT, anti-Semitic and Islamophobic. He opposes abortion, denies climate change and has said that he wants to remove science and social studies from first through fifth grade curriculum, abolish the State Board of Education, and expand charter schools and school voucher programs, potentially supplanting the public school system.
On his Facebook page, which has more than 100,000 followers, Robinson’s posts have impugned transgender people, Muslims, Jews, former President Barack Obama, and African-Americans who support Democrats.
In a 2012 social media post, Robinson acknowledged that in 1989, he paid for a woman that he impregnated to get an abortion. In 2022, Robinson said the woman was his eventual wife, Yolanda.
The Faith and Freedom Coalition, based in Duluth, Ga., was formed 14 years ago by Ralph Reed, founder of the Christian Coalition and a former State Chairman of the Georgia Republican Party. Reed created the Faith and Freedom Coalition as a bridge between the Tea Party movement and evangelical voters. The organization has grown quickly with hundreds of thousands of supporters and several hundred local chapters.
The latest available report for the fiscal year ending Dec. 31, 2021 showed revenues of $29,681,130; expenses of $33,854,275; and donations of $29,668,360.
Classical Marxism denotes the collection of socio-economic-political theories expounded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Communism and socialism have flowed from Marxist thought. Critics have said that Marxism is a godless theory, led by Russia and China, that is bent on world domination with individual rights replaced with government controls. Historically, the U.S. has used fears of communist domination to justify American intervention and colonialism. It also has been wielded by politicians, like trump, to attack their opponents.
It is doubtful that trump can define either a Marxist, a Communist or a socialist, beyond the dog whistles that bring cheers from his base.
Fears about socialists, anarchists and communists first reached a fever pitch in the U.S. in the early 20th century. One result was the Palmer Raids, named after Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer. The series of raids were conducted in November 1919 and January 1920 to capture and arrest suspected socialists, especially anarchists and communists, and deport them from the United States.
The raids particularly targeted Italian immigrants and Eastern European Jewish immigrants with alleged leftist ties, with particular focus on Italian anarchists and immigrant leftist labor activists. The raids led to 10,000 arrests as 556 foreign citizens were deported, including a number of prominent leftist leaders.