California Rep. Harley Rouda, a freshman Democrat, recently compared President Trump to the rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany during a virtual chat with supporters.
When asked Tuesday about Trump “demonizing the press,” Rouda responded, “I’m scared by it. I am scared that every single day we are taking one more step towards fascism. You have a president of the United States, unlike any other president we have, who denigrates the press. Calls the press ‘fake news,’ anytime and every time, with the exception of Fox News, which is more like state propaganda news.”
Rouda, a former Republican who switched parties before running for Congress in 2018 and defeating Republican incumbent Dana Rohrabacher, is known to make controversial outbursts.
The Orange County Democrat described the controversial event when Trump had the law enforcement use tear gas on protesters as the president walked from the White House to St. John’s Church.
“What we’re seeing by this president should cause all of us fear,” he said, adding that he and his wife were in Germany in 2017 after Trump was elected and went to the National Museum in Berlin. “Obviously, it was the history museum, and obviously, a big chunk of the history was focused on Hitler, his rise to power, World War II, and the aftermath.”
Rouda continued, “I’ll give the Germans credit: They make no mistake about what they call it. They call it murder, over and over, as to what Hitler and his supporters did. But the thing that stuck out to my wife and I was that, as you are walking through the process of how Hitler came to power and then what he did, he came to power under fair and free elections.”
Rouda added, “And he started denigrating the press. He started denigrating minorities. Talk about the need so that the people could hear the true story that the government needed to control the press. And when you start looking at the commonalities between what we are witnessing by this president and what has transpired in dictatorships around the world.”
Other Democratic members have compared Trump to Hitler in the past, including House Majority Whip James Clyburn and New York Rep. Jerry Nadler.
The Washington Examiner reached out to Rouda’s campaign but did not receive a response.
The spokesman for a PAC dedicated to winning a House majority for Republicans slammed Rouda’s comments.
“Forget bringing people together. Congressman Rouda’s hateful rhetoric only divides and inflames our country,” said Will Reinert, the spokesman for the Congressional Leadership Fund. “While Harley Rouda believes that the 46% of his constituents who voted for President Trump are turning our country into Nazi Germany, we know he is just expressing his extreme disdain for those who don’t believe in his radical, liberal views.”
Author: Kerry Picket
Source: Washington Examiner: California Democrat compares Trump to rise of Hitler in Germany
