America is showing many early warning signs of fascism, according to the US Holocaust Museum's criteria.
These include powerful nationalism, disdain for human rights, identification of enemies, and supremacy of the military.
Transcript:
Alistair Campbell
And as a starting point, Rory, can I just read to you, if you go to the American Holocaust Museum in Washington, there is a yellowing, thinning paper that hangs on the wall. And the headline is the early warning signs of fascism. And as I go through them, can I ask you and our listeners and viewers just to sort of maybe give marks out of 10 for the extent to which you might think that we're seeing these early warning Signs in relation to what's happening in the States. Number one, powerful and continuing nationalism. Very good. Number two, disdain for human rights. Number three, identification of enemies as a unifying cause. Number four, supremacy of the military. Number five, rampant sexism. Number six, controlled media. Number seven, obsession with national security. Number eight, religion and government intertwined. Number nine, corporate power protected. Number 10, labor power suppressed. Number 11, disdain for intellectuals and the arts. Number 12, obsession with crime and punishment. 13, rampant cronyism and corruption. 14, fraudulent elections. (Time 0:02:32)
Trump's TikTok Decision
Trump's decision on TikTok defies bipartisan Congress and the Supreme Court.
He wants a friend to take over TikTok because it helped with his campaign.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
Remind us what the TikTok decision was for listeners.
Alistair Campbell
Essentially, not least because Trump had been calling for it, the Americans decided that TikTok, because of its role in Chinese economic espionage and so forth, that it was effectively To be banned. And he says, no, we're going to get it. (Time 0:08:24)
Greenland Acquisition Attempt
Trump suggested the US acquire Greenland, even offering money and hinting at military force to Denmark.
This unprecedented approach lacks historical parallel, even among authoritarian figures.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
So let's try to be sort of quite straightforward about pointing out what he's actually done. So, for example, people will be aware that he put out a message on, I think initially on True Social or Telegram, which later ended up on Twitter, where he said that Canada should be the 51st state, America should reacquire the Panama Canal, and that Greenland should become part of the United States. Now, when that happened, people imagined before the election that this was a bit of bravado and humor. He then called the Danish prime minister and in a 15-minute call insisted that Denmark hand over Greenland. And when the Danish prime minister said, essentially, you've got to be joking, it's up to the people of Greenland whether they want to be part of the United States, he offered money and Appeared to be threatening military force. Now, this is something very interesting, and I just want to focus on it. I mean, I could look at a couple of other things, and I'd like to move on to them in a second. The cutting of all US international development assistance immediately. Let me talk about that a little bit. And we can talk about his announcement that he wishes to ethnically cleanse Gaza, remove every single Palestinian from Gaza, and move them to Jordan and Egypt. (Time 0:10:09)
A New Political Culture
Trump's Greenland ambitions represent a new political culture, devoid of legal or ethical justifications.
This differs drastically from historical land acquisitions, even by authoritarian regimes.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
What struck me most about Greenland, which we honestly, I don't think have seen in more than 2,000 years of Western history, a ruler doing something like that without pretending to Have any legal or ethical justification. Even the Roman emperors, when they went around trying to acquire territory, claimed they were doing it for some kind of reason and tried to get senatorial consent. The British Empire at its very worst always said that it was doing it because one of their consuls had been threatened or they were defending indigenous people or there were some interests Of trade. Even Hitler, right? I mean, this is what's so weird. Hitler did not feel that he could invade Russia and Poland without staging an attack against his troops, claiming that he was acting in self-defense. So this represents a very, very new culture. I'm sort of interested in what is it about the modern world, about the world that's been created by social media, by mass communications, by total cynicism and disillusionment. That means that you can now just say, excuse me, I'm going to help myself to territory from a friendly neighboring ally. And I'm not even going to pretend that the rights of the Greenlanders are being oppressed or that America has a legal justice. When the English kings invaded France, they at least did so, claiming that they were the rightful kings of France and they were descended from such French king. This is a different universe. Also, you said in (Time 0:11:43)
Impact of USAID Funding Halt
Halting USAID funding disrupts vital programs in 100 countries, affecting healthcare and other services.
This abrupt cessation jeopardizes US soft power and international relations.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
Who work for the Americans. Let me just spell out what's happening now with USAID. So the American government gives about $40 billion a year, $40,000 million a year in overseas assistance, $25.6 billion through USAID. On Friday, I got a flurry of emails from all the NGOs that I'm associated with or partnering with around the world because they had all received a message from USAID saying, all funding Stops now, stop your programs. These are NGOs who have contracts with the American government, signed contracts. So let's say you're operating in the Congo and you're doing vaccination. You've hired a lot of staff, you've bought your vaccines, you're rolling out your vaccination program, stop. And when people tried to ask questions, there was the most extraordinary email that came back from USAID. And I'm just going to read it to you because I think it's quite a good way maybe of illustrating what must be happening inside the US government at the moment. This is an email from USAID. Dear grantee, just imagine writing this as a civil servant. We are aware that you may have questions about how the executive order on foreign aid will impact your grant. At this time, we are coordinating internally while waiting for formal guidance on how to interpret the new executive order on foreign assistance funding. We appreciate your patience and we'll be in touch as soon as we have more information. Now, if you're the Jordanian government, this is your entire education budget, health budget. It's all gone on budget and the money's been stopped on a dime. So your government basically is bankrupt and can't deliver services. Now, the US government gets to do this once and only once. What Trump has done is one of the great scams of all time. You become a monopoly provider. You insert into the middle of everybody else's military, political, and economic system. And then you say, I've got you over the barrel. Give me everything you want. What does that mean? You can't do it again. Nobody's going to let America integrate into their political, economic, and military systems in the same way in the future because they've seen it. It would be like if somebody turned up in your house, said, I'm going to take responsibility for all your heating, electricity, broadband, services, children's education, and then Turned up and said, by the way, I'm providing all that. I'm going to extort you for $200,000. Well, you might pay up once, but you're going to get another provider in the future. (Time 0:18:55)
Trump's Bullying Tactics
Trump used tariffs to force Colombia to accept deported nationals, demonstrating bullying tactics.
This behavior undermines positive US-Colombia relations.
Transcript:
Alistair Campbell
What do you think this does for soft power? Do they care about soft power anymore? Because I know historically the Americans have really liked this idea that they're sort of top of the global soft power it's usually us and the americans that are up there now this is Going to damage them so much but it's so deliberate and then the other the other thing that happened yesterday which you know the trump people will say well that's good because it shows You how strength works two planes set full of Colombians, nationals who are being deported from the United States, and the president of Colombia refuses to allow them to land. Trump immediately announces, immediately 25% tariffs, 50% in 24 hours if they haven't reversed the decision, they reverse the decision. So what it shows is that bullying, if you like, works. However, it will also upend whatever positive relationship there is between Colombia and the United States, which actually the previous administration had worked pretty hard to Try to repair. So this is a sort of deliberate, let's just, everybody's an enemy, we go after everybody. Right now, he'll be thinking, this is working. I'm getting my way on everything. But there'll come a point where I think this just backfires. (Time 0:21:20)
Control Over Health Information
Trump's executive order pauses publications from health organizations like the CDC and FDA.
This raises concerns about transparency and control over health information.
Transcript:
Alistair Campbell
Me take you to another area where I've been actually talking to people in the protective health sector. And again, I think this is something that people should be really, really concerned about. This is one of his executive orders that got next to no coverage at all. They, quotes, review protocols. Executive orders also halting publication of regulation and guidance documents issued by bodies including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare, Medicaid Services, and the Food and Drug Administration. Now, it says that the pause will be temporary. But meanwhile, the people who are in these organizations, one of which I spoke to, says that the whole thing has had an absolutely chilling effect. And that for the first week in something like 64 years, something called the morbidity and mortality weekly report, this is something that goes out every week and has done for 64 years. And it explains with real live data, health risks to the American people. This week, it did not go out. And the thinking is two things. One, he wants to show them that they can be muzzled whenever he wants them to be muzzled. And secondly, he wants to make sure that if there's bad news coming out about health and what have you, the White House can be in complete control of it. I got another email, Rory. This, I think, is chilling as well. I mentioned NASA when we talked about this with the Mooch. And do you want to know the name of the email and the address that you have to send to if you see somebody who is not going along with this new DEI initiative to basically get it out? It's called DEIatruth at opm.gov. And it says, there will be no adverse consequence for timely reporting of this information. However, any failure to report such information within 10 days may result in adverse consequences. In other words, if you hear somebody saying, well, this fucking DEI stuff, you can bollocks that, I'm not going to get engaged. You're sitting at the next desk. You have got to tell truth at opm.gov that your neighbor in the office. I mean, it's positively (Time 0:24:42)
Musk's Support for the AFD
Elon Musk's support for the AFD promotes ethnic pluralism, a far-right ideology.
This view, claiming specific cultures for nations, can justify exclusion and discrimination.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
Extraordinary. I mean, we talked about fascism at the beginning. I think the guy who really is a proper authoritarian fascist or emerging as such is Musk. I mean, the recklessness now of this man, that stuff that you've just talked about where he says, you know, every country needs to have its own culture, connects directly with this ethnic Pluralism phrase, which all the far right in Europe use. And ethnic pluralism, as I said a couple of weeks ago, is this theory that Germany is only supposed to have a limited number of people from other countries. I think they've calculated they're supposed to have exactly 600 Afghans and no more. And ethnic pluralism, and because it's got this word, pluralism sounds quite liberal. It's not at all. It's the justification, what Musk is saying out there, is the justification for this remigration. It's justification for saying German and Austrian citizens who happen not to be ethnically white should move out of the country because they come from an alien religion. They haven't assimilated properly. And the most worrying thing of all, I was talking to a Jewish friend who was like, well, it's fine. They're only going after the people who aren't making a real effort to assimilate and who are wearing funny clothes and are going to mosque too much. Of course, this is very, very dangerous because, of course, this was indeed what people said in the 1930s. Oh, maybe they're just going to go after the Jews who aren't assimilating properly. (Time 0:39:50)
Prince Harry's Legal Battle
Prince Harry's legal battle against News Group highlights media lawbreaking and impunity.
News Group's settlement and apology avoided a potentially revealing trial.
Transcript:
Alistair Campbell
Yes. Go on then. Now, I'm an admirer of Prince Harry. I like people with guts. I like people who take on, you know, big, powerful forces. What I want to draw attention to, I want to ask these listeners and viewers and you to ponder, let's just say Harry had taken this case to court and lost. I wonder how many front pages that would have filled and how many pages inside they might have used to cover it.
Rory Stewart
So just take us back a little bit, because not everybody's following the story. So this for international listeners, this was this immense phone hacking scandal.
Alistair Campbell
Believe me, Roy, Prince Harry gets a lot of international coverage.
Rory Stewart
Okay, but just explain the story for us in simple terms. As far as I understand it, what happened is that a lot of the British newspapers were hiring private detectives and others. And what they were doing is they were tapping the phones of celebrities. And then the stories that they ran in their papers came not just from tapping, but also breaking into their homes, going through their rubbish, doing all this kind of stuff. Prince Harry was one of the victims of this, but just probably one of the more famous victims, because there were, I don't know what, thousands of victims of this stuff, right?
Alistair Campbell
Thousands, thousands, yeah.
Rory Stewart
And Hugh Grant and others have been involved in cases over many, many years. But what was different about Prince Harry seemed to be that he was saying he was going to take it all to the way to the world, because the others have often settled out of court. Is that right? Correct, yeah. First (Time 0:44:02)
Media's 'No Pissing Pact'
Media outlets downplayed Prince Harry's legal victory, showcasing their 'no pissing pact'.
This pact protects them from criticizing each other, enabling impunity.
Transcript:
Alistair Campbell
Totally. Well, what's extraordinary is that when we were in government, I had a settlement because they'd been getting into our stuff. I was actually a witness in the Prince Harry thing because I was used because they wanted to show that just because it didn't lead to a publication of story didn't mean that the law wasn't Being broken to get information. And this is what these private detectives were being used to get into my bank account. And that sort of went nowhere. But so, no, I think you're right about the culture. And it's the culture. We're back to this point that we keep talking about the whole time, impunity. They think they're above the law. And the thing that's happened since Harry's case is that, and as I said to you at the start, if Harry had lost this case, it would have been, we'd still be talking about it. The papers would still be full of it. He's finished. He's gone back to, you know, Diana will be turning in her grave, all this sort of stuff. Let me just give you some examples of this. So The Spectator, now edited by Michael Gove, brackets Rupert Murdoch. In the end, writes The Spectator, Harry folded. His much ballyhooed case, which was due to beginning the high court last for eight weeks, has concluded. Much ballyhooed I mean, I'm more dismissive. The Mail barely reported it, and they didn't mention the fact that they are currently involved in a case which is coming to court next year. The Sun, the paper at the heart of it, it was kind of tucked away on page six. The Times, sister paper, was on the bottom of page 12, alongside a story about Judi Dench being worried about her eyesight. The male in the mirror buried away. And the Telegraph, to be fair to the Telegraph, Rory, it was on the front page. But guess what the headline was? Harry climbs down after eight figure payout. And the Sunday papers, it was as if nothing had happened. It's all gone away. And so this is how they get away with it. But I think with this one, I think I've got a feeling this one could go because we talk about perjury. We're talking about the destruction of evidence and so forth. (Time 0:48:37)
