CROSSPOST: JOHN GANZ: American NeoFascism: Where We Are At

John’s thesis, as I understand it: Right-wing paramilitary street violence has failed to become a sustained political force. It is largely that failure that has saved us. It is that that has kept us from the roiling boil of martial law and police repression. That roiling boil would have resulted in a régime that turns its punitive power into an effective military and police repressive force. Then that, with sufficient mass mobilization, would have produced the radicalization needed for full-blown fascism proper: https://www.unpopularfront.news/p/where-were-at https://www.unpopularfront.news Almost exactly two years ago, I wrotea piece called “Testing the Fascism Thesis” with the subtitle “Keeping Myself Honest.”In it, I attempted to make the case that the fascism analogy wasn’t merely a piece of alarmist rhetoric but actually was a useful tool to assess the Trump movement and regime, and it even had some predictive power. I likened it to a “research programme” as described by the philosopher of science Imre Lakatos. In his theory, a “degenerating research programme” merely explains retroactively and alters its hypotheses to accommodate an emerging reality, but a “progressive research programme” will actually predict novel phenomena. I believed that the fascism research programme, as it were, had already proved itself to be progressive: believers that Trumpism had a lot in common with historic fascism predicted thatsomething likeJanuary 6th would happen; doubters mocked this as mere hysteria. The fact that it didn’t work is immaterial, a little like saying that a diagnosis of cancer is false because the patient didn’t die. Of course, there are many different types and severities of cancer. Back in November 2024, I hazarded 12 predictions of what a Trump regime might do if one understood it to be fascist or fascioid. I’d not invoke the philosophy of science today. I’ve become much more interested in what the Aristotelian tradition has to tell us about politics. For Aristotle, a historical analogy is part of a body of practical wisdom. It helps us judge a particular situation and deliberate on how to respond. Reasoning about real political events always deals with what’s merely probable: we can’t demonstrate our propositions with scientific certainty; we must alwaysjudgeand thereforeapproximate,but we can do so with greater or lesser accuracy and revise our judgments based on the evidence. I’d probably say that the fascism analogy is an instance of what Aristotle called aparadeigma—the origin of our term “paradigm”—or reasoning by example, where one uses a historical case to illuminate a yet-unknown present one, proceeding from part to part, or “like to like.” In theRhetoric, there’s a very apt example: Dionysius of Syracuse requested bodyguards; therefore it was reasonable to argue that he was planning a tyranny, since Peseistratus and Theaganes of Megara did the same before they installed their own tyrannies. In like manner, if Trump or his cronies are doing something that Mussolini or Hitler did, it might be reasonable to suspect they have similar designs. Fascism is just one analogy, one paradigm of political judgment, but it’s not the only one, nor even necessarily the best one, especially if applied in isolation or in a dogmatic and blinkered way. But I still insist it does supply something valuable to our understanding, especially if properly qualified and combined with other examples and experiences. Anyway, all that theoretical throat clearing is sort of neither here nor there. The initial exercise stands, and right before the midterms, I’d like to go through the list and see what has come true and what hasn’t. The use of state-tolerated or encouraged mobs, either organized into paramilitaries or quasi-organized, to physically intimidate, maim, or kill political enemies and even unreliable allies. This is a big one and arguably already has come true. If this is a regular part of the politics of the next few years, I think the fascism thesis is in pretty good shape… It came true on January 6th, but then it really didn’t develop. Paramilitaries and street fighters are not really a part of the political practice of Trumpism 2.0. The Proud Boys are not out there cracking skulls; The militias are not roving the streets of American cities. Researcher Dan Trombly, who wrote a guest post on political violence for this newsletter, called this a “failure to become fascist”: “the rise and decline of streetfighters as symptomatic of their failure to generate a dynamic fascist force within the MAGA movement.”I think this is very well-observed: there has been a marked sense of disappointment and failure of the most fascist elements within MAGA among the extreme right. The use of mobs/paramilitaries as deputies to general state repression of dissent. This also would be a big red flag, but I have less confidence in this coming true. I think the cops will be enough. Similar to the above. There are, however, two things to consider: First, there have been quite a bit of death threats and harassment directed at those who obstruct the administration—particularly judges and their families—suggesting that decentralized intimidation can do some of the same work as an organized mob. Second, the administration’s use of ICE against political speech and protest is a clear effort to turn a federal agency into a political police force. Suspending elections or using violence, particularly assisted by paramilitaries or mobs, to disrupt elections. I don’t really see elections being in serious danger—at least, at first… Well, we’ll see tonight, I guess, but I really don’t see the attempts to subvert the midterms being successful or even significant. I predict a pretty normal election. With that being said, they are trying to dosomething, and their apparent inability to pull it off tells us more about the limits of their power than the limits of their ambitions. The use of the state security apparatus on domestic political rivals. This one needs no explanation… Confirmed, but with significant failures. Comey and James are the obvious examples, but this goes well beyond Trump settling personal scores. TheNSPM-7 memorandumgives the hunt for domestic enemies a bureaucratic framework, complete with investigations into political organizations and their supposed paymasters. The Justice Department placed the prosecution of 15 people associated with Direct Action Minnesota under this umbrella. Officials also called the Prairieland terrorism convictions an opening victory in their war on “antifa.” Prosecuting someone for shooting a police officer is one thing; treating the incident as a warrant to go hunting the left and its “funding networks” is another. The use of federal troops and officers for mass deportations; the creation of a system of detention camps for the same purpose… Yes, but again with some big failures and retreats along the way. Federal officers, military deportation flights, detention camps on military bases: all of these have happened. Add the wanton cruelty of third-country deportations, shipping people to countries where they have no ties, and the delivery of Venezuelans to El Salvador’s CECOT prison, where Human Rights Watch and Cristosal documented systematic torture. But the most grandiose plans have not survived contact with reality: the projected 30,000-person operation at Guantánamo was scaled back, and the much-hyped “Alligator Alcatraz” abandoned after less than a year. Surging arrests have run up against legal and logistical limits on deportations. But falling short of the administration’s ambitions is cold comfort to the people caught in the machinery. The purging of “old regime” military officials and bureaucrats and replacement with new regime loyalists… Confirmed, with pronounced racial, gender, and ideological dimensions. The purge of supposedly “woke” military leadership includes Joint Chiefs chairman General C. Q. Brown, who is black, and Admira