Deporting US democracyBy Timothy SnyderIn certain ways, this autumn in the US has recalled the autumn of 1938 in Nazi Germany, when mass deportation of undocumented people was one of Hitler’s most ambitious coercive policies before the start of World War II. A family was deported; a desperate refugee took revenge; the government organized a pogrom and reorganized its police; war followed. A policy of mass deportation had led to a reaction that, although unpredictable in its details, was not surprising. For the Nazis, the mass deportation and pogrom of autumn 1938 were steps toward creating a centralized national police agency, the Reich Security Main Office, the following year. That would be the classic next step in the regime change that Trump seems determined to carry out in the US.

Source: Taipei Times December 22, 2025 16:35 UTC