Last week, alarm bells rang across Europe as German Chancellor Olaf Scholz condemned Vice President J.D. Vance for defending "free speech" while downplaying the resurgence of the far-right party in Germany. Vance had criticized Germany’s crackdown on the extremist AfD party, ignoring its embrace of historical revisionism and squelching the party’s embrace of Nazism and denying the Holocaust.
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Scholz warned that such rhetoric, especially in light of Elon Musk’s recent shocking Nazi salute, signals a disturbing shift in the U.S. administration, one increasingly mirroring the authoritarian tactics it claims to oppose. The German Chancellor’s rebuke underscored Europe’s growing fear that America’s leaders are normalizing, even embracing, the legacy of Hitler and the Nazis.
Musk, soon after his infamous salute, appeared virtually at an AfD campaign event, telling supporters not to be ashamed of Germany’s history. Musk essentially defended Nazi terror and emboldened the party’s extremism. Further, the AfD, like Hitler, has gone aggressively after transgender individuals, aggressively spreading anti-trans disinformation in Germany.
It’s no surprise that Vance and Musk stand by them, since the Trump regime is doing the same thing to the trans community here in the United States.
In the last few weeks, Trump’s second presidency, which is more like a Hitler-inspired dictatorship, has launched policies that are methodically targeting and erasing transgender people from American society, echoing history’s darkest atrocities. Writing these words are both mind-numbing and deeply painful, personally, and for so many who still deal with the horror of the Holocaust.
First, it is imperative to acknowledge the unparalleled horror of the Holocaust, where six million Jews were systematically exterminated. It was a tragedy that has left enduring scars across generations, and will continue to do so unless societies ignore Musk’s call to forget it. Any comparison to the Holocaust must be approached with profound respect for its victims and survivors.
In addition, despite what Musk and Vance say, the Holocaust should never, ever be forgotten. Every generation from here on end needs to know the truth about what happened.
Before World War II, Hitler’s regime systematically excluded Jews from German society through anti-Jewish laws, professional bans, and forced "Aryanization" of businesses. Kristallnacht in 1938 marked a shift to open violence, with synagogues burned, businesses destroyed, and thousands arrested. As war began, Jewish people were confined to ghettos, facing starvation and forced labor.
With the 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union, Nazi policies escalated to mass murder. Einsatzgruppen carried out mass shootings, and by 1942, the Wannsee Conference formalized the "Final Solution," leading to deportations to extermination camps equipped with gas chambers, where millions were murdered.
The mechanisms of dehumanization and societal exclusion employed by the Nazi regime bear a chilling resemblance to the current administration's tactics against transgender individuals. Lost by many in all the flurry of Trump’s executive orders, legal challenges, arbitrary government layoffs, and just plain corruption, is his determined elimination of trans people from American society.
Since Trump's inauguration in January 2025, his administration has undertaken a series of actions that undermine and erase the rights and recognition of the transgender community. These measures, implemented through executive orders and policy changes, represent a blatant disregard for the dignity and identity of transgender individuals.
The Trump administration has launched a sweeping assault on transgender rights, beginning with Executive Order 14168, which redefines sex in federal policy as strictly male or female, erasing transgender, nonbinary, and intersex identities from government recognition. Agencies have been ordered to remove references to gender identity, cut funding for transgender programs, and bar transgender individuals from single-sex facilities that align with their gender.
The administration has further dismantled protections by directing the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to dismiss gender identity discrimination cases, signaling that workplace prejudice is acceptable.
The Department of Education has halted programs supporting transgender students, scrapped resources for homeless transgender youth, and banned gender-related employee resource groups, leaving vulnerable students without critical support.
A systematic purge of federal websites has erased LGBTQ+ resources, further marginalizing the community. Many sites and organizations have dropped the “T” and “Q” from LGBTQ+, including the Stonewall Memorial.
Additionally, an executive order banning transgender women from women’s sports threatens schools with funding cuts for allowing inclusion, while a redefinition of sex in Title IX excludes transgender people from its protections.
Restrictions on gender-affirming care have intensified, with federal agencies reviewing insurance policies to eliminate coverage under Medicare, Medicaid, and the ACA, making care less accessible.
Last week, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth mandated an immediate cessation of gender-affirming medical care for transgender service members and prohibited new enlistments of individuals with a history of gender dysphoria.
And on Wednesday, with the bird flu raging, a measles outbreak threatening to proliferate, and an especially virulent strain of influenza all affecting America’s health, in one of his first acts as Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. rolled out sweeping new policies that effectively erase the federal recognition of transgender, nonbinary, and intersex people. Kennedy's prioritizing bashing the trans community underscores the overall goal of the administration.
These policies collectively seek to erase transgender individuals from public life, stripping them of recognition, rights, and critical support systems. The consequences are severe, particularly for the estimated 300,000 transgender youth and 1.6 million transgender adults in the U.S. Research shows that discrimination exacerbates mental health struggles, increasing suicide risk among transgender people. For those affected, including families desperate for care for their children, these measures are not just policies, they are life-threatening attacks on their existence.
While many Americans may not personally know a transgender person, they cannot stand idly by as the administration seeks to remove them from their communities, jobs, and daily lives.
History has shown us the catastrophic consequences of allowing such exclusionary policies to persist. We must recognize the humanity of our transgender neighbors and affirm their rightful place in the American tapestry. To remain silent is to be complicit in their erasure.
Tied together, all of the administration's recent actions against the transgender community are a direct assault on the principles of equality and human dignity. By drawing parallels to historical instances of systemic marginalization, we can better understand the gravity of these policies and the urgent need to oppose them.
It is our collective responsibility to ensure that history does not repeat itself and that every individual, regardless of gender identity, is afforded the respect and rights they deserve. Trump will have blood on his hands as this erasure continues, and that’s probably his goal. But so will the rest of us if we don't stand up and loudly condemn Trump’s attempt to emulate Hitler.
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