On Saturday's Ayman show on MSNBC, during a panel discussion of President Donald Trump's recent executive actions, contributor Dean Obeidallah declared public ICE raids to be a "fascist spectacle" like those by Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, and fellow analyst Maria Hinojosa compared Trump's deportation efforts to the Holocaust and American slavery.
While discussing President Trump's actions against DEI, Obeidallah went on to decry the President as a "vile, racist piece of garbage."
After host Ayman Mohyeldin brought up public figures like Doctor Phil McGraw and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem being filmed accompanying federal agents on ICE raids, Obeidallah brought Nazi references to the discussion:
...but these are fascist spectacles. That's what historians call them. They are fascist spec -- Mussolini did it. Hitler did it -- huge marches, big rallies, the 1936 Olympic Games. Same thing Mussolini -- huge march on Rome. They are spectacles to get press to make them look more powerful and bigger than life. Their goal is to make the rest of us be intimidated and be fearful -- paralyzed with fear as Timothy Snyder talks about in his book, On Tyranny. We can't be paralyzed with fear ... This is fascism -- we're seeing it right in our streets right here. The use of the military -- well, it should be next -- in the streets of America to round up people who are brown.
Following up, Mohyeldin lamented:
The problem with this, though, is that we're talking about it, but there are probably large swaths of the country who are just watching right-wing media and who follow Doctor Phil, and they're probably buying the fact that, like, "Finally, Donald Trump is in power -- two weeks in, he is fixing the immigration system," and they are just eating it all up.
The MSNBC host soon suggested that illegal aliens would be mistreated as he brought up Trump's plans to detain some at Guantanamo Bay as they await their deportaion flights:
Maria, the -- probably one of the uglier parts of this saga that is unfolding is Guantanamo Bay and this facility that was notorious for abuse and torture now again being used in this draconian way. You know, President Obama, I remember, tried to shut it down. President Biden tried to shut it down. They couldn't do it. And yet this -- this facility continues to haunt us in ways that perhaps we probably never imagined.
Hinojosa compared the deportation of illegal aliens to the Holocaust and American slavery:
But one thing that did make AOC tear up was talking about the fact that people in her community are coming and saying, "Look, I'm signing the custody of my child to my neighbor. I'm going to self-deport so that I can come back in a decade." Because if you get deported, you can't come back. ... But the thought of, again, family separation. It's not the first time it's happened in our country. Enslaved people were giving their children to other people so that they would get out of slavery, right? In the Holocaust, people were hiding people -- getting their children outside. ... So it's fascism, and it's happening, though we won't see that part of the family giving their child over to a neighbor to take care of them.
In a later segment, as the group discussed President Trump blaming DEI for the recent plane crash in D.C., and his mocking reporters for asking him if he would visit the site of the crash even though it was underwater, Obeidallah erupted: "Donald Trump's a scumbag. I mean, I think we can say that. He's a vile, racist piece of garbage. He happens to be President of the United States, so we have to pay attention. If he wasn't, he'd be one of vile people out there in this country."
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read:
MSNBC's Ayman
February 1, 2025
8:05 p.m. EasternDEAN OBEIDALLAH, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: By bringing Doctor Phil, what does it do? It gets more press. Doctor Phil promoted the night before like a World Wrestling Federation event. He goes, "I'm going out tomorrow, and it's not going to be safe." Maybe they'll work in other right-wing celebrities -- Hulk Hogan will be out there or Kid Rock. And it's the idea -- but these are fascist spectacles. That's what historians call them. They are fascist spec -- Mussolini did it. Hitler did it -- huge marches, big rallies, the 1936 Olympic Games. Same thing Mussolini -- huge march on Rome. They are spectacles to get press to make them look more powerful and bigger than life.
Their goal is to make the rest of us be intimidated and be fearful -- paralyzed with fear as Timothy Snyder talks about in his book, On Tyranny. We can't be paralyzed with fear -- we have to step up and fight this stuff. This is fascism -- we're seeing it right in our streets right here. The use of the military -- well, it should be next -- in the streets of America to round up people who are brown.
And in New Jersey, they detained a guy who was a U.S. military veteran -- a U.S. citizen -- and they mocked him because he said, "I'm an American." And they mocked him for it. ... So this is a spectacle. It is called a "fascist spectacle." People can Google that term -- it is real.
(...)
AYMAN MOHYELDIN: The problem with this, though, is that we're talking about it, but there are probably large swaths of the country who are just watching right-wing media and who follow Doctor Phil, and they're probably buying the fact that, like, "Finally, Donald Trump is in power -- two weeks in, he is fixing the immigration system," and they are just eating it all up.
(...)
MOHYELDIN: Maria, the -- probably one of the uglier parts of this saga that is unfolding is Guantanamo Bay and this facility that was notorious for abuse and torture now again being used in this draconian way. You know, President Obama, I remember, tried to shut it down. President Biden tried to shut it down. They couldn't do it. And yet this -- this facility continues to haunt us in ways that perhaps we probably never imagined.
(...)
MARIA HINOJOSA, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: But one thing that did make AOC tear up was talking about the fact that people in her community are coming and saying, "Look, I'm signing the custody of my child to my neighbor. I'm going to self-deport so that I can come back in a decade." Because if you get deported, you can't come back. If you remove yourself, you can potentially come back. But the thought of, again, family separation. It's not the first time it's happened in our country. Enslaved people were giving their children to other people so that they would get out of slavery, right? In the Holocaust, people were hiding people -- getting their children outside. So this is what's happening now that people are living in -- that's what's happening. So it's fascism, and it's happening, though we won't see that part of the family giving their child over to a neighbor to take care of them.
(...)
8:21 p.m.
OBEIDALLAH: Donald Trump's a scumbag. I mean, I think we can say that. He's a vile, racist piece of garbage. He happens to be President of the United States, so we have to pay attention. If he wasn't, he'd be one of vile people out there in this country.
(...)
And this idea that Donald Trump is the defender of white supremacy has been with us. White supremacy is as American as apple pie. You have to look at the history of this country from the original Constitution which had the Three-Fifths Compromise and the Fugitive Slave Clause to after the Civil War. The Civil War itself was to defend white supremacy. Jim Crow, George Wallace -- "Segregation today, tomorrow and forever." Donald Trump is just the next iteration of that. So the point is, we got to stand up to this guy because, if not, they just -- they just -- that's everything. Diversity to them is different shades of white people.
