By Ben Emos | Thursday, June 25, 2025 | 6 min read
When Ivana Trump disclosed in a 1990 Vanity Fair interview that Donald Trump kept a book of Hitler’s speeches by his bed, many treated it as an odd bit of rich-man trivia—an offbeat, tasteless detail tucked between designer ties and gold-plated faucets. But for some of us, it planted a seed. Years later, in the dusty stacks of historical archives while researching Mein Kampf & Trump: A Dangerous Resemblance, that offhand revelation took on a more ominous tone.
What began as a study of inflammatory rhetoric quickly evolved into something more complex—and disturbing. It was not the bombast or authoritarian body language that struck me most, though those certainly drew headlines. No, it was policy. Specifically, the way economic grievance was harnessed and weaponized through protectionism, with tariffs used not just as economic levers, but as political cudgels.
And when the dust settled, one parallel stood out above all others: Donald Trump’s 2025 global tariff war bore a chilling resemblance to the economic strategy Adolf Hitler employed in the 1930s to consolidate power and dismantle democracy.
A Weaponized Economy: Germany in the 1930s
Before Hitler was a dictator, he was a strategist. After rising to power in 1933, he inherited a Germany wracked by war guilt, mass unemployment, and hyperinflation. But instead of offering reconciliation or reform, he offered scapegoats and economic nationalism. The Treaty of Versailles was branded a humiliation. International trade was painted as a parasite feeding off the German worker. The solution, Hitler argued, was autarky—economic self-sufficiency.
Central to this doctrine were punitive tariffs, import restrictions, and tightly controlled currency exchanges. These measures weren’t just aimed at reviving the economy—they were designed to isolate Germany, to break its dependence on what the Nazi regime called “Jewish finance” and “Anglo-capitalist” systems. By walling off Germany economically, Hitler created both the illusion of strength and the condition for absolute control.
What often gets overlooked is how this economic strategy preceded the most draconian social policies. The destruction of labor unions, the silencing of dissenting media, the criminalization of political opposition—these all followed the economic lockdown. The economy wasn’t just policy. It was prelude.
Fast Forward: America, 2025
On the surface, Trump’s 2025 tariff campaign looked like a bold, if misguided, effort to restore balance to international trade. China, Canada, Mexico, the European Union—all were hit with tariffs under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, a Cold War-era law originally designed for national security threats. The logic was framed as patriotic: “America First.” Steel jobs. Unfair trade. A hollowed-out heartland.
But look a little deeper, and the logic begins to fray. Allies were punished alongside rivals. Farmers—supposedly the core of Trump’s base—suffered massive losses when China retaliated with tariffs of its own. Billions in subsidies followed, not unlike the kinds of compensatory handouts used in state-controlled economies. And instead of making America more self-sufficient, it made it more polarized and more isolated.
This wasn’t just trade policy. It was grievance weaponized through economics. Sound familiar?
Parallels That Matter
Let’s be clear: Donald Trump is not Adolf Hitler. The historical, cultural, and moral contexts are vastly different. But history does not repeat—it rhymes. And the most dangerous rhymes are the ones that go unnoticed.
1. Economic Nationalism as a Rallying Cry
Both leaders used tariffs not simply to “correct” trade imbalances but to frame international engagement as betrayal. For Hitler, it was the betrayal of Versailles and the Weimar Republic. For Trump, it was NAFTA, China, and what he called “the globalist agenda.”
In both cases, tariffs were sold as a way to protect the nation’s soul. Not just jobs, but dignity. Not just trade, but sovereignty.
2. Enemies Within and Without
Once tariffs began to bite and economies responded (retaliation from other nations, rising prices, disrupted supply chains), both regimes blamed enemies—foreign and domestic. In Nazi Germany, Jewish financiers and Bolsheviks were blamed for the country’s woes. In Trump’s America, it was immigrants, liberal elites, and “deep state” actors undermining economic recovery.
In both models, the strongman was cast not as a creator of chaos, but as its last defense.
3. Short-Term Gains, Long-Term Consequences
Just as Hitler saw short-term industrial recovery due to rearmament and forced labor programs, Trump’s tariffs produced initial excitement in domestic steel and aluminum industries. But those gains were narrow, and the overall cost—especially in agriculture, consumer prices, and diplomatic relationships—was high.
The point wasn’t sustainability. The point was symbolism.
4. Autarky Rebranded
Hitler named it outright: autarky. Trump never used the word. But “bring the jobs back,” “make it here,” and “decouple from China” were all attempts to rebrand an old concept in new clothes. This is not inherently bad. Countries have a right to economic resilience. But when the goal becomes total self-reliance in an interconnected world, it tips into delusion. Or worse—authoritarian preparation.
A Culture of Grievance
What ties all this together is cultural grievance. In both eras, economic tools were used not just to stimulate the economy, but to solidify identity. To be economically loyal was to be truly German—or truly American. Tariffs weren’t just taxes on imports. They were purity tests.
And once identity is tied to economic suffering, any opposition can be labeled unpatriotic. This is how democracies erode—not with sudden violence, but with a slow corrosion of consensus.
Where the Similarities End
Of course, we must acknowledge where the analogy ends. Hitler’s regime was a genocidal machine. Trump, for all his incendiary rhetoric, operated within a democratic framework, however strained. Courts blocked some of his moves. Voters removed him in 2020. Institutions held—if barely.
But we should not need death camps to recognize warning signs. Economic autarky, culture wars, enemy scapegoats, and rhetorical dehumanization—these are early tremors. And ignoring them because they don’t yet amount to catastrophe is history’s oldest and most fatal mistake.
The Lessons We Refuse to Learn
In the end, what unsettled me most wasn’t that Trump appeared to imitate Hitler—it’s that he may have done so unknowingly. That the lessons of history could be so easily forgotten that two men, separated by a century, might trace such parallel paths simply by following the gravity of grievance.
Ivana Trump’s revelation about a copy of Hitler’s speeches on the nightstand may remain an eerie footnote. But if we dismiss these echoes as mere coincidence, we risk letting rhyme become repetition—and repetition, in time, become ruin.
For a deeper analysis of these disturbing parallels, read Mein Kampf & Trump: A Dangerous Resemblance—available now on Amazon.
Copyright 2025 FN, NewsRoom.
