Montage: Media, Democrats history of labeling Republicans racists, Nazis and terrorists
Left-leaning media outlets and their cohorts in the Democratic Party have used all sorts of unpleasant names to describe Republicans.
When President Biden coined the term "semi-fascism" for Republicans holding the Donald Trump banner last week, it was just the latest moniker bestowed by the liberal media and political left on the movement.
Criticism of Trump supporters goes all the way back to the 2016 presidential campaign, when then-candidate Hillary Clinton was widely panned for claiming that half of her opponent's advocates could fit into a category she described as a "basket of deplorables."
"You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right?" she said at the time. "The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic — you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up."
Recent years have only seen the rhetoric against Republicans, and more specifically Trump-friendly Republicans, rise among Democratic politicians, as well as left-leaning media network personalities and guests.
President Joe Biden disembarks from Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, on Aug. 29, 2022. (Reuters/Elizabeth Frantz)
In the last several months, Biden has repeatedly used a variety of names to describe Trump supporters, including the phrase "ultra MAGA."
"Let me tell you about this ultra MAGA agenda," Biden said in May. "It’s extreme, as most MAGA things are." Around the same time, Biden also referred to Trump as the "great MAGA king."
Trump’s Save America super PAC quickly capitalized on the president’s language, sending out a fundraising email with a shirt for purchase. The shirt portrayed Trump as Superman with the words "SUPERMAGA" written in comic book font below. The former president also sent out a meme featuring himself as "Lord of the Rings" character Aragorn alongside the caption, "The Return of the Great MAGA King."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has also used a variety of names to refer to Trump Republicans over the past few years. In August 2020, while discussing mail-in voting, Pelosi made headlines after she referred to Republicans as "enemies of the state" and "domestic enemies."
'The Cross Connection' host Tiffany Cross (Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images)
In July 2019, Tiffany Cross, during an appearance on MSNBC, told host Joy Reid that people need to start calling Trump supporters racist and asserted that the "Make America Great Again" hat popularized by the former president was akin to a modern-day swastika or Ku Klux Klan hood. Another instance saw Cross refer to Trump's base as "Klan-like." Despite her comment, which was widely panned, Cross was hired by the network less than a year later.
MSNBC was largely responsible for much of the incendiary rhetoric aimed at Trump supporters in the last few years, often airing segments that compared Trump and his supporters to terrorist organizations and authoritarian regimes.
While the COVID-19 pandemic was still in full force in September 2020, and the presidential election mere months away, NBC News and MSNBC national affairs analyst John Heilemann suggested that the Republican Party under Trump had become a "death cult."
President Biden, right, has suggested that former President Trump's political base is "semi-fascist." (James Devaney/GC Images | Alex Wong/Getty Images)
A variety of other reporters and guests applied far worse nicknames to Republicans under Trump’s leadership.
Former Department of Homeland Security chief of staff Miles Taylor once claimed that elements of the GOP were not dissimilar to the militant Islamic movement known as jihadists.
MSNBC contributor Dean Obeidallah said in May 2021 that the Republican Party was no longer a party but rather a "White nationalist movement" and a "fascist threat" to the nation.
"That’s not hyperbolic, that’s academic," he added.
MSNBC host Joy Reid has also referred to Republicans as a "White nationalist movement."
But with the midterms swiftly approaching and the possibility of another Trump campaign looming, MSNBCers have amped up rhetoric against the former president and his supporters in 2022.
MSNBC, CNN, DEMOCRATS LARGELY DEFEND BIDEN'S ‘SEMI-FASCISM’ COMMENT, SLAM TRUMP REPUBLICANS
Jason Johnson speaks onstage at Politicon 2018 at the Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles on Oct. 20, 2018. (Michael S. Schwartz/Getty Images)
Continuing on with the terroristic allusions, MSNBC political contributor Jason Johnson said the Republican Party to Trump supporters was like the PLO to Hamas.
"They are a dime-store front for a terrorist movement," Johnson said in January.
"The Republican Party is basically a domestic terrorist cell at this point, and they should be treated as such," DNC adviser Kurt Bardella similarly said just a few days ago.
Meanwhile, MSNBC strategist Fernand Amandi, who frequently claims that Republicans are fascist and authoritarian, said in July that criticism of Democrats by their own constituents is OK, so long as they understand there is no alternative.
"There is no alternative right now because the Republican Party today is a fascist, authoritarian project," he added.
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MSNBC’s Donny Deutsch said in April that Republicans were the party of "knuckleheads, weirdos and freaks" and that it was a simple message for Democrats to capitalize on.
"Underneath that, it’s the party of nothing," Deutsch added.