Is fascism coming to America or is it already here?

On December 8, the official Department of Homeland Security Facebook account posted a recruitment graphic on its official page. In past administrations, something like this would have ended careers. Here we are four days later, and few people have even mentioned it.

The image showed the Statue of Liberty standing rigid and militarized, no longer welcoming or open. Instead, she appeared to be standing guard, a stark contrast to the promise once etched at her feet: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” What was once an invitation now felt like a warning, reserved only for those deemed acceptable. Behind her, filling the sky, loomed a massive Zeppelin drifting overhead. The words read, “Secure America’s Future,” followed by a recruitment link for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Many people must have glanced at that image and dismissed it as just another recruitment ad, not realizing what they were really looking at. Because propaganda does not announce itself loudly. It works through symbols, tone, and emotional suggestion. Airships and zeppelins, large rigid blimps used in the early twentieth century, are not neutral imagery when it comes to political history from that period. In that era, particularly in Nazi Germany, they were used repeatedly in propaganda to communicate technological dominance, national purity, and the idea of a powerful state hovering above the population, always watching. They were meant to create a sense of inevitability.

That symbolism did not disappear because it stopped working. It faded because we learned what it meant and worked hard to reject it. It is being revived now precisely because it was so effective before, and today’s modern authoritarian movements are reaching back to reuse the same visual language, knowing how powerfully it once worked. It also serves as a quiet signal to like-minded extremists already among us, a way of saying: you are seen, you belong here, and we want you inside the government itself

And for me, this image landed with an unexpected weight and irony, because my husband is the great-great-nephew of the man who piloted the Hindenburg, Max Pruss. That airship wasn’t just a machine. It was a towering symbol of Nazi pride, adorned with swastikas and often used as a propaganda spectacle, designed to showcase the strength and superiority of a regime that believed it could not fall. But what the Trump regime is conveniently forgetting is that it did fall. The Hindenburg and the Nazi Party. It went up in flames over American soil, a fiery collapse that exposed just how fragile that illusion of supremacy really was. So for me, when I saw that in the recruitment post, I saw warning signs.

Most people might not have noticed, though. But the people this was meant for absolutely did. That’s how dog whistles work. They’re not designed to be obvious to everyone. In fact, their power comes from being overlooked by the general public while sending a loud, unmistakable signal to a specific audience. It allows a regime to maintain plausible deniability while quietly recruiting loyalty. All it needs to do is be recognized by the right eyes, those already aligned with fascist values, those harboring extremist beliefs, and those looking for validation that their worldview belongs in government. It’s a recruitment strategy, aimed not at the best candidates, but at the most obedient ones. Those who won’t question. Those who already believe outsiders are the enemy. Those eager to serve the leader, not the country.

The Statue of Liberty’s transformation in this image is just as telling as the airship behind her. She’s no longer framed as a beacon of refuge or freedom. She’s framed as a guard. Paired with language about “securing” the future, the implication is clear without ever being stated outright. Security from whom? Protection against what? Fascist messaging almost never names the enemy directly. It relies on suggestion because suggestion lets the viewer project their own fears onto the image. After years of rhetoric portraying immigrants and outsiders as threats, the message doesn’t need to say more. The viewer fills in the blanks and walks away feeling validated in the belief that those who weren’t born here are the ones to blame for whatever’s gone wrong. That’s how propaganda works. It doesn’t argue. It confirms.

And that is the point that keeps getting missed. This is not about preventing fascism anymore. It’s already here. We already have one leader and a small circle of loyalists who claim to speak for the “real” nation, use propaganda and a cult of personality to demand total loyalty, turn businesses and state agencies into tools of control, and silence or punish anyone who disagrees, often by targeting minorities and so-called outsiders as the enemy. This is about recognizing that it has already taken root inside our institutions. You do not get overt propaganda from federal agencies unless the shift has already happened. This is not a warning sign. It is evidence.

And that same authoritarian logic didn’t just show up in one image this week. It showed up again and again.

In Arkansas, the state severed ties with PBS, the first in the nation to do so. This wasn’t just budget trimming. It was a political decision. PBS is not just television. For decades, it has been one of the only publicly available sources of early education, culture, and global exposure. My kids were PBS Kids, like so many others over the years. Rick Steves is one of the reasons I became a travel writer. His commentary on the rise of fascism across Europe opened my eyes to what was happening here at home long before many others saw it. And for many low-income families, PBS isn’t just a collection of children’s shows; it’s their first teacher, their first exposure to new ideas, different places, and people outside their own daily world. It helps expand what their families are already working so hard to give them.

PBS stands in direct opposition to everything fascist regimes depend on. That’s why it was attacked so early and so hard. Because fascist and authoritarian governments would rather children never imagine. Never question. Never feel curiosity about those who live differently from you.

We saw it again when the Trump administration argued in court that providing American Sign Language interpretation at White House press briefings would interfere with the president’s ability to control his image. The suggestion wasn’t about cost or practicality. It was about optics. They argued, in plain terms, that allowing deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans to receive real-time information from their government posed a threat to the carefully managed image of power they wanted to project.

According to The Independent (US Edition), the administration’s filing in June warned that the lawsuit, brought by the National Association of the Deaf to reinstate interpreters, would “severely intrude on the President’s prerogative to control the image he presents to the public” and force him to “share his platform” with an ASL interpreter. That alone should tell you everything.

Authoritarian regimes always begin with control of information. But more importantly, they begin by deciding who gets to receive it. Who is included? Who is allowed to understand the full picture? And who is quietly pushed to the margins until they are forgotten.

Disability communities are often the first to be excluded, not by accident, but by design. Fascist governments throughout history have targeted disabled people as disposable, inconvenient, or unworthy of full participation in society. The Nazi regime famously began its genocide with Aktion T4, the mass murder of disabled people in the name of “purity” and “efficiency.” That same ideology shows up in smaller, more insidious ways when a modern government says: “You don’t need to hear what we say unless it benefits our image.”

This wasn’t just about sign language. It was about the normalization of gatekeeping. About testing how far the public will allow them to go in determining who deserves access to truth and who doesn’t. If the federal government can argue that citizens who rely on interpreters are a liability, it sends a clear message: your ability to participate in public life is conditional. You can be excluded at any moment, not for what you’ve done, but for who you are.

This isn’t a fringe lawsuit. It’s a window into the mindset of a regime that sees access and information they don’t control as a threat. And a regime that sees Americans with disabilities not as citizens to include, but as obstacles to manage. That is textbook fascism.

We saw it in Indiana on Thursday, too, when the President of the United States pressured Republican lawmakers to approve a mid-decade redistricting plan designed to eliminate all Democratic seats and hand Republicans a 9–0 congressional map. The current map sends seven Republicans and two Democrats to Congress. But that wasn’t enough for Trump. He sent Vice President JD Vance to lobby state senators directly and publicly demanded they fall in line.

When they didn’t, and the Indiana Senate voted down the plan on Thursday, the retaliation began. The state’s Republican Lieutenant Governor later posted, and then quickly deleted, a message claiming the White House warned Indiana would lose federal support if the bill failed. In his words, “Trump has made it clear to Indiana leaders: if the Indiana Senate fails to pass the map, all federal funding will be stripped from the state.”

Legal analysts say such an attempt to withhold federal funds would almost certainly trigger a constitutional challenge under the 10th Amendment. But the threat itself tells us everything. This wasn’t a policy disagreement. This was a loyalty test. And when Republican lawmakers failed it, they were hit with coordinated online attacks, harassment from MAGA activists, and in some cases, even swatting attempts and death threats.

This is how fascism works. It doesn’t always come with uniforms or marches. Sometimes, it comes with budget threats, intimidation, and silence, like it just did in Indiana.

And we saw it overseas as well. In an interview with Politico earlier this week, President Trump denounced Europe as a “decaying” group of nations led by “weak” people. And now leaked files revealed that the Trump Regime is working to persuade certain European countries, Austria, Hungary, Poland, and Italy, to break from the European Union and align instead with a U.S.-backed nationalist bloc after framing Europe as facing `civilisational erasure. This is the international version of the same domestic strategy we see here: break institutions, build parallel ones, and fill them with loyalists.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. When you take a step back and look at this coordinated assault on our Constitution, our institutions, and even our elected officials, what comes into focus is not just chaos or confusion; it’s a pattern. A pattern drawn straight from the authoritarian playbook. Fascism doesn’t begin with tanks in the streets. It begins with the normalization of cruelty, the silencing of dissent, the destruction of public trust, and the slow replacement of truth with propaganda. The Trump regime is following the same blueprint used by fascist movements throughout history to turn democratic systems into tools of control.

And yet, there is still proof that pushback matters. This week, preservationists filed a federal lawsuit to halt Trump’s White House ballroom project, arguing it was launched without environmental review, public input, or congressional oversight. Tearing down the East Wing and replacing it with a symbolic monument to himself is exactly what authoritarians do. So yes, this pushback matters.

For those of you watching this unfold and wondering if it’s really happening, yes, it is. If your gut is screaming that something is wrong, listen to it. You’re not imagining things. And for those of you outside the United States, watching in disbelief from afar, I see you too. I feel the same mix of shock and grim recognition. Because I understand exactly what this is.

MAGA was sold the same lie fascists have always used. They were promised simple solutions to complex problems. They were told someone else was to blame for everything wrong in their lives. That cruelty was strength. That lies were truth. That violence was patriotism. And the people behind Trump, this time, learned from the past. They studied what worked in regimes like Nazi Germany and what didn’t. Then they skipped the failures, doubled down on the tools that succeeded, and applied them to our modern systems with chilling precision.

This is not chaos. It is not incompetence. It is a coordinated authoritarian attack on democracy.

And to our friends abroad: they’re coming for you too. Trump’s team has already begun targeting global institutions, undermining alliances, and aligning with authoritarian leaders overseas. What is happening here is a warning. Use it. Organize now. Educate now. Resist wherever this same ideology has begun to take hold in your own countries. Do not wait for it to grow stronger. You might not get another chance.

To my fellow Americans: we are not powerless, and we are not too late. The cracks are showing. The pressure is working. Trump’s grip is slipping. People are leaving the sinking ship. But this is not the moment to ease up. This is the moment to press harder. We keep showing up. We keep spreading the truth. We keep the pressure on, every single day, all the way to the midterms.

We will get through this. And we will rebuild this country, not by returning to what was, but by reimagining what it can be. A nation that finally lives up to its promise. A place that is truly free because people were brave enough to fight for it.

I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather

P.S. If you’ve made it this far, chances are we see things the same way. You can help keep this work going by subscribing to my Substack; there’s a free option, or you can become a paid subscriber for just 15¢ a day. Paid subscriptions help me reach more people, cover more ground, and keep telling the truth about what’s happening to our country.