Former Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean said Thursday on MSNBC’s “The Beat” that Republicans were “undermining democracy” like “Hitler did.”
Dean said, “We are watching something that we haven’t seen for a long time in this country, but it happens in many democracies, and it is the weak point of democracies when one side figures out how to use democracy to undermine democracy. So what these folks are doing, essentially, is what Hitler did. It is what Viktor Orbán did in Hungary.”
He continued, “Democracy dies because you no longer care about democracy. The Republicans have no commitment to democracy at this point. There are very few that do. Kinzinger is somebody who stood up. Liz Cheney stood up for what is right. Most are running around subservient to somebody who never cared about democracy, and that’s Donald Trump. So this next few years will determine whether the United States survives as the cradle of democracy.”
Dean added, “The way out of this is young people aren’t going to take this. My view of this is, actually, I end up being optimistic. And the reason I do is I think the Republicans have already lost this. The reason they are abandoning democracy is because they have no choice. They can’t win in a democracy. This is not going to go away. These folks will get old and die soon. Look at how old these people are that are carrying on like this for the most part.”
On the Black Lives Matter movement, Dean said, “For the first time since I have been alive, and I remember back in the ’60s, white kids and black kids were out there together in equal numbers demanding justice. And that is what the real future of this country is. So I am optimistic in the long run because these fascists are going to die off. The Republicans are going to be restored. I think there is a good debate to be had between conservatives and liberals. It is a good thing to have conservatives in the government who are reminding us we can’t spend money and print money all the time. I do not think it is a good thing to have conservatives who do not believe in democracy in the government. These people are not conservatives. They are neo-fascists, and that’s a fact.”
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