Concentration camp expert warns Trump won’t stop with just immigrants in camps
We still have the power!
“We need to be aware, as a country, how quickly this can get much, much worse.”
That is the warning from Andrea Pitzer--an expert on concentration camps who wrote the 2017 book, “One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps”-on where we find ourselves today under the Trump regime.
I’ve written repeatedly since Donald Trump won in November that his second term will be worse than we want to imagine. That has obviously come to be.
The question now is how much darker will things become and how do we effectively fight back? Pitzer in our conversation this week (which you can watch below) powerfully and very informatively addressed both points.
Pitzer explained that in writing her book documenting the history of concentration camps, she found that when the leaders go down the path of dehumanizing a group of people as a political tool – be it Jews in Nazi Germany or migrants today with Trump—we must understand it doesn’t end there. It continues down a road that can lead to mass detentions or even genocide.
What is deeply disturbingly is just how fast Trump has—and continues to move—in his embrace of this age-old playbook. Pitzer noted that in just the first few months into his term, “We were already seeing people being kidnapped off the streets by agents who are masked.” Now we are at the next step in the fascist playbook with the “Alligator Alcatraz” camp that opened in Florida.
Pitzer stated point blank that “Alligator Alcatraz” is a “concentration camp.” She noted that a “concentration camp”—as opposed to prisons that are part of the criminal justice system—involve “mass detention of civilians without any real trial. If there's any kind of trial, it's a show trial.” And the reason for their imprisonment is not for “some crime that they've committed, but instead, on the basis of identity.”
Pitzer—a journalist who has written articles for a range of outlets—did not hesitate to connect the tactics of the Nazis in regard to Jews to what we are seeing from Trump and his regime officials with immigrants. She explained that the first goal of the Nazis was to make life so difficult for the Jewish population—such as with the anti-Jewish Nuremberg laws-- that they would self-deport from Germany. However, when that didn’t have the intended impact, it was then—five years into Hitler’s time as the German leader--that the Nazis began to round up German Jews as a group and put them in concentration camps, which helped to usher in The Holocaust. (The first Nazi concentration camps created in 1933 were primarily for political opponents.)
As Pitzer highlighted, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem invoked that same concept of self-deportation when she visited Alligator Alcatraz last week. Noem noted that the Everglades camp was meant to frighten immigrants into self-deporting, declaring, “If you don’t, you may end up here.”
When the self-deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants does not happen—and it won’t—what more will the Trump regime do? As a reminder, thanks to the Trump big billionaires bill, Trump will now have more than $100 billion dollars for immigration enforcement including more than doubling the number of ICE officers and building a swath of concentration camps.
However, history is warning us that Trump will not be content to simply focus on migrants. In fact, in the past few weeks we’ve seen the Trump regime expanding their actions to target U.S. citizens. Trump’s DOJ announced in June they are now focused on “prioritizing denaturalization” of U.S. citizens. These are people who have come to the United States legally, followed all the rules and become U.S. citizens. But per the DOJ memo, they will seek to strip people of U.S. citizenship based on a list of ten grounds—including if a citizen simply “poses a potential danger to national security.” That could mean any of the 25 million naturalized citizens are at risk if they become critics of Trump and he dubs them a “potential danger.”
We also learned from a federal court decision on Friday that Trump’s ICE has not only been unconstitutionally rounding up migrants by way of “roving patrols,” but they have also been detaining U.S. citizens in their raids and refusing to immediately release them.
In addition, Trump’s DOJ is now criminally investigating two of Trump’s critics, former CIA Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey. In addition, Trump in April signed an executive orders directing his DOJ to find crimes to punish two former aides, Miles Taylor, a former Homeland Security official who criticized Trump, and Christopher Krebs, a top cybersecurity official who refused after the 2020 election to back up Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was stolen.
And on Saturday morning, Trump threatened to strip U.S. born Rosie O’Donnell of her citizenship, writing on Truth Social: “Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.” From a legal point of view, there is no current provision to strip a U.S. born citizen of their citizenship. Clearly, Trump is desperate to distract from his cover up of the Jeffrey Epstein files.
But with that said, what we know from Trump is that he always tells us exactly what he wants to do and then tries to achieve that. Don’t be surprised when he tries to strip an American born critic of U.S. citizenship in the hopes the corrupt GOP Supreme Court will allow him to do just that.
From there, Trump will deport his now stateless critics to other nations—or take a page from other fascist leaders--and simply imprison them in the new concentration camps he is building.
As Pitzer stated, “We're in a bad place, and I really think Americans who don't want it to happen will need to stand up against it in some way, because the other thing that we've seen is these things do not stop on their own.” She added, “They absolutely do not.”
Yes, these are challenging times. But we still have the power to build a movement to stop Trump and take back our power—be that via elections or other ways. As Pitzer noted, “the independent judiciary and especially the right to protest are critical.” She noted that that the idea of protesting “doesn't just mean does mean nationally.” In fact, she emphasized that “what you do in your community on a small local level is absolutely critical.”
When people even in red areas see others from their community say, “this is wrong,” history shows it has an impact on their views, Pitzer explained. That is why she urges people to get involved with local community organizations, the mayor and council, etc. It’s this local engagement she believes will help us build coalitions to win the 2026 elections and beyond.
I don’t want to sugarcoat where we find ourselves as a nation. I can’t tell you it’s all going to be okay. But I can tell you that if we check out, Trump will succeed at his fascist takeover of the United States. I can also tell you with great confidence that if we unite, organize and prepare for the fight ahead—whatever form that takes--we have the power to defeat the dark forces of Trumpism.
I hope you will watch my discussion below with Andrea Pitzer. It is truly worth your time:
There have been many stories about Americans getting "mistakenly" swept up. We know that all those in the camps are there w/o due process and are being held in inhumane conditions. But as long as the media doesn't report on it, there are still those who are unaware. Now with the regime talking about "deporting" and revoking citizenship from those they disagree with, we are well on the path. As many have pointed out you don't quadruple the ICE budget unless you plan on jailing a lot more people. The camps must be stopped.
Spot on article!