Radio host Charlamagne tha God struck out at prominent Democrats for calling President Trump a “fascist,” while they continue to work with him.
The Breakfast Club co-host and CNN contributor said in an interview with Mediaite’s Press Club that it is frustrating when Democratic politicians call Trump an “authoritarian” or “fascist,” but then normalize his behavior through their actions.
“If you’re, you know, Joe Biden, and you say, ‘Donald Trump is a threat to democracy,’ but then when Donald Trump wins the presidency, you standing outside the White House saying, ‘Welcome home,’” he said Monday to Press Club host Colby Hall.
Charlamagne then turned his critique to New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, who had a friendly meeting with the president on Nov. 21, after he referred to the president as a “fascist” in statements to the press.
“Or if you’re Zohran Mamdani, and you say, Donald Trump is a fascist, but then you’re saying you can work with a fascist. And I’m like, well, that’s not how fascism works,” Charlamagne said.
“Never in the history of mankind has somebody worked with a fascist, and it’s worked like, that’s actually how you normalize fascism. What that does is, number one, it makes those words mean absolutely nothing,” the radio host continued.
“When you call somebody a ‘fascist’ and you say that ‘they’re the next Hitler,’ think about what that does to society,” he added. “But then you politicians, y’all are in the White House just having a drink together and saying y’all can work together.”
Charlamagne said the same idea also applied to former President Barack Obama, who was seen having a friendly chat with Trump at Jimmy Carter’s funeral earlier this year.
“You wouldn’t be playing footsie with a fascist at a funeral, right, President Obama?” he questioned.
He continued to make his case that political pundits and media personalities should be the ones using “fascist” labels, not politicians. He said that if Democrats continue to call Trump a “fascist,” but work with him, then their actions make “those words mean absolutely nothing.”
Charlamagne’s political criticisms have spanned across the aisle this year. The radio host called out the Democratic Party for their handling of the 2024 presidential election in August; that same month, he hit back at Trump after the president called Charlamagne a “racist” and a “Low IQ individual” following Charlamagne’s appearance on Laura Trump’s Fox News show.
“If these are just regular political disagreements and we’ve gotten to the point where the rhetoric can be so intense for them,” Charlamagne told Hall. “But those words don’t actually matter, man, how much stock should we really put into it?”
