Musician Linda Ronstadt drew parallels between the election of President Trump and the rise of the Nazis in Germany during an interview with Anderson Cooper on CNN.
“You have read a lot about the Weimar Republic in Germany, and you sort of see great parallels between then and now,” Cooper said in a preview clip released Monday.
“Well, great parallels,” said Ronstadt. “There were a lot of chances. Hitler rose to power; there were a lot of chances to stop him, and they didn’t speak out. And the industrial complex thought they could control him once they got him in office. And of course, he was not controllable.”
“I think a lot of people, though, would be surprised to hear comparisons between what happened then and now,” Cooper suggested.
“If you read the history, you won’t be surprised. It’s exactly the same,” Ronstadt said. “You find a common enemy for everybody to hate. I was sure that Trump was going to get elected the day he announced. And I said, ‘It’s going to be like Hitler, and the Mexicans are the new Jews.’ And sure enough, that’s what he delivered, you know?”
Ronstadt, a critic of the president, turned heads earlier this month when she confronted Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at a State Department gala and told him that he was “enabling Donald Trump.”
“I’d like to say to Mr. Pompeo, who wonders when he’ll be loved, it’s when he stops enabling Donald Trump,” said the singer during her speech at the Kennedy Center.
The full interview, part of CNN Films’ Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice, is set to air on Jan. 1, 2020, at 9 p.m. ET.
