Former Bush Official Loses It ... Accuses Obama of Having 'Fascist, Socialist Ideals'

Posted by Amanda Terkel, Think Progress at 8:09 AM on September 18, 2009.

TPMDC reports that Ellen Sauerbrey, who served as President Bush’s Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration, told a local Republican group in Maryland last week that President Obama was following in the footsteps of global dictators:

She said that the Obama administration advanced “fascist, socialist ideals.”

“I’m really afraid for the future of our country,” Sauerbrey told attendees at the annual Lincoln/Reagan Dinner of Sept. 12 in Callaway. “Our Constitution is indeed being dismantled.”

In an interview with TPMDC, Sauerbrey tried to back away from her comments, insisting that she “mentioned Hitler’s name other than when the reporter came up to me afterwards,” she said. “And I said, look, I am not making a direct comparison Obama and Hitler. I’m making a comparison between policies in countries, and that history has a way of repeating itself.” Bush’s appointment of Sauerbrey in 2005 was widely panned because she had “no experience responding to major crises calling for international relief” and was nothing more than a “patronage” appointment.

Tagged as: obama, mental health, sauerbrey

Amanda Terkel is Deputy Research Director at the Center for American Progress and serves as Deputy Editor for The Progress Report and ThinkProgress.org at the Center for American Progress.