Historian: Trump’s 'us v. them' response to LA wildfires shows inability to handle 'moments of crisis'

09 January

The wildfires battering Los Angeles County, from the San Gabriel Valley to Pacific Palisades to the Hollywood Hills, have resulted in widespread destruction and at least five deaths so far. President-elect Donald Trump has responded to the tragedy by claiming that California Gov. Gavin Newsom is to blame and railing against him on his Truth Social platform.

Historian Nicole Hemmer, known for her focus on the conservative movement, discussed Trump's reaction to the wildfires during an appearance on The New Republic's podcast, "the Daily Blast." And she laid out some reasons why she finds his comments so troubling.

Trump, Hemmer lamented, immediately went into "us versus them" mode and showed his inability to respond to a crisis in a presidential manner.

Hemmer told host Greg Sargent, "It definitely is the case that this is something Trump does, right? He takes these moments, moments that used to be a time when people began to come together a little bit, at least in that period of immediate disaster when there's shock and horror…. You and I grew up in a period where we had the Oklahoma City bombing, the Columbine shootings, so many different natural disasters. And they have been these moments when people found a kind of common humanity."

Hemmer continued, "I don't want to paint too rosy a picture of it, but I do think that there’s something substantially different about entering that moment and saying, 'Actually, the person responsible for your problems are my political enemies, and instead of focusing on rebuilding, you should focus on hating them.'"

Trump's response to the wildfires, according to Hemmer, is a blatant example of viewing "natural disasters as political opportunities" — not unlike his response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

Hemmer told Sargent, "It's actually this deeper fascistic strategy of 'us' versus 'them.' And what do you do with 'them?' You punish them at every opportunity. If you have power, you use that power to protect your own and to harm others. And that is absolutely the philosophy of the Trump Administration that just becomes very clear in these moments of crisis."

Listen to the full New Republic podcast at this link or read the transcript here.

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