Subject: Re: Is This Fascism?
Orange Jesus went on to say that the "government" should come down hard on MSNBC and make them pay for their illegal political activity. By describing their coverage as "illegal," isn't he implying he will criminally prosecute the station and its reporters?

And isn't that, well, fascism?

I don't think so.

One of Trump's rhetorical techniques is to try to delegitimize all criticisms of him. People who criticize him are disloyal, hypocritical, are breaking the law, or are interfering with the election. Anyone doing anything that might negative affect his chances of winning the election are "interfering" with the election, even though the essence of political campaigning involves millions of people doing things that will affect the outcome of the election in small or big ways.

But him calling for the government to enforce the laws against stations isn't fascism. Because the stations aren't doing anything illegal, enforcing the laws against the stations won't result in prosecutions. This is no more fascism than the occasional calls among certain ill-informed progressives to try to pull various Fox stations' broadcast licenses because they are spreading "election disinformation" or whatever:

https://www.axios.com/pro/tech...

....and no more likely to result in any actual government action.