"When Silence Wins, Everyone Else Loses"

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Guest article by Michael Cohen

“First they came…” We know the words. We recite them like some cautionary bedtime tale from a distant time, tucked neatly away between the pages of a history textbook or the plaque of a Holocaust museum wall. But they were never meant to be nostalgic. They were meant to be prophetic. And in this moment, they’re screaming louder than ever—while far too many are still whispering back.

We are watching the scaffolding of fascism being rebuilt in plain sight. Not with jackboots and swastikas, but with red hats and courtroom rants. And if you think the echoes aren’t real, then you haven’t been listening. Or worse, you have—and you’ve chosen to look away.

Reminiscent of Hitler’s grotesque propaganda, where Jews were cast as vermin, stripped of their humanity so that no one would care when they were disappeared, the Trump apparatus is manufacturing the same cruelty, recast for modern America. The new “vermin” are the immigrants. The undocumented. The vulnerable. The desperate.

They’re painted not as people, but as animals. As monsters. As rapists. As the scourge of American society. The messaging isn’t accidental. It is the exact kind of dehumanization that makes cruelty palatable, even desirable. It’s why we’re shown grainy, pre-approved clips of crime scenes; out-of-context images served up like blood-soaked appetizers, designed to trigger rage and extinguish empathy. Women thrown in front of trains. Elderly women bludgeoned with bats. Children assaulted. The message? They deserve it. They’re not like us. They are not human.

It’s psychological warfare. When you cast someone as a monster, the public won’t flinch when you cage them like animals. Won’t protest when you deny them due process. Won’t care when families are separated, when children are locked in squalid detention centers, when an innocent immigrant is sent to a detention center in El Salvador—wrongly and with no due process rights. No tears. No outrage. Just silence.

Sound familiar?

This is the playbook. This has always been the playbook. Turn the masses against the vulnerable. Make cruelty the point. Then repeat the lie until the truth chokes on its own breath.

But here’s the problem: Americans aren’t buying it. Not all of them. Not enough, at least, to let it slide unnoticed. The Trump administration’s relentless message—echoed by its enablers, shouted by its media surrogates, and parroted by the bootlicking chorus of GOP cowards—is falling on increasingly skeptical ears. The country, weary of chaos, has begun to recognize the con. Just look at what is happening at the GOP town halls!

Still, they persist. Because for Trump and his loyalists, truth is malleable. It’s a tool to be twisted, a weapon to be sharpened against the innocent. Just look at how they’re now spinning Supreme Court rulings—another dangerous manipulation of language and law.

The recent SCOTUS decision regarding Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the wrongfully detained immigrant, is being heralded by MAGA-world as a 9-0 victory. “Total exoneration,” they cry. “The Court ruled in our favor.” Nonsense. Lies. The decision wasn’t a greenlight for authoritarianism; it was a narrow ruling on the process, and even that was layered in caution. But Trumpworld isn’t interested in legal nuance. They're interested in wordsmithing: to effectuate versus facilitate Mr. Garcia’s return to the U.S. Say it enough times, and it becomes real to the willfully ignorant.

And the most chilling part? They’re not doing it alone.

The institutions designed to check this madness—the courts, the Congress, the media—are under siege. Some are holding the line. Judges are resisting. Journalists are shouting the truth into the void. But the sandbags are thinning. The attacks are relentless. And the defenders are far too few.

The pattern is clear: vilify the outsider. Undermine the judiciary. Destroy the free press. Rewrite history in real time. All while demanding loyalty not to the Constitution, but to the man. To the movement. To the myth.

This isn’t just about Trump. He’s merely the vessel. This is about every coward in Congress who stood—and still stands—silent. Every billionaire who bankrolled hate. Every anchor who twisted facts into propaganda. Every voter who looked the other way because it wasn’t them being targeted.

Yet.

Martin Niemöller’s haunting poem was never about poetry; it was a warning. A truth carved out of guilt and ash. And we are staring down the same damn fire.

So, ask yourself: When they came for the immigrants, the press, the prosecutors, the librarians, the judges, the drag queens, the teachers, the women, the trans kids, the historians—did you speak out?

Or did you wait?

Because soon enough, it won’t be them they’re coming for. It will be you.

And by then, there may be no one left to speak.

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