Comparing Trump’s Policies to Mao’s Historical Atrocities
The column likens current U.S. policies under Trump to Mao Zedong’s disastrous campaigns, arguing that a small elite is imposing harmful rules on the public.
In a polemical essay, the writer compares Mao Zedong’s 1958 Tibetan agricultural decree—responsible for a famine that killed roughly 26% of the region’s population—to policies pursued by Donald Trump and his allies. The article points to Bobby Kennedy Jr.’s push to split the MMR vaccine into three doses, ICE’s acquisition of high-voltage gloves, and the removal of over 6,800 book titles from schools as modern equivalents of Mao’s forced collectivization, Red Guard terror, and cultural suppression.
It also highlights the termination of 300,000 federal workers in Trump’s first year and the labeling of Democratic lawmakers as “traitors.” By invoking historical atrocities, the author argues that today’s political elite are inflicting unnecessary suffering through ignorance and authoritarian tactics.
Why it matters
It warns that current policy choices may erode public health and civil freedoms, echoing past totalitarian mistakes.
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