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By Mandy Taheri
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The Trump administration has come under scrutiny by critics in recent days for allegedly echoing Nazi sentiment in slogans used by both the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Labor (DOL).
Why It Matters
President Donald Trump's administration has repeatedly faced criticism over rhetoric and actions that have been compared to authoritarian and fascist regimes. The administration has dismissed claims that it is operating as a fascist regime and has repurposed Nazi phrases or sentiments.
Read More on Politics
Slovenian magazine Objektiv put out a January cover of Trump with crude oil dripping over his top lip from below his nose, giving him the appearance of a mustache much like the one that Nazi leader Adolf Hitler was famous for.
The criticism comes amid ongoing pressure campaigns by the Trump administration, including floating taking Greenland, the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, and increased violent ICE force on Americans.
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What To Know
Tom Morello, the guitarist for the band Rage Against the Machine, called out the Trump administration in a social media post on Monday, arguing that the DHS’s podium with the statement “One of ours, all of yours,” is a Nazi slogan.
In his post, Morello said the slogan was “coined when an SS officer was killed and the Nazis murdered every male resident of the village in response,” in reference to the Lidice massacre of 1942.
The massacre in a small Czech town came on orders from Hitler as an “act of revenge for the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, a prominent Nazi official,” the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum says on its website.
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem stood behind the podium during a press conference on January 8 at the World Trade Center, the day after ICE officer Jonathan Ross fatally shot Renee Good in Minneapolis.
Hunter College history professor Benjamin Hett, whose work focuses on Nazism, told Newsweek that the phrase's origin is not entirely clear. He noted that he cannot confirm if that slogan was used in Lidice.
“I have never heard that,” he said.
“I am skeptical that that was really a slogan, though it does partially capture what they did after the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich (the occasion for the Lidice massacre—in which the men of the town were killed, the women sent to concentration camps, so they didn't kill ‘all of yours’ exactly)."
Peter Fritzsche, a history professor at the University of Illinois, told Newsweek, in part, in an email: "I know the discourse around Lidice fairly well and I have not come across anything specific like 'One of ours, all of yours' but the phrase captures the essence of Germany’s hostage policy in World War II which was affirmed by Hitler many times."
The Associated Press reported that the town was “leveled to the ground,” referring to Berlin radio announcements. The population was recorded as 483, citing the town as having given shelter and assistance to the Heydrich “murderers.”
A second slogan has sparked controversy as well, with the Department of Labor posting on X on January 12, “One Homeland. One People. One Heritage.”
“The Nazi slogan was ‘Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer’—One People, One State, One Leader. So there are some differences as well as some similarity. I would not say that the differences make the use of the slogan any less troubling,” Hett said.
Fritzsche noted that the phrase "is a typical 'dissolve,' in which one collective noun presumes the other: the Nazi slogans 'One People, One Reich, One Führer' or 'One People, One Reich, One Belief' in which each part leads logically to the other to legitimate the unity and purity of the people, the governance structure, the belief system.
"The Department of Labor phrase, if it is their phrase, is not sequential in moving from folk essence to political structure, but reiterative: there is only one people, one kind of people because there is only one homeland, one heritage, which is not only knowable, enduring, indisputable, but also requires defense, hence the phrase or chant to strengthen will and identification."
Photos of Hitler plastered with the “Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer” slogan were used for propaganda posters in Germany at the time, with a version available to view at the Imperial War Museums online archive.
What People Are Saying
Terry Virts, a retired NASA astronaut, reshared the DOL’s X post, writing on January 12: “US Government posting a version of ‘Ein volk, ein reich, ein führer.’ I don’t see how this ends well.”
President Donald Trump, during a 60 Minutes interview in November 2024: "Look, they call me a Nazi all the time. I'm not a Nazi, I'm the opposite. I'm somebody that's saving our country. But they call me Nazi."
Vice President JD Vance, during a September rally: “If you want to stop political violence stop attacking our law enforcement as the Gestapo, if you want to stop political violence stop telling your supporters that everybody who disagrees with you is a Nazi."
Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello, on X: "Kristi Noam, Nazi slogan on podium today. 'One of ours, all of yours.' WW2 SS officer killed, Nazis retaliated—One of ours, all of yours. The Victims:
- Men: Over 170 shot on the spot; others later executed in Prague.
- Women: Roughly 200 were deported to Ravensbrück concentration camp, where many died.
- Children: Most were separated from their mothers; 82 were gassed at the Chełmno extermination camp. A few deemed 'racially pure' were taken for "Germanization" by SS families.
- The Obliteration: The village was burned, buildings were dynamited, and the area was bulldozed and replanted to literally erase it from the map. YOU VOTED FOR THIS??"
The State Department, on X on January 5: "This is OUR Hemisphere, and President Trump will not allow our security to be threatened."
Update 1/13/26, 2 p.m. ET: This article has been updated with comment from Peter Fritzsche.
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