In their latest film series, The U.S. and the Holocaust, Ken Burns et al. focus primarily on our country's half-hearted response to Hitler's persecution of European Jews. While the Great Depression tempered our willingness to accept a large number of immigrants, racism and anti-Semitism played significant roles as well.
Indeed, in the first episode, we learn that Hitler admired American's economic success and believed that our mistreatment of Native Americans and African slaves had been significant factors in our rapid expansion. As in America, White Protestants controlled the levers of power in Nazi Germany.
Even today, as Conservative Republicans play to a base of Evangelical Christians and White Supremacists by shipping immigrants to Sanctuary Cities, they also kiss the ring of our former Racist in Chief, hoping to receive his blessing; mimicking Hitler, they employ book banning as a political tool. Though I have only watched the first episode of The U.S. and the Holocaust, on PBS, I highly recommend the series, especially since it exposes the roots of the current threat to American Democracy.
