The Warsaw Ghetto & America In This Moment
In the Warsaw Ghetto, the Germans didn’t just round up Jews for the trains—they enlisted Jewish leaders to do it. The Nazis understood something fundamental about human nature: people are more likely to follow orders without revolt, even to their own destruction, when those orders come from someone familiar, someone they once trusted. So they formed a Jewish council, a Judenrat, and put rabbis and community leaders in charge. These were men who had spent their lives protecting their people, guiding them. And now, they were the ones compiling the lists.
At first, these men who went on the council told themselves they could save some, maybe stall the inevitable. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as it looked. Maybe by complying, they could lessen the brutality. But they knew. And still, they handed over the names. And the trains ran anyway.
I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately.
Because today, we’re watching another group of men (and a few women) doing the same thing with Trump’s destruction of our country. This time, it’s not rabbis in a ghetto—it’s Republican senators and congresspeople in Washington. It’s the ones who, behind closed doors, admit they’re terrified of Trump, who whisper that Musk’s growing influence over information, government, and democracy itself is a catastrophe. They even meet with Trump privately and beg him to not attack their red state and to continue focusing on blue states for his blows.
But they know. I was sure that Susan Collins was threatened, or she was promised something, when she capitulated and voted for RFK’s appointment. She had hundreds of thousands of calls to her office to point to for a no vote. Caroline Kennedy’s unprecedented statement. It had to be something.
Whatever it was, not a week later, the DT administration attacked Acadia National Park, the pride of Maine and also something that brings in $41 million in revenue. They fired those who care for the park, who keep it safe for visitors. The reaction has been strong.
She has said she thinks it’s a mistake; it will be fixed.
So when the time comes to act to save what they all know is the demise of America, and they could do it collectively—which would take away his power to target those lone stand-up humans and take them down—they do what they’re told.
Sometimes it keeps me up at night. Are they stupid? Or is it human nature to believe, against all evidence, that is not what it is?
They look at the wreckage around them—institutions being gutted, laws being rewritten in service of power, democracy itself on a slow march to the gallows—and they still nod along. Some of them tell themselves they’re buying time, keeping things from getting worse. Maybe if they play along, they can mitigate the damage. Others are just trying to save their own skin, their own families, their own careers.
But I tend to think it’s about their own power, money, and greed. And I get that. Turns out we elected lowlifes to serve our interests. A mistake we, the people, made. But what I don’t get is how they think he won’t turn on them eventually. He has turned on each and every person who has ever collaborated with him. Each and every one.
So, the Republicans in Congress have handed over their lists.
They’ve sold out judges, voting rights, and women’s autonomy. They’ve signed off on corruption, on political violence, on the systematic destruction of democratic norms. They don’t believe in the lies they repeat, but they repeat them anyway. Because they think if they just comply, they can make it through?
But history doesn’t remember the names of the men who thought they could outmaneuver tyranny from the inside. It remembers what they allowed to happen.
The only question left is whether any of these men will refuse. Whether, at the last moment, any of them will have the courage to rip up the list instead of handing it over. One by one, they sometimes raise their hand. Trump’s statement about Zelensky being a dictator brought out a few Republicans.
In response, some Republicans eviscerated Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"Putin started this war. Putin committed war crimes. Putin is the dictator," Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) wrote on X.
"Vladimir Putin is a vile dictator and thug," Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) wrote on X.
"Vladimir Putin is the dictator without elections," Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) wrote on X.
And others, gently supported, sort of, Zelensky.
"I would certainly not call Zelensky a dictator," said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), as NBC News cataloged.
"It’s not a word I would use," said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).
"I wouldn’t use the same word," said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).
They could have all gotten together and put an end to Trump’s direction toward supporting Russia. A bridge too far. Together. Successfully. Instead, he will punish those people who took a step toward freedom, and DT will continue changing the course of our political support around the world—that support has been the hallmark of our democracy and made us a friend to those I want to call my friend. And, for the record, Putin is not one of them.
But here is where the story can change. I figured out the difference between those who enabled the Warsaw Ghetto slaughter and our people at the Capitol.
Unlike the Jewish leaders in the Warsaw Ghetto, who had no real power, today’s Republican senators and congressmen do have power. More power than Trump. They are not hostages to this machine. They are its gears. And if enough of them choose, right now, to stop playing along, they could bring the whole thing to a halt.
Because here’s the truth: if the GOP in Congress stands together, if they say enough, if they decide to reject the money, the threats, and the false promises, there is nothing Trump or Musk can do. Musk can throw all the money he wants into the elections, but elections are still a few years away.
And we need to make sure they are pressured from our end to do it.
They could vote against Trump’s agenda. They could stop shielding him from consequences. They could break the silence that keeps them in line. And if they truly wanted to, they could even remove him.
Impeachment is still on the table. It is still possible. The mechanisms exist, the laws exist. They could act. Right now.
Because there was a tipping point in the Warsaw Ghetto too. Eventually, the Jewish leaders who had tried to bargain with the inevitable, who had convinced themselves that compliance might soften the blow, realized the full weight of what they had done. And when that moment came, when they saw that their choices had only delayed their own fate, they climbed onto the trains with the people they had once tried to save.
The question for today’s Republican leaders is whether they will realize their complicity before it is too late—or whether, when the final reckoning comes, they too will board the train of their own making.
First they came for the socialists....
Brilliant piece, Christine. Thank you.