CORNEL WEST: Always a pleasure to be here. I just thank God for Democracy Now!, because journalism is almost dead as we move into this neofascist age. And thank God you all are still willing to tell the truth.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, your response to the election of Donald Trump and now the Cabinet he is appointing around him?
CORNEL WEST: Well, I think he’s already betrayed working people in terms of making sure, in his view, that Wall Street is in the driver’s seat. And what I mean by that is, is that in an emerging neofascist moment, you have the rule of big business, which is big banks and big corporations. You scapegoat the most vulnerable. It could be Muslims, Mexicans, gay brothers, lesbian sisters, indigenous peoples, black people, Jews and so on. And then you also have militaristic orientations around the world. And so, you see the extension of the repressive apparatus, as those of us who hit the streets, those of us who have been willing to go to jail, we’ve had to recognize we’ll have more coming at us under a Trump administration. But the crucial thing is, is that he had talked about his connection with working people, and it’s clear that the 1 percent are still running things.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: But you’ve also said—Dr. West, you just said that his administration will be neofascist.
CORNEL WEST: That’s right.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Could you explain? What do you mean by that, neofascist as opposed to fascist, and what the two mean?
CORNEL WEST: Well, neofascist, it’s an American-style form of fascism. And what I mean by that is we’ve had a neoliberal rule, from Carter to Obama. That neoliberal rule left in place a national security state. It left in place massive surveillance. It left in place the ability of the president to kill an American citizen with no due process. That’s Obama. That was the culmination of the neoliberal era. Now you get someone who’s narcissistic, which is to say out of control psychologically, who is ideologically confused, which is to say in over his head. And who does he choose? The most right-wing, reactionary zealots, which lead toward the arbitrary deployment of law, which is what neofascism is, but to reinforce corporate interest, big bank interest, and to keep track of those of us who are cast as other—peoples of color, women, Jews, Arabs, Muslims, Mexicans and so forth and so on. So this is one of the most frightening moments in the history of this very fragile empire and fragile republic.
