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New York Democrats are lambasting former President Donald Trump for choosing to host a rally at Madison Square Garden just nine days before Election Day.
One lawmaker compared the rally, set for 27 October, to the infamous 1939 Nazi rally in the Manhattan stadium just before the Second World War.
Republicans have slammed such comments as raising the temperature during a campaign that has already seen two attempts on the former president’s life.
New York State Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal, a Democrat, called on Madison Square Garden to cancel the event.
“Allowing Trump to hold an event at MSG is equivalent to the infamous Nazis rally at Madison Square Garden on February 20, 1939,” he wrote on X.
“This is a disastrous decision by Madison Square Garden that will endanger the public safety of New Yorkers and has the potential to incite widespread violence. For the good of NYC and its residents, I demand @TheGarden keep our city safe by canceling the Trump rally,” he added.
The German American Bund organized the 1939 rally in support of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler – an event with more than 20,000 attendees and which saw a portrait of George Washington alongside swastikas.
Many of those who took part in the rally had come from Yaphank, Long Island, where the Bund was based, and where they had a summer camp to push Nazi ideas.
Speaking in 2019, former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, recounted the events of the rally while speaking at Madison Square Garden.
“We are witnessing an assault on the rule of law and the foundations of our democracy,” she said at the time, during the Trump presidency.
New York Republicans slammed the comparison, with state senator Rob Ortt responding to Hoylman-Sigal on X, saying: “Referring to a peaceful rally for the leading candidate for President of the United States as a ‘Nazi Rally’ is not only a disgusting comparison, it is a gross escalation of the dangerous rhetoric in the wake of two direct attempts on President Donald Trump’s life.”
“I’m not calling anyone a Nazi,” Hoylman-Sigal added, according to The Guardian. “I’m pointing out a historic similarity.”
“I was talking about the venue and many of his followers who are white supremacists and have demonstrated hatred and vitriol toward minority groups, including Jews, people of color, and the LGBTQ community,” he said.
The CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, Halie Soifer, told Politico that Trump had aligned himself with neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers.
“If ever there was a moment to make such a comparison, it’s now, which is why the vast majority of American voters are opposing Donald Trump in this election,” she said.
Trump campaign press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Hoylman-Sigal should resign, according to The Guardian.
She said his comments were “the same type of dangerous rhetoric that led to two assassination attempts on President Trump’s life and has divided our country.”
Vito LaBella, a Republican state senate candidate, wrote on X that “all polls show about half this country supporting this man. It’s OK that you hate Trump. You just called 150 million voters Nazies [sic]. Shame on you.”
