Trump’s broken promise: From ‘America First’ to ‘America Only’ – and antisemitism

You may have seen or heard some of the recent comments going around on the right. These are things that people have said at events like Turning Point or that important people like Tucker Carlson have said more and more often. These comments often come close to making direct accusations, but they clearly point to old lies about Jewish power, disloyalty, or secret coordination. Many people are confused by the reaction: why now and why here? Jews have been a big part of American life for a long time, and their role in public institutions hasn’t changed all of a sudden.

The ideological mood has changed. The return of these tropes is not random; it is a sign of something. To comprehend the resurgence, it is essential to focus less on the Jewish community and more on the evident tensions within modern nationalism.

Many of Donald Trump’s most devoted supporters hoped he would bring nationalism, but he never did. People like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Steve Bannon, Matt Gaetz, and a growing number of MAGA supporters wanted more than just anger or cultural provocation. They wanted a clear national vision that would tell them who belongs and who doesn’t, as well as why the country always seems to be out of whack. Instead, Trump gave people anger without a plan.

“America First” was more of a slogan than a philosophy. It stirred up anger without having to do the harder work of figuring out what it means to be an American in a diverse, globalized world. That avoidance has had serious effects. As the movement grows, it’s getting harder to ignore the difference between what nationalists want and what they actually get.

In response, “America First” has started to change into something sharper and more exclusive. More and more, it is being seen not as a statement about national priorities, but as a call for national isolation – what could more honestly be called “America Only.” In this perspective, global engagement is perceived not as a strategic option but as a manifestation of weakness, while interdependence is regarded as indicative of corruption.

Allies are seen as a burden, pluralism as a weakness, and historical complexity as a problem. People think that the country can be morally, economically, and culturally self-sufficient. Any long-lasting connection outside the country’s borders starts to seem like betrayal instead of inheritance. This change is a clear sign that nationalist thought is becoming more rigid.

At this precise juncture, antisemitism commences to reemerge with renewed vigor. To comprehend the rationale, antisemitism must be perceived in a manner distinct from conventional interpretations. It shouldn’t be seen as just an old bias that is adapting to modern ideological situations. It doesn’t work as a lens to see where modern political ideas don’t work because they don’t fit together.

Antisemitism emerges not solely in response to ideological failure, but as a mechanism to clarify that failure without modifying the ideology itself. When a movement says it will bring people together and make sense, but it can’t do either, it looks for a saboteur instead of a flaw. Historically, and as expected, Jews have been given that role.

This pattern is especially dangerous for nationalism because it is based on a weak idea. It promises togetherness, belonging, and shared meaning, but it depends on a false sense of coherence that modern societies can’t keep up with.

Modern countries are made up of many different groups, are always changing, have different histories, and have parts that don’t always get along. They are shaped by migration, trade, conflicting loyalties, and political compromise. Nationalism makes this complicated situation seem like a story of sameness and continuity, even when the facts don’t support it.

Jews as the boundary case

When that story starts to fall apart, nationalism doesn’t like to admit it was wrong. Instead, it looks for someone who stands for the problem it can’t solve.

It is not by chance that Jews hold that position; it is by design. They are a boundary case for modern political thought because they are hard to put into a box. Jews can be religious or not religious, from the same country or from another country, and they can be specific or general at the same time.

They have survived across borders, governments, and centuries without ever coming together to form a single political group. This resilience disturbs ideologies reliant on immutable identities and unyielding allegiances. Jews don’t need to fight nationalism to show how limited it is; their history does that by going on.

This is unacceptable in the new “America Only” framework. People are increasingly criticizing Jews not for what they do, but for what they are thought to stand for. Their transnational continuity is redefined as disloyalty, their historical resilience as manipulation, and their visibility in global networks as interference.

The well-known ideas of “dual loyalty” and “hidden influence” come back, but they are now more relevant to the digital age. Jews are seen as problems for national self-sufficiency because their existence goes against the idea that a nation can or should exist on its own. The accusation is less about Jews and more about keeping the idea of ideological purity alive.

Antisemitism serves as an ideological repair mechanism in this context. It lets nationalists say that the idea and the promise were good, but someone stopped them from coming true. The Jew is a symbol of modernity, globalization, and the complicated nature of history.

The ideology blames other people instead of accepting that a closed national system is not possible. Antisemitism offers a narrative that preserves certainty while avoiding responsibility. It turns moral failure into political failure and intellectual failure into a conspiracy.

This is why antisemitism often comes up before other kinds of hate do. It doesn’t focus on the edges of power; instead, it focuses on the places where meaning falls apart. It comes to light when people in a society think, often correctly, that the stories they tell about how things work are no longer true.

Antisemitism offers the deceptive solace of an explanation that seems illuminating while lacking honesty. It elucidates the reasons for the failure of withdrawal without conceding that withdrawal is neither practical nor advantageous. In doing so, it protects the ideology from having to look at itself, even if it means lying.

When looked at closely, the rise in antisemitism among some right-wing groups is not an unusual or backward step. It’s a sign. Trump didn’t bring nationalism; he showed how weak it is. The movement is running out of ideas as “America First” turns into “America Only.”

Jews are the symbol of those limits, not because they have unusual power, but because their history shows how things can be contradictory. In this sense, antisemitism isn’t just hatred of Jews. It is animosity towards unresolved modernity, directed at those who, by virtue of history, refuse to vanish.