HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The term enemy of the people or enemy of the nation, is a designation for the political or class opponents of the subgroup in power within a larger group. The term implies that by opposing the ruling subgroup, the "enemies" in question are acting against the larger group, for example against society as a whole. It is similar to the notion of "
enemy of the state An enemy of the state is a person accused of certain crimes against the state such as treason, among other things. Describing individuals in this way is sometimes a manifestation of political repression. For example, a government may purport to m ...
". The term originated in
Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
times as lat, hostis publicus, typically translated into English as the "
public enemy "Public enemy" is a term which was first widely used in the United States in the 1930s to describe individuals whose activities were seen as criminal and extremely damaging to society, though the phrase had been used for centuries to describe ...
". The term in its "enemy of the people" form has been used for centuries in literature (see '' An Enemy of the People'', the play by Henrik Ibsen, 1882; or ''
Coriolanus ''Coriolanus'' ( or ) is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1605 and 1608. The play is based on the life of the legendary Roman leader Caius Marcius Coriolanus. Shakespeare worked on it during the same yea ...
'', the play by
William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
, c. 1605). The
Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
made extensive use of the term until 1956, notably by
Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretar ...
. It is routinely used by authoritarian rulers. Former U.S. President
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...
used the phrase on multiple occasions since early 2017 to refer to news organizations and journalists whom he perceives as critical of and biased against him.


Origins of the expression


Roman Republic and Empire

The expression dates back to
Roman times In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...
. The Senate declared emperor
Nero Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus ( ; born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus; 15 December AD 37 – 9 June AD 68), was the fifth Roman emperor and final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, reigning from AD 54 unti ...
a ''hostis publicus'' in AD 68. Its direct translation is "public enemy". Whereas "public" is currently used in English to describe something related to collectivity at large, with an implication towards government or the State, the
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
word "publicus" could, in addition to that meaning, also refer directly to people, making it the equivalent of the genitive of ''populus'' ("people"), ''populi'' ("popular" or "of the people"). Thus, "public enemy" and "enemy of the people" are, etymologically, near synonyms.


French Revolution

The words "'' ennemi du peuple''" were used extensively during the
French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...
. On 25 December 1793 Robespierre stated: "The revolutionary government owes to the good citizen all the protection of the nation; it owes nothing to the Enemies of the People but death". The
Law of 22 Prairial The Law of 22 Prairial, also known as the ''loi de la Grande Terreur'', the law of the Great Terror, was enacted on 10 June 1794 (22 Prairial of the Year II under the French Revolutionary Calendar). It was proposed by Georges Auguste Couthon but ...
in 1794 extended the remit of the
Revolutionary Tribunal The Revolutionary Tribunal (french: Tribunal révolutionnaire; unofficially Popular Tribunal) was a court instituted by the National Convention during the French Revolution for the trial of political offenders. It eventually became one of the ...
to punish "enemies of the people", with some political crimes punishable by death, including "spreading false news to divide or trouble the people".Higgins, Andrew (26 February 2017
"Trump Embraces ‘Enemy of the People,’ a Phrase With a Fraught History"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''


Marxist–Leninist states


Soviet Union

The
Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
made extensive use of the term (russian: link=no, враг народа, ''vrag naroda'') (literal meaning is the enemy of the people). The term was first used in a speech by Felix Dzerzhinsky, the first chairman of the Cheka, after the
October Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...
. The
Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee The Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee (russian: Петроградский военно-революционный комитет) was a militant group of the Petrograd Soviet and one of several military revolutionary committees that ...
printed lists of "enemies of the people", and
Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1 ...
invoked it in his decree of 28 November 1917: Other similar terms were in use as well: *''enemy of the labourers'' (враг трудящихся, ''vrag trudyashchikhsya'') *''enemy of the proletariat'' (враг пролетариата, ''vrag proletariata'') *''class enemy'' (классовый враг, ''klassovyi vrag''), etc. In particular, the term "enemy of the workers" was formalized in the
Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code) Article 58 of the Russian SFSR Penal Code was put in force on 25 February 1927 to arrest those suspected of counter-revolutionary activities. It was revised several times. In particular, its Article 58-1 was updated by the listed sub-articles and ...
, and similar articles in the codes of the other
Soviet Republics The Republics of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or the Union Republics ( rus, Сою́зные Респу́блики, r=Soyúznye Respúbliki) were national-based administrative units of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( ...
. At various times these terms were applied, in particular, to
Tsar Nicholas II Nicholas II or Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov; spelled in pre-revolutionary script. ( 186817 July 1918), known in the Russian Orthodox Church as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer,. was the last Emperor of Russia, King of Congress Polan ...
and the
Imperial family A royal family is the immediate family of King, kings/Queen regnant, queens, Emir, emirs/emiras, Sultan, sultans/Sultana (title), sultanas, or raja/rani and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the ...
, aristocrats, the bourgeoisie,
cleric Clergy are formal leaders within established religions. Their roles and functions vary in different religious traditions, but usually involve presiding over specific rituals and teaching their religion's doctrines and practices. Some of the ter ...
s, business entrepreneurs,
anarchists Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessari ...
,
kulak Kulak (; russian: кула́к, r=kulák, p=kʊˈlak, a=Ru-кулак.ogg; plural: кулаки́, ''kulakí'', 'fist' or 'tight-fisted'), also kurkul () or golchomag (, plural: ), was the term which was used to describe peasants who owned ove ...
s,
monarchists Monarchism is the advocacy of the system of monarchy or monarchical rule. A monarchist is an individual who supports this form of government independently of any specific monarch, whereas one who supports a particular monarch is a royalist. ...
,
Mensheviks The Mensheviks (russian: меньшевики́, from меньшинство 'minority') were one of the three dominant factions in the Russian socialist movement, the others being the Bolsheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries. The factions em ...
, Esers,
Bundists Bundism was a secular Jewish socialist movement whose organizational manifestation was the General Jewish Labour Bund in Lithuania, Poland, and Russia ( yi, אַלגעמײַנער ײדישער אַרבעטער בּונד אין ליטע פויל ...
,
Trotskyists Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Ukrainian-Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and some other members of the Left Opposition and Fourth International. Trotsky self-identified as an orthodox Marxist, a re ...
, Bukharinists, the " old Bolsheviks", the army and police,
emigrant Emigration is the act of leaving a resident country or place of residence with the intent to settle elsewhere (to permanently leave a country). Conversely, immigration describes the movement of people into one country from another (to permanentl ...
s, saboteurs, wreckers (вредители, "vrediteli"), " social parasites" (тунеядцы, "tuneyadtsy"), ''Kavezhedists'' (people who administered and serviced the KVZhD (China Far East Railway), particularly the Russian population of Harbin, China), those considered bourgeois nationalists (notably
Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...
, Ukrainian, Belarusian,
Armenian Armenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia * Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent ** Armenian Diaspora, Armenian communities across the ...
, Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian nationalists, Zionists, Basmachi). An "enemy of the people" could be imprisoned, expelled or executed, and lose their property to confiscation. Close relatives of enemies of the people were labeled as " traitor of Motherland family members" and prosecuted. They could be sent to
Gulag The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= was the government agency in ...
, punished by the involuntary settlement in unpopulated areas, or stripped of citizen's rights. Being a friend of an ''enemy of the people'' automatically placed the person under suspicion. A majority of the ''enemies of the people'' were given this label not because of their hostile actions against the ''workers' and peasants' state'', but simply because of their social origin or profession before the revolution: those who used hired labor, high-ranking clergy, former policemen, merchants, etc. Some of them were commonly known as ''
lishentsy A ''lishenets'' ( rus, лишенец, p=lʲɪˈʂenʲɪt͡s), wikt:лишение#Russian, лишение ''deprivation'' + wikt:-ец#Russian, -ец ''wikt:-ee#Etymology 1, -ee''; "disenfranchised"; plural ''lishentsy'', russian: лишенцы) ...
'' (лишенцы, derived from Russian word ''лишение'', deprivation), because by the
Soviet Constitution During its existence, the Soviet Union had three different constitutions in force individually at different times between 31 January 1924 to 26 December 1991. Chronology of Soviet constitutions These three constitutions were: * 1924 Constitut ...
they were deprived of the right of
voting Voting is a method by which a group, such as a meeting or an electorate, can engage for the purpose of making a collective decision or expressing an opinion usually following discussions, debates or election campaigns. Democracies elect holde ...
. This automatically translated into a deprivation of various social benefits; some of them, e.g.,
rationing Rationing is the controlled distribution of scarce resources, goods, services, or an artificial restriction of demand. Rationing controls the size of the ration, which is one's allowed portion of the resources being distributed on a particular ...
, were at times critical for survival. Since 1927, Article 20 of the Common Part of the penal code that listed possible "measures of social defence" had the following item 20a: "declaration to be an enemy of the workers with deprivation of the union republic citizenship and hence of the USSR citizenship, with obligatory expulsion from its territory". Nevertheless, most "enemies of the people" suffered labor camps, rather than expulsion.


Rejection of the phrase

On 25 February 1956,
Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...
delivered a speech to the
Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...
in which he identified
Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretar ...
as the author of the phrase and distanced himself from it, saying that it made debate impossible. "This term automatically made it unnecessary that the ideological errors of a man or men engaged in a controversy be proven," Khrushchev said. "It made possible the use of the cruelest repression, violating all norms of ..legality, against anyone who in any way disagreed with Stalin, against those who were only suspected of hostile intent, against those who had bad reputations ... The formula ‘enemy of the people’ was specifically introduced for the purpose of physically annihilating such individuals." For decades afterwards, the phrase "was so omnipresent, freighted and devastating in its use under Stalin that nobody n Russiawanted to touch it. ... except in reference to history and in jokes", according to William Taubman in his biography of Khrushchev. However, the term returned to Russian public discourse in the late 2000s with a number of nationalist and pro-government politicians (most notably
Ramzan Kadyrov Ramzan Akhmadovich Kadyrov ce, КъадаргӀеран Ахьмат-кӏант Рамзан, translit= (born 5 October 1976) is a Russian politician who currently serves as the Head of the Chechen Republic. He was formerly affiliated to the ...
) calling for restoration of the Soviet approach to the "enemies of the people" defined as all non-system opposition.


Mainland China

In
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; also romanised traditionally as Mao Tse-tung. (26 December 1893 – 9 September 1976), also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary who was the founder of the People's Republic of China (PRC) ...
's 1957 speech ''
On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People ''On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People'' () is a 1957 essay by the Chinese Communist revolutionary Mao Zedong published during the Eleventh Session of the Supreme State Conference. It explores the concepts developed by Mao i ...
'', he comments that "At the present stage, the period of building socialism, the classes, strata and social groups which favor, support and work for the cause of socialist construction all come within the category of the people, while the social forces and groups which resist the socialist revolution and are hostile to or sabotage socialist construction are all ''enemies of the people''." (According to
Philip Short Philip Short (born 17 April 1945) is a British journalist and author. He was born in Bristol. He studied at Queens' College, Cambridge. After graduation, he spent from 1967 to 1973 as a freelance journalist, first in Malawi, then in Uganda. He ...
, an author of biographies of Mao and Cambodia's Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, in domestic political struggles Chinese and Cambodian communists rarely if ever used the phrase "enemy of the people" as they were very nationalistic, and saw it as an alien import.)


Albania

Enemy of the people ( Alb: Armiku i popullit) in Albania were the enemy
typology Typology is the study of types or the systematic classification of the types of something according to their common characteristics. Typology is the act of finding, counting and classification facts with the help of eyes, other senses and logic. Ty ...
of the
Communist Albania The People's Socialist Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika Popullore Socialiste e Shqipërisë, links=no) was the Marxist–Leninist one party state that existed in Albania from 1946 to 1992 (the official name of the country was the People's R ...
n government used to denounce political or class opponents. The term is today considered
totalitarian Totalitarianism is a form of government and a political system that prohibits all opposition parties, outlaws individual and group opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high if not complete degree of control and reg ...
,
derogatory A pejorative or slur is a word or grammatical form expressing a negative or a disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack of respect toward someone or something. It is also used to express criticism, hostility, or disregard. Sometimes, a ...
and hostile. There are still some politicians who use the term on political opponents with the intention of dehumanization. After the communist take over in, many who were labeled with this term were executed or
imprisoned Imprisonment is the restraint of a person's liberty, for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is "false imprisonment". Imprisonment does not necessari ...
. Enver Hoxha declared religious leaders, landowners, disloyal party officials, clerics and clan leaders as "enemies of the people". This is said to have led to the death of 6000 people. Thousands were sentenced to death. From 1945 to 1992, around 5000 men and women were executed and close to 100,000 were sent to prison as they were labeled enemies of the people. Many who were targeted held important leadership positions in the party and state structures of the regime. Hoxha also used the term against the Soviet Union and the US when he spoke: ''"as to ’Albania being only one mouthful’, watch out, gentlemen, for socialist Albania is a hard bone that will stick in your throat and choke you!"''. On 1 June 1945, The Albanian Central Commission for the Discovery of Crimes, of War Criminals and Enemies of the People requested the International Commission for the Discovery of Crimes and War Criminals to hand over a number of Albanian war criminals found in concentration camps in Italy such as Bari, Lecce, Salerno and others. In 1954, Hoxha condemned the American and British liberation of Albania calling them "enemies of the people". In the 1960s, many Albanian migrants returned from Austria and Italy after having fled in the 1940s, and despite having been promised not to be punished, were immediately arrested as "enemies of the people". In 1990, Ismail Kadare applied for political asylum in France, which was granted, resulting in him being condemned by Albanian officials as an "enemy of the people".


Nazi Germany

Regarding the Nazi plan to relocate all Jews to Madagascar, the Nazi tabloid ''
Der Stürmer ''Der Stürmer'' (, literally "The Stormer / Attacker / Striker") was a weekly German tabloid-format newspaper published from 1923 to the end of the Second World War by Julius Streicher, the '' Gauleiter'' of Franconia, with brief suspensions ...
'' wrote that "The Jews don't want to go to Madagascar – They cannot bear the climate. Jews are pests and disseminators of diseases. In whatever country they settle and spread themselves out, they produce the same effects as are produced in the human body by germs. ... In former times sane people and sane leaders of the peoples made short shrift of ''enemies of the people''. They had them either expelled or killed."


United States in the 1960s

In the United States during the 1960s, organizations such as the Black Panther Party and
Students for a Democratic Society Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) was a national student activist organization in the United States during the 1960s, and was one of the principal representations of the New Left. Disdaining permanent leaders, hierarchical relationships ...
were known to use the term. In one inter-party dispute in February 1971, for example, Black Panther leader Huey P. Newton denounced two other Panthers as "enemies of the people" for allegedly putting party leaders and members in jeopardy.


Usage in the 2010s


United Kingdom

During the aftermath of the referendum on membership of the European Union, the '' Daily Mail'' was criticized for a headline describing judges (in the ''Miller'' case) as "Enemies of the People" for ruling that the process for leaving the
European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been de ...
(i.e. the triggering of Article 50) would require the consent of the
British Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprem ...
. The May administration had hoped to use the powers of the
royal prerogative The royal prerogative is a body of customary authority, privilege and immunity, recognized in common law and, sometimes, in civil law jurisdictions possessing a monarchy, as belonging to the sovereign and which have become widely vested in th ...
to bypass parliamentary approval. The paper issued
character assassination "Character Assassination" is a four-issue Spider-Man story arc written by Marc Guggenheim with art by John Romita, Jr. and published by Marvel Comics. The arc appears in ''The Amazing Spider-Man'' #584-#588. An interlude, "The Spartacus Gambit" ...
s of all the judges involved in the ruling (
Lord Chief Justice Lord is an appellation for a person or deity who has authority, control, or power over others, acting as a master, chief, or ruler. The appellation can also denote certain persons who hold a title of the peerage in the United Kingdom, or are ...
Lord Thomas, Sir
Terence Etherton Terence Michael Elkan Barnet Etherton, Baron Etherton, (born 21 June 1951) is a British retired judge and member of the House of Lords. He was the Master of the Rolls and Head of Civil Justice from 2016 to 2021 and Chancellor of the High Court ...
, and Lord Justice Sales), and received more than 1,000 complaints to the
Independent Press Standards Organisation The Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) is the regulator of the newspaper and magazine industry in the UK. It was established on 8 September 2014 after the windup of the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), which had been the main ind ...
. The
Secretary of State for Justice The secretary of state for justice, also referred to as the justice secretary, is a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, with responsibility for the Ministry of Justice. The incumbent is a member of the Cabinet of the Un ...
,
Liz Truss Mary Elizabeth Truss (born 26 July 1975) is a British politician who briefly served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from September to October 2022. On her fiftieth day in office, she stepped down ...
, issued a three-line statement defending the independence and impartiality of the judiciary, which some saw as inadequate due to the delayed response and failure to condemn the attacks.


Donald Trump

In 2012, longtime Democratic pollster
Patrick Caddell Patrick Hayward Caddell (May 19, 1950 – February 16, 2019) was an American public opinion pollster and a political film consultant who served in the Carter administration. He worked for Democratic presidential candidates George McGovern ...
gave a speech at a conference sponsored by Accuracy in Media, a conservative watchdog group, in which he called the media “the enemy of the American people.” In 2013, Caddell signed on as a contractor for Robert Mercer. On 17 February 2017, hours after meeting Caddell while touring a
Boeing The Boeing Company () is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, telecommunications equipment, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and p ...
aircraft plant in
North Charleston, South Carolina North Charleston is the third-largest city in the state of South Carolina.City Planning Department (2008-07)City of North Charleston boundary map. City of North Charleston. Retrieved January 21, 2011. On June 12, 1972, the city of North Charlest ...
, President of the United States
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...
declared on Twitter that ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'',
NBC News NBC News is the news division of the American broadcast television network NBC. The division operates under NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, a division of NBCUniversal, which is, in turn, a subsidiary of Comcast. The news division's var ...
, ABC,
CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
, and
CNN CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...
were "
fake news Fake news is false or misleading information presented as news. Fake news often has the aim of damaging the reputation of a person or entity, or making money through advertising revenue.Schlesinger, Robert (April 14, 2017)"Fake news in reality ...
" and "the enemy of the American People". Trump repeated the assertion on 24 February at the
Conservative Political Action Conference The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC; ) is an annual political conference attended by conservative activists and elected officials from across the United States and beyond. CPAC is hosted by the American Conservative Union (ACU) ...
, saying, "A few days ago I called the fake news the enemy of the people and they are. They are the enemy of the people." At a 25 June 2018 rally in
South Carolina )'' Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no) , anthem = " Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind" , Former = Province of South Carolina , seat = Columbia , LargestCity = Charleston , LargestMetro = ...
, Trump singled out journalists as "fake newsers" and again called them "the enemy of the people". Some commentators tried to link these comments to a mass shooting at the offices of a newspaper publisher in Annapolis, Maryland, that took place only days later, on 28 June, but the incident turned out not to be related. During his term, Trump prevented two CNN White House correspondents,
Kaitlan Collins Kaitlan Collins (born April 7, 1992) is an American journalist who served as chief White House correspondent for CNN until 2022. She currently hosts ''CNN This Morning'' alongside Don Lemon and Poppy Harlow. Previously, she was the White Hous ...
and Jim Acosta, from attending certain events. On 19 July 2018, following the critical reaction to his meeting with Russian President
Vladimir Putin Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who holds the office of president of Russia. Putin has served continuously as president or prime minister since 1999: as prime min ...
on 15 July 2018 in
Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the capital, primate, and most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of Uusimaa in southern Finland, and has a population of . The city ...
, Finland, Trump tweeted "The Summit with Russia was a great success, except with the real enemy of the people, the Fake News Media." ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' noted Trump's use of this phrase during his "moments of peak criticism" and use of the term by
Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
and Soviet propaganda. On 2 August 2018, after Trump tweeted "FAKE NEWS media... is the enemy of the American People", multiple international institutions such as the United Nations and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights criticized Trump for his attacks on the free press. On 16 August 2018, the
United States Senate The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States. The composition and pow ...
, in a symbolic rebuke to Trump, passed by
unanimous consent In parliamentary procedure, unanimous consent, also known as general consent, or in the case of the parliaments under the Westminster system, leave of the house (or leave of the senate), is a situation in which no member present objects to a prop ...
a resolution affirming that the media is not "the enemy of the people" and reaffirming "the vital and indispensable role the free press serves." From his inauguration on 20 January 2017 through 15 October 2019, Trump used Twitter to call the news media the "enemy of the people" 36 times. In response to the recount process of the
2020 United States presidential election in Georgia The 2020 United States presidential election in Georgia was held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States presidential election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated. Georgia voters chose ele ...
, which certified Joe Biden as the winner of the state, Trump called
Georgia Secretary of State The Secretary of State of the U.S. state of Georgia is an elected official with a wide variety of responsibilities, including supervising elections and maintaining public records. The office has had a four-year term since 1946. Before 1880, th ...
Brad Raffensperger Bradford Jay Raffensperger (born May 18, 1955) is an American politician, businessman, and civil engineer, serving as the Secretary of State of Georgia since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served in the Georgia House of Re ...
an "enemy of the people".


See also

* '' An Enemy of the People'' – play by Ibsen * ''Enemies of the People'' (film) * No War But The Class War *
Ostracism Ostracism ( el, ὀστρακισμός, ''ostrakismos'') was an Athenian democratic procedure in which any citizen could be expelled from the city-state of Athens for ten years. While some instances clearly expressed popular anger at the ci ...
* '' Persona non grata'' *
Public enemy "Public enemy" is a term which was first widely used in the United States in the 1930s to describe individuals whose activities were seen as criminal and extremely damaging to society, though the phrase had been used for centuries to describe ...
*
Struggle session Denunciation rallies, also called struggle sessions, were violent public spectacles in Maoist China where people accused of being "Five Black Categories, class enemies" were public humiliation, publicly humiliated, accused, beaten and tortured by ...
*
Untermensch ''Untermensch'' (, ; plural: ''Untermenschen'') is a Nazi term for non-Aryan "inferior people" who were often referred to as "the masses from the East", that is Jews, Roma, and Slavs (mainly ethnic Poles, Serbs, and later also Russians). The ...
*
Extremist Extremism is "the quality or state of being extreme" or "the advocacy of extreme measures or views". The term is primarily used in a political or religious sense to refer to an ideology that is considered (by the speaker or by some implied share ...
*
Hate groups A hate group is a social group that advocates and practices hatred, hostility, or violence towards members of a race, ethnicity, nation, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, or any other designated sector of society. Accord ...
*
Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...


References

; Citations {{DEFAULTSORT:Enemy Of The People Political repression in the Soviet Union Political repression Soviet phraseology Communist repression Communist terminology Ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Ideology of the Chinese Communist Party French Revolution Nationalism Authoritarianism