PDF Summary:Prequel, by Rachel Maddow

Most Americans know about Nazi Germany's atrocities during World War II, but few realize how deeply Nazi influence penetrated the United States during the 1930s and 1940s. In Prequel, Rachel Maddow examines how the Nazi regime worked to spread propaganda, fund pro-fascist organizations, and exploit political divisions within America—all while receiving support from some members of Congress and other influential Americans.

Maddow discusses the various tactics Nazis used to weaken American democracy, from distributing millions of pieces of propaganda to planning armed attacks on the US government. She also explores how some Americans fought back against these fascist movements, and how government agencies like the FBI failed to adequately address the threat. This summary reveals the historical connections between that era's authoritarian movements and modern challenges to American democracy.

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Next, we will discuss some inquiries and legal proceedings, as well as obstruction and suppression.

Investigations and Prosecutions

Maddow notes that the sedition trial involving the Christian Front ended without any convictions. The trial lasted 10 weeks, and the jury deadlocked on four defendants. The DOJ opted not to retry the case, so the four were released, and the rest of the defendants were acquitted. This was a very public humiliation for the Justice Department. The Christian Front members were released and even regained their firearms.

(Shortform note: The Christian Front sedition trial ended without any convictions because the prosecution failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendants had conspired to overthrow the US government by force. As Gallagher notes, the jury deadlocked on four defendants and acquitted the rest, leading the DOJ to drop the case. The court had to treat the men as legally innocent and return their property, including firearms, unless they were convicted of a separate firearms offense.)

Next, we will discuss some covert and investigative activities, as well as legal battles and outcomes.

Covert and Investigative Efforts

Maddow explains how investigative efforts revealed a plan by congressional representatives to disseminate Nazi materials. The investigation revealed that members aided the Nazi government in disguising its propaganda and disseminating it to American soldiers and the public. The evidence included franked envelopes from Representative Hamilton Fish’s office that were used to mail literature from the Silver Shirts, along with a form to order editions of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. The inquiry grew to encompass more than just the late Senator Ernest Lundeen and Congressman Hamilton Fish's offices.

(Shortform note: “Franked envelopes” refers to a privilege that allows members of Congress to send mail without paying postage. Instead of a stamp, they use their signature, and the government covers the cost. This system is meant to help them communicate with their constituents about official business. However, it can be misused for personal or political purposes, as seen in the case of Nazi propaganda being distributed through congressional offices.)

Legal Battles and Outcomes

John Rogge led a significant sedition case against Americans who collaborated with the Nazis. Maddow describes him as the head prosecutor in the most significant sedition case in US history. Rogge and his team were determined to show that Hitler's regime had effectively established activities in the United States. They wanted to prove that an unexpected number of Americans, some of whom were in influential positions, had collaborated with the Nazis to undermine US interests.

(Shortform note: The sedition case was significant because it later became a cautionary tale in the US. In Perilous Times, Geoffrey R. Stone explains that the case was a warning against using sedition laws to criminalize extremist political expression. The case was used as an example in debates about how far the government could go in prosecuting people for their political beliefs.)

In April 1946, Rogge traveled to Nuremberg, Germany, for the trials. For eleven weeks, Rogge and his team questioned over sixty captured Nazi leaders and reviewed upwards of 30,000 documents from Germany's Foreign Office. What Rogge collected in Germany validated the findings of the DOJ’s investigation on American soil. The plan traced back to 1933, when Hitler rose to power as chancellor and gained complete command of Germany's government. The Nazis promptly launched a vigorous, well-financed campaign to discourage America from helping Europe's beleaguered democratic nations.

(Shortform note: In Active Measures, intelligence historian Thomas Rid traces the intellectual history of political warfare, arguing that the concept emerged in the first half of the twentieth century as states began to view foreign public opinion as a battlespace. Rid contends that the archival evidence from this period reveals how governments, particularly totalitarian regimes, developed sophisticated techniques to shape political outcomes abroad through clandestine influence operations, front organizations, forgeries, and disinformation. This shift, he explains, marked a fundamental change in how states approached international conflict, moving from overt military force to the exploitation of ideological divisions and democratic openness.)

Rogge additionally came back with further concrete evidence revealing the identities of Americans who had supported Hitler's Keep America Out of Foreign Wars campaign, as well as evidence of the specific rewards these agents received from the German government for their collaboration. While in Germany, Rogge and his team discovered that the number of Nazi collaborators in America was greater than had been thought. Rogge's roster featured prominent U.S. businesspeople, labor heads, and political officeholders.

The Noninterventionist Movement

Some historians have taken a more skeptical view of Rogge’s claims about the extent of American support for Hitler’s Keep America Out of Foreign Wars campaign. In his 1971 book America First: The Battle Against Intervention, 1940–1941, historian Wayne S. Cole argues that the noninterventionist movement in the United States during this period was primarily an indigenous phenomenon, rooted in longstanding American traditions of neutrality and unilateralism. Cole contends that while some individuals may have harbored pro-fascist sympathies, the movement as a whole was not centrally directed or financed by foreign powers.

Obstruction and Suppression

In discussing obstruction and suppression, Maddow highlights that the FBI and other authorities were more focused on communism than on the threat of fascism and Nazi influence in the US. The FBI, led by J. Edgar Hoover, was untrained in counterintelligence and counter-espionage, which contributed to this oversight. The FBI had an almost 2,000-page file on the leftist actor and film producer Charlie Chaplin, but they did nothing with a briefcase full of evidence of pro-fascist subversives in the US working alongside Nazi Germany.

(Shortform note: The FBI’s lack of counterintelligence training and its focus on one kind of “subversive” may have led them to disregard the briefcase of evidence. The Bureau’s training and internal “security” indexes were based on earlier efforts to root out labor and political radicals, so agents were conditioned to look for that kind of threat and to discount other forms of subversion. This institutional bias may have blinded them to new forms of subversion.)

Though they began adding to their file on the Silver Shirts' leader William Dudley Pelley and the group's headquarters in North Carolina, they didn’t press him for information about the group. In 1934, the FBI stated that the Silver Shirts weren't connected to the Nazi regime in Germany, and by 1939, they still showed little interest in learning whether that was true. Maddow argues that while fascism and Nazism were taking hold and spreading in the US in the mid-1930s, the FBI failed to act.

(Shortform note: In his book Hitler’s American Friends, historian Bradley W. Hart uses FBI memoranda and case files to show that the Bureau monitored the Silver Shirts but considered them a low-priority nuisance rather than a serious threat. Hart argues that Hoover’s FBI was more concerned with communist subversion than right-wing extremism during the 1930s. He explains that the Bureau’s files on the Silver Shirts were often incomplete and that agents failed to follow up on leads that might have uncovered deeper connections to Nazi Germany.)

Ideological and Law-Based Foundations

Maddow asserts that the ideological battle against US fascism during the '30s and '40s was a precursor to modern struggles. The US government, its institutions, and democracy were threatened by both foreign and domestic enemies. Americans were fighting on both sides of the divide at home, and the conflict was marked by violence and extreme right-wing authoritarian movements. Former American military officers were prepared to orchestrate numerous coordinated armed assaults on governmental sites after FDR was likely reelected in 1940. The assaults were intended to incite fear and confusion, to radicalize Americans against Roosevelt, and to end with a violent overthrow of the U.S. government and the establishment of a fascist regime.

(Shortform note: One way to understand this ideological battle against US fascism is through the concept of “militant democracy,” which was first articulated by German political scientist Karl Loewenstein in the 1930s. Loewenstein argued that democracies must sometimes take strong measures to defend themselves against anti-democratic forces, even if it means temporarily limiting certain freedoms. This idea emerged in response to the rise of fascism in Europe, where democratic systems were being exploited by authoritarian movements. Loewenstein believed that democracies should not be passive in the face of existential threats, but should actively protect their core values and institutions. This concept remains relevant today as democracies worldwide grapple with the challenge of balancing civil liberties with the need to counter anti-democratic movements.)

The belligerents were robbing federal armories, buying weapons, and manufacturing and amassing bombs. Maddow adds that they enjoyed an astonishing amount of backing from federally elected officials who used their political influence to protect the extremists, obstruct the Justice Department’s attempts to counter or penalize them, and protect themselves from possible criminal charges. In Congress, betrayal and dishonesty were rampant among those who had pledged to uphold the Constitution but ended up being part of a scheme to dismantle it.

(Shortform note: In Hitler’s American Friends, Hart provides evidence to support Maddow’s claims that the belligerents had the backing of federally elected officials and that betrayal and dishonesty were rampant in Congress. He notes that the pro-German lobbyists who drafted the language for the bills and speeches of isolationist members of Congress left a clear documentary trail. He explains that the language was often couched in the technicalities of issues like civil aviation agreements, immigration and refugee quotas, and American “neutrality.”)

The German government invested resources to split American politics, aiming to prevent the US and its democratic arsenal from entering the European war. Their campaign of propaganda was supported by some American soldiers. Among Viereck's native American co-conspirators and like-minded allies were George Van Horn Moseley, a U.S. Army general known for his conspiratorial thinking; Father Charles Coughlin, a well-liked radio preacher with antisemitic views; businessmen from America such as Henry Ford; and at least 24 current Congress members. Congress members and senators leveraged their unique governmental advantages to assist Viereck and the Nazi agenda.

(Shortform note: The German government’s efforts to split American politics through propaganda, supported by some American soldiers, can be seen as an early example of “sharp power.” This term, coined by the National Endowment for Democracy, describes how authoritarian states exploit the openness of democracies to shape their internal political debates. The involvement of elite American co-conspirators like congressmen and prominent businessmen highlights how foreign influence operations often target influential figures to amplify their impact. This strategy remains relevant today, as modern authoritarian regimes continue to seek out sympathetic voices within democratic societies to advance their agendas.)

However, Maddow notes that the most fascinating aspect of the story involves the Americans who took on the challenge of combating armed far-right militias, authoritarians, and fascists within the country. They confronted the politicians who protected fascists. They weren't necessarily the ones you'd anticipate seeing at the forefront, but they stood firm and succeeded.

(Shortform note: In Why Civil Resistance Works, Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan argue that nonviolent resistance is more effective than violent resistance in achieving political change. They explain that nonviolent movements succeed because they can mobilize large numbers of ordinary people, including workers, students, professionals, business leaders, civil servants, and members of various organizations.)

Maddow emphasizes that Nazi Germany used propaganda to exploit weaknesses in the US political structure. The Nazis identified "trouble spots" in the US, such as disputes over race, income disparities, and political differences. They used these issues to sow division and weaken the country’s ability to engage in the Second World War. The Nazis also spread misinformation about the US government and its allies, hoping to keep the US out of the war and make Americans less effective as a country. They believed that a fractured and demoralized America couldn't successfully fight in Europe, hoping to prepare the US for an eventual conquest.

The History of Political Warfare

Maddow’s description of Nazi efforts to exploit American “trouble spots” fits into a larger tradition of “political warfare” that has been studied by scholars for over a century. Political warfare refers to the use of propaganda, disinformation, and other non-military tactics to influence the political landscape of another country. This approach has been used by various countries throughout history, including the Soviet Union during the Cold War and Russia in recent years. The goal is to create internal divisions and weaken the target country’s ability to respond effectively to external threats. By understanding this broader context, we can better appreciate the long-term impact of these tactics on American society and politics.