Sadiq Khan calls Donald Trump 'global poster-boy for white nationalism'
Sadiq Khan has warned that the lessons of the Second World War are “in danger of being forgotten” as he branded Donald Trump the “global poster-boy for white nationalism”.
Writing in the Observer, the London Mayor also said Nigel Farage and his Brexit party had pushed Boris Johnson’s Conservatives to become “ever more right wing, illiberal and intolerant.”
“For the first time in more than 70 years, it seems the lessons of the second world war are genuinely at risk of being forgotten or, worse still, being rewritten,” Mr Khan wrote.
He said the EU and NATO are facing “unprecedented attacks” - often from the leaders of the countries that helped create them and said support for democracy was at a “record low across the western world”.
Speaking ahead of a visit to Poland to commemorate the start of the Second World War, Mr Khan said vulnerable and minority communities are being scapegoated “for all society’s ills”.
“This comes as a new wave of extremist far-right movements and political parties are winning power and influence at alarming speed – fuelled by Donald Trump, the global poster-boy for white nationalism,” he wrote.
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He cited Matteo Salvini in Italy, Marine Le Pen in France and Hungary’s Viktor Orban as examples of politicians across Europe exploitoing division to gain power.
“The impact can also be seen in the UK,” he added, “where the outsize influence of Nigel Farage and his Brexit party has pushed the Conservatives, under Boris Johnson, to become ever more rightwing, illiberal and intolerant.”
The comments are the latest attack by Mr Khan on Donald Trump, who he has previously branded a “20th century fascist”, while the US President described the Mayor of London as a “stone cold loser” who had done a “terrible job”.