Donna Deegan’s comparison of Donald Trump’s immigration plan to ‘concentration camps’ deserves the GOP backlash it’s getting

Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan is getting thrashed on social media by GOP leaders after making comments likening former President Donald Trump’s immigration ideas to “concentration camps.”

Deegan’s remarks have been called antisemitic and a “disgusting” “cheap shot.” The critique is spot on.

At issue is an interview with Times Radio in London in which Deegan was discussing immigration policy under a hypothetical second Trump presidency. While Trump has not specifically said he’d create detention camps as part of his mass deportation plan, he hasn’t ruled it out.

Make no mistake, I am not a fan of Trump’s immigration policies. There is a difference between being tough on border security and immigration policy in general and being just flat out inhumane. Trump is, at best, toeing that line.

So while it’s fair to critique his proposals on the matter, doing so by comparing it to one of the worst human rights atrocities in global history is indeed a foolish line of attack that diminishes the loss of 11 million souls, 6 million of whom were Jewish.

And rightfully so, Deegan is getting ratioed online.

“Jacksonville Mayor @DonnaDeegan ‘s antisemitic comments comparing the deportation of illegal immigrants to the Holocaust are disgusting and disqualifying,” state Rep. Randy Fine posted on X, adding that he would “work next session to withhold state funding from her administration” if Deegan did not offer an apology.

Fine, who I rarely agree with on his particular brand of bombastic comments on social media, is the only Jewish lawmaker in the Legislature. This is a person who has probably received more down arrows (IFYKYK) in Capital Directions than anyone not named Anthony Sabatini. So it means something when I agree with him.

Fine went on to share similar sentiments in a recorded interview with the right-wing media outlet Florida’s Voice, noting that “those cities that adopt antisemitism are not gonna be cities that get money from the state.”

And it’s not just Randy Fine. Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, who previously served as Senate President and is objectively one of the most mild-mannered leaders in The Process known for taking a measured approach to his words, also blasted Deegan.

“The audacity of Donna Deegan to reduce the atrocities of the Holocaust to a political cheap shot is disgusting and beneath people of Jacksonville,” Simpson posted to X. “The tax payers footing the bill on her two week junket to London sent her there to bring back jobs, not lie about President Trump.”

Indeed, one of the things that makes her comments so egregious is that she made them while on a taxpayer funded trade mission to the United Kingdom. This was not a campaign event, where various rhetoric accusing Trump of all sorts of things is expected. It’s not a stump speech for Kamala Harris. And many of the taxpayers helping to foot the bill for the trip are Trump supporters. Remember a cardinal rule of elected life — you represent all constituents, not just those who agree with you.

Deegan was in the U.K. to try to bring home business for her city, which brings up another reason the comparison to concentration camps deserves criticism. No American, least of all an elected official, should be bashing a current or former American President, even Trump, when they are visiting abroad. There is a sizable chunk of Europeans who do plenty of Trump-bashing on their own without Deegan’s help.

On top of that, Deegan’s comments seem to ignore what should be common knowledge for someone serving at her level, that words have meaning. When you say “concentration camp,” it immediately brings to mind the Holocaust. It evokes images of “Schindler’s List” or “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.”

I get it, “kids in cages” is bad, cruel and inhumane. And again, I don’t agree with the idea of using detention camps for mass deportation. But let us not forget Godwin’s Law, which asserts that the longer an internet debate goes on, the more likely someone is to be compared to Adolf Hitler. While that doesn’t directly correlate to Deegan’s comments, the meaning embedded within it does. The facetious assertion includes the idea that comparisons to Hitler trivialize the atrocities of the Holocaust.

Even the host of the Times London interview questioned the “loaded” language and offered Deegan an opportunity to tone it down. Yet she doubled down.

“What would we call them? If you’re rounding people up and putting them in camps?” Deegan responded. “What would we call those? It’s a concentration of people that are in a camp. I’m not suggesting anything beyond that, but I just think it seems rather inhumane to me.”

Obviously this isn’t the first time — far from it — that a Democrat has compared Trump to Hitler or his policies to those related to the Holocaust. Trump’s own running mate, U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, once called Trump “America’s Hitler.”

Does anyone actually think Trump is going to oversee the extermination of 11 million Americans? And his immigration rhetoric, while unsavory to many, does not include any suggestion of murdering undocumented immigrants, rather just removing them from the country. We can have a reasonable debate about his plans, but that debate should not debase the fundamental horror that was the Holocaust.

Before Deegan’s ill-advised interview comments, I thought Trevor Lawrence was the worst performer among all those in London for the Jaguars football games. Deegan popped in to say, “hold my beer.”