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ArtistA modern, colorful manga-style comic panel with clean, confident linework, expressive chibi-influenced proportions, and flat, slightly muted colors with soft cel shading. The tone is tense, lucid, and morally urgent, with dread conveyed through posture, framing, and eye contact rather than gore. Dialogue appears in a simple, perfectly legible rounded comic font. Single-panel composition. Setting: A contemporary café interior. Small tables, ceramic cups, a muted color palette. Behind the characters, a large glass window dominates the background. Through the window, on the street outside, several ICE agents in tactical gear are visible. One agent is mid-action, smashing a car window with a clenched fist; inside the car, a woman sits frozen in shock. The scene outside is partially reflected on the glass, visually bleeding into the café’s calm interior. Siren light flickers faintly across surfaces. Foreground characters: The couple sits at a small café table, close together, bodies angled toward each other but eyes repeatedly pulled toward the window. Left character (him): A slim, athletic man with almost shaved hair, glasses, and a warm Mediterranean complexion. He wears an orange T-shirt and short beige trekking shorts. Seated upright, shoulders tense. One hand grips the edge of the table, knuckles pale; the other hovers near his cup, forgotten. His face is set with controlled alarm—brows drawn tight, jaw rigid, eyes fixed on the violence outside before turning back to her with grim certainty. Dialogue (him, low and unequivocal): “Fascism is back. Not tomorrow. Not maybe. It’s here, among us, now.” Right character (her): A woman with green eyes and long amber hair styled in a clearly defined french braid starting at the forehead and lying neatly along the scalp before falling over her shoulder. She wears a cropped tank top and loose, colorful hip-hop style pants. She leans forward, forearms on the table. One hand opens flat, palm down, as if pinning facts in place; the other curls slightly, restrained anger visible in her fingers. Her expression is sharp and unflinching—eyes narrowed, lips tight with controlled fury. Dialogue (her, precise and severe): “Paramilitary squads. Militarized cities. State censorship. Racial roundups. Isolationism. All the symptoms are there.” Interaction & visual tension: The stillness of the café contrasts violently with the chaos outside. Reflections in the glass blur the line between observer and participant. Their body language shows shared recognition: this is not theory, but presence. Bottom caption, centered inside the panel: “© Emiliano Girina”
In the United States, a set of political and social dynamics has re-emerged that bears an unsettling resemblance to the mechanisms that enabled fascism in Italy during the Ventennio. The comparison is not a claim of perfect identity or historical repetition. History never copies itself cleanly. What it does, however, is rhyme—especially in the tools power uses when it decides that law, pluralism, and human dignity are obstacles rather than foundations.
One of the clearest parallels lies in the treatment of “undesirable” populations. In Fascist Italy, repression did not begin with gas chambers or total war, but with administrative violence: surveillance, lists, forced relocations, internal exile, and the normalization of police power directed at specific groups. In the contemporary United States, mass deportations function in a similar way. They are framed as bureaucratic necessities or matters of “security,” yet they rely on fear, opacity, and the dehumanization of migrants. Immigration enforcement becomes not merely a legal process, but a spectacle of force meant to signal who belongs and who does not.
This is reinforced by the visible militarization of cities. Fascism thrives when public space is saturated with uniforms, weapons, and the language of emergency. Mussolini’s regime made constant use of paramilitary presence and police intimidation to project order and inevitability. Today, heavily armed agents, armored vehicles, and aggressive raids—often carried out by ICE and other federal forces—transform neighborhoods into occupied zones. The message is not subtle: the state is watching, the state is armed, and resistance is futile. When law enforcement begins to resemble an occupying army, democracy quietly suffocates.
Racialized enforcement is another echo. Fascist regimes require an internal enemy, clearly marked and repeatedly blamed for social decay. In Italy, this logic eventually hardened into racial laws and colonial brutality. In the U.S., racial profiling and targeted raids disproportionately affect Latino and other non-white communities. “Law and order” becomes a coded language for racial control, where entire groups are treated as presumptively guilty. The goal is not justice, but discipline.
Isolationism also plays a familiar role. Fascist Italy cultivated a narrative of national humiliation and betrayal, insisting that the country must turn inward, reject “decadent” foreign influence, and rediscover a mythical past. Contemporary American isolationism draws from the same well. International cooperation is cast as weakness, multilateral institutions as constraints, and empathy beyond borders as a threat. The nation is imagined as a fortress, besieged and morally superior, even as it withdraws from shared norms and responsibilities.
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