In a CNN interview, singer Linda Ronstadt compared President Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler, saying both used strategies to "find a common enemy for everybody to hate."
Appearing before the CNN premiere of her documentary The Sound of My Voice, Ronstadt told anchor Anderson Cooper she was certain that Trump would be elected when he announced his campaign.
"I was sure that Trump was going to get elected, the day he announced," the "When Will I Be Loved" singer told CNN. "I said, 'It's going to be like Hitler, and the Mexicans are the new Jews.'"
Ronstadt also drew parallels between Trump and Hitler's ascension to their respective offices, saying that because few spoke out against their behavior while they campaigned.
"The intelligentsia of Berlin, and the literati, and all the artists were just busy doing their thing. Hitler rose to power-there were a lot of chances to stop him, and they didn't speak out," she told Cooper.
"The industrial complex thought they could control him once they got him in office, and of course, he was not controllable," she said. "By the time he got established, he put his own people in place and stacked the courts, and did what he had to do to consolidate his power."
When Cooper pointed out that many would be surprised by the comparison, she said: "If you read the history, you won't be surprised, it's exactly the same."
Rhino, Ronstadt's record label, did not immediately respond to request for comment. The White House and Trump campaign did not immediately respond to request for comment.
Ronstadt, who was a Kennedy Center honoree earlier this month, has criticized Trump in the past. In a 2017 interview with The Guardian, she called Trump's presidency "a genuine national emergency." She also compared him to Hitler in the interview. "I've read a lot on the history of Hitler, and people keep drawing comparisons," she told The Guardian. "They're so staggering. It's step by step by step. He's isolating us, he's taking us out [of contact] with South America, Mexico, Canada."
In December, she called out Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a reception for the Kennedy Center honors, after he referenced her 1975 hit "When Will I Be Loved." "I'd like to say to Mr. Pompeo, who wonders when he'll be loved, it's when he stops enabling Donald Trump," she said according to Variety.
