Former Vice President Al Gore speaking at the San Francisco Climate Week Conference compared some Trump administration actions to those of Nazi Germany.
The explosive comments made Monday night has the political world buzzing.
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WATCH HEREGore took aim directly at the Trump administration by saying "We have to solve our democracy crisis in order to solve the climate crisis." He then likened Trump's quote "attacks on liberty" to Nazi Germany, but also offered a clear disclaimer.
"I understand very well why it is wrong to compare Adolf Hitler's Third Reich to any other movement — it was uniquely evil, full stop," Gore said. "I get it, but there are important lessons from the history of that emergent evil."
Gore went to say he sees parallels between the Trump administration and the Third Reich, specifically how they use disinformation and threats to free speech to undermine policies they do not agree with.
The former vice president then referenced what German philosopher Theodore Adorno famously wrote about Nazi Germany.
"The first step of that nation's decent into hell was - and I quote - the conversion of all questions of truth into questions of power. He described how the Nazi’s – and I quote – attacked the very heart of the distinction between true and false," Gore said.
Gore said he believes the White House is trying to create "a preferred version of reality."
"They say Ukraine and Russia instead of the other way around, and expect us to believe it," he said.
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SIGN UP The communications director of the White House posted a response on Tuesday writing, "Usually those who yell the loudest about Nazis are often times using their same tactics themselves."
A spokesman for the California GOP party agreed.
"There is no organization in America right now that has a more difficult time struggling between the truth and the false than the Democratic party that can't even define what a woman is," said Matt Shupe, California Republican party spokesman. "So I think for them to project their own problems and their own toxicity onto another group of people or organization is completely unfair."
Gore's fiery keynote also took aim at the president's actions on climate change, saying his policies are doing real damage to much of the progress that has been made.
