Donald Trump's presidency involved no Holocaust, no concentration camps, no gas chambers. There was no genocide and no threat of one.

But what it did feature was bad enough — more than bad enough for America to stop, search its soul and commit itself to declaring, "Never again."

It featured a narcissistic sociopath of a president, a totalitarian wannabe who believed that his power was absolute, or should be. It featured an epic liar who employed The Big Lie with particularly destructive effect after he was voted out of office in order to defraud Americans into believing he had won — and who tried to coerce officials into conspiring with him to concoct a crooked election result. It featured a snarling, cruel and deeply dishonest man who obstructed justice with abandon, and who not only embraced toxic white supremacy but also stoked it, giving America its first real taste of fascism.

And it featured the spurning of the peaceful transfer of power that is the essence of any democracy by a president who summoned an extremist mob to Washington, D.C., on the day President-elect Joe Biden's election was to be acknowledged in accordance with our Constitution. Promising them a "wild" time and endorsing his lawyer's exhortation that they initiate "combat," the president personally directed the mob to proceed to the Capitol and use "strength" to "take your country back." The mob did as directed, smashing up the Capitol, assaulting dozens of police officers and murdering one, reportedly threatening to kidnap the speaker of the House and chanting to hang the vice president. But for pure, blessed serendipity and the heroism of a few individuals, we might have seen the kidnapping and assassination of top national officials, all incited by the leader of our own country.

And but for roughly 22,000 voters spread among Georgia, Wisconsin and Arizona who decided to vote for Joe Biden rather than Donald Trump, America would have four more years of such a person, whose contempt for democracy, arrogation of limitless power to himself and penchant for spreading poison might well have finished off the American experiment.

In taking up the second impeachment of Trump, the United States Senate has not merely the opportunity to say "never again" but the urgent obligation to do so. It's unlikely that 17 Republican senators will muster the courage to convict Trump of the incitement to violence and insurrection they know he committed. But a trial that lays out Trump's criminal conduct and what it wrought serves a crucial purpose. Trump's White House has been a house of un-American activities, and the country — and those who come after us — need to see the betrayal of America by Trump and his defenders for what it was.

Moreover, America needs to turn a spotlight on the witch's brew of white nationalism and neo-fascist extremism that make up Trump's hardcore base. There is a painful truth: Our country has an enemy within. Other countries that abandoned their traditions and disgraced themselves had to do the same in order to survive as democracies. Post-war Germany has spent decades facing up to its embrace of Nazism. Italy had to confront its romance with fascism. America must likewise face up to its dance with Trumpism — and, much more importantly, rid itself of it.

The impeachment trial, legislation to ban the naming of federal buildings after Trump and the elimination of federal subsidies for Trump's post-presidential activities: These are all part of what is needed to send a national message that Trumpism is a stain on our nation. Full, fair investigations into evidence that Trump committed federal or state crimes are important to show that we are truly a nation that respects law.

But it won't be enough. Extremism expert Farah Pandith has written that "(whether) we are trying to stop radicalization into Nazi groups or ISIS, the winning strategy (against extremism) is a combined effort of government, business, philanthropy and regular citizens." America's battle against Trumpism will be a long and difficult one. But it is one that simply must be won.

Jeff Robbins, a former assistant United States attorney and United States delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, was chief counsel for the minority of the United States Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. An attorney specializing in the First Amendment, he is a longtime columnist for the Boston Herald, writing on politics, national security, human rights and the Mideast. To find out more about Jeff Robbins and read his past columns, please visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.

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