I've tried to think of his equal in recent history. Not Hitler, who he did say he admired as a forceful person, Hitler was a person with a racial bias and a crazy "Vision." Trump has no vision. He lives exactly for this moment's roaring entertainment via power rush. He is, I believe, closest to Stalin --- Power over All. Stalin once said: anyone can come into my office and talk to me. I listen and then I shoot them. He laughed. Some here will find that hilarious.
1) You're correct that Trump has no vision and just a pawn, but is part of and has the backing of a well organized (mainly pointing to The Heritage Foundation, The Christian Nationalists, and a few other Constitution originalist-driven orgs) and wealthy (mainly pointing to the Tech Bros like Musk, Thiel, and Ellison) consortium behind him. The Architect of Evil, Stephen Miller, is driving a lot of this cruelty across the administration's efforts, especially immigration cruelty. The guy is the consummate misanthrope and white nationalist and really has no need for any brown or black immigrants.
2) This admin and it's continuing Authoritarian efforts and cruelty may not be just like 1930s/1940s Germany but it has many similar characteristics, but again, it's more by a consortium whose white nationalist and uber rich leaders saw an opportunity in Trump to be the MAGA figurehead who could get them into power and an opportunity to start breaking down our current Democracy and Republic; and so far, it has worked out pretty well for them, and Trump has done his job to brainwash about 30-35% of the country.
3) If allowed to continue on its current authoritarian and cruel path, it absolutely can be very similar to 1930s/1940s Germany. We all have to remember, it's early days, and Hitler and the Nazi Party took like 5-6 years before they really solidified complete control, and removed all opposition and then started taking over countries which eventually led to WWII with the invasion of Poland. Right now is very early days for Trump.
(And before you rule out the unthinkable, just note that DHS has plans for 2026 alone to add 23 new detention centers / warehouses to add capacity to hold another 100K detained immigrants on top of the current 73K immigrants already detained. If the admin continues to build up the detained immigrant population at this rate, in 2-3 years, there may be 1-2 million immigrants (and likely some U.S. Citizens who oppose the admin) in detention centers all across America. When you dehumanize a population and let it build up like that (because so far, immigrants are being deported at a pretty low rate compared to how many are detained - Gotta keep CoreCivic and Geo Group happy and making $!) and you realize you can't possibly deport all those people to the countries who have agreed to take some of them, you eventually find yourself with a "problem" and who knows, if this Authoritarian consortium stays in control, what a future admin in this position might do re: a large volume of detained immigrants?)
That's why, without doubt, the upcoming midterm elections, now about 9 months away are crucial as Democrat control of The House and maybe even the Senate via the midterms would derail the current admins complete control over America and their Authoritarian momentum, which is exactly why I firmly believe he and his team will 100% be all over tampering and suppressing the midterm elections. They absolutely are determined to NOT lose one bit of control. We're in for quite the ride over these next 9 months...
However, you're not going to the poverty-stricken U.S. Aid locations and instead of placing your money where your mouth is, you'd rather spend your big playa bucks on NYC concerts. You give your money to U.S. Aid Big Money Player. I'll pass on the fraud, waste, and abuse.