GEORGETOWN - One of the more jarring comments President Donald Trump made Monday night in Houston came when he proclaimed himself a proud “nationalist.” It’s a term laden with bad connotations -- fascists and warmongers and white supremacists -- but for Trump, apparently, synonymous with an “America First” worldview.

On Tuesday, Sen. Ted Cruz declined to embrace the label his political benefactor celebrated at the Houston rally that Trump headlined for him, even as Trump critics raised alarms.

“I’m not going to worry about labels. I spend every day fighting for 28 million Texans, fighting for jobs, fighting for more opportunity,” he said at a campaign stop at a retirement community north of Austin.

Sen. John Cornyn, stumping this week with Cruz, expressed no discomfort with Trump’s label.

“I would call myself an American first and foremost. If that makes me a nationalist, then so be it,” said Cornyn, whose dad flew B-17s in World War II, fighting fascism -- a particularly virulent strain of nationalism.

“They were Nazis. They wanted to take over the world. I wouldn’t try to make more of that than I think the president intended,” he said.

Not everyone was so willing to shrug off Trump’s proclamation.

Robert Reich, labor secretary in the Clinton administration, put a spotlight on the president’s comment and made clear that to him, this is no innocuous label.

Trump, he tweeted, “openly identifies himself as a nationalist, calls for the jailing of his political opponents, attacks the press & cozies up to dictators, while Republicans in Congress stand idly by.”

The President of the United States openly identifies himself as a nationalist, calls for the jailing of his political opponents, attacks the press & cozies up to dictators, while Republicans in Congress stand idly by. The stakes of this elections couldn't be higher for democracy. https://t.co/2A7ijy9QSO — Robert Reich (@RBReich) October 23, 2018

Scholars who study nationalism in the United States and abroad, now and through history, likewise see uncomfortable implications.

At Southern Methodist University, Erin Hochman, an associate professor of modern German and European history, called it “striking” to hear an American president describe himself as a nationalist.

"It's definitely a dog whistle," she said -- particularly because Trump immediately drew a contrast between "nationalist" and "globalist," an idea historically applied by radical nationalists, like the Nazis, to people, such as Jews and socialists, who allegedly hold no loyalty to the state.

Like "the historical idea of rootless cosmopolitans," she said, "That's a code word for neo-Nazis."

1 / 2President Donald Trump is brought on stage by Sen. Ted Cruz during a rally on October 22, 2018 at the Toyota Center in Houston. Cruz is seeking re-election in a high-profile race against Democratic challenger Beto O'Rourke.(Loren Elliott / Getty Images) 2 / 2Sen. Ted Cruz leaves a campaign rally in Sun City in Georgetown, Texas, on Tuesday Oct. 23, 2018, the second stop of a four-day bus tour with Sen. John Cornyn.(Todd J. Gillman / staff)

There are lots of innocuous sorts of nationalism, she said: flying the flag, celebrating patriotism and national unity in an inclusive way. But context is essential. Trump has disparaged Mexicans as rapists and criminals, and describes asylum seekers as invaders. He labels Democrats and the news media as a threat to the country.

Many of those who flock to his side “are obsessed about borders and about immigrants and about people who do not belong,” Hochman said.

“Of course this is not 1933 Germany,” she said, but echoes are there.

Conservative thinker Dinesh D’Souza was among those defending the president’s use of the term on Tuesday. Trump pardoned the controversial author in May -- at Cruz’s urging — for a campaign finance law conviction.

“Gandhi was a nationalist, as were Mandela, Ho Chi Minh, Fidel Castro, Winston Churchill and Abraham Lincoln. Nationalism by itself is not fascism,” he tweeted.

Last night Trump called himself a nationalist, which is sure to provoke the media left to once again accuse him of fascism. Yet Gandhi was a nationalist, as were Mandela, Ho Chi Minh, Fidel Castro, Winston Churchill and Abraham Lincoln. Nationalism by itself is not fascism — Dinesh D'Souza (@DineshDSouza) October 23, 2018

Bart Bonikowski, a Harvard sociologist who has written extensively about nationalism, ethno-populism, the politics of resentment and Trump, called the Gandhi argument “preposterous. ... It’s disingenuous and completely ignores Trump’s consistent track record.”

Trump’s comments, he tweeted, amount to yet “another norm violation. It’s about bringing the fringe into the mainstream. And it serves the same function as his endless lies: it proves to his (white) supporters that he represents them.”

But the “nationalist” comment has another feature typical of Trump’s gaslighting: plausible deniability. After all Gandhi was a nationalist too! Right-wing pundits have seized on this preposterous argument. It’s disingenuous and completely ignores Trump’s consistent track record — Bart Bonikowski (@bartbonikowski) October 23, 2018

Cruz and Cornyn embarked on a four-day bus tour Tuesday morning, starting in San Antonio.

At the Sun City community in Georgetown, a number of retirees wore hats indicating military service and they offered mixed views on “nationalism.”

The president’s label raised questions for Gary Knoepke, a semiretired executive wearing an Army cap — he served from 1958 to 1965.

“You don’t hear that word anymore,” he said. “Nationalism can be a negative word.

“I didn’t take it that way,” he said, though he was surprised, because of the connotations of white supremacy and bellicosity. But he added, “I don’t think that he has a bone in his body like that.”

Others felt that the way Trump invoked the term leaves no room for concern.

“‘Nationalism’ is in the mouth of the definer. I would go with 'America first,’ ” said Dennis Wallace, 70, a retired electrical engineer, and if that’s what Trump means by it, “I’m a nationalist, too.”

His dad fought in the Pacific during World War II and he doesn’t see Trump promoting anything akin to the dangerous nationalism of Japan, Germany and Italy of that era.

America has been a force for good and will remain so, he said, even if Trump is steering a new focus on the home front. “We have helped out people who needed help, and we’ve straightened out people who needed to be straightened out,” Wallace said.

Edward Kennedy, 77, an IBM retiree who served in the Air Force, had no problem with the label, even if the United States has fought wars with nationalists of assorted stripes -- communists, Nazis and others.

“I look at America first. If I’m a nationalist, so be it,” he said.

Trump used the term again on Tuesday at the White House, speaking about the new trade deal with Mexico and Canada and boasting that his trade policies deter companies from leaving the United States.

“Call me a "nationalist" if you'd like, but I don't want companies leaving. I don't want them firing all their people, going to another country, making a product, sending it into our country -- tax-free, no charge, no tariff, no nothing,” he said.