“Many are mad, and the rest are rolling their eyes,” said David Salisbury, a lead organizer at Washington-based witch community Firefly House.

Witches are not a constituency with which politicians normally concern themselves. And there’s little sense in the community that Trump actually cares about what they truly think. But for those who practice witchcraft, the president’s words bring up a painful period in history, when men and women were accused of being witches and murdered, both in the American colonies and in Europe.

Actual witch hunts have left what witchcraft author Kitty Randall, who uses the name “Amber K.” in the witching world, calls a “traumatic emotional imprint” on modern-day witches.

“To have him compare his situation to the worst period in our history is just infuriating,” Randall said.