During her lifetime Thompson would come to be regarded as one of the world's most influential journalists and radio broadcasters.
In this capacity, she championed many causes, but she will perhaps be best remembered for the dire warnings contained in her reportage from Nazi Germany in the early 1930s (during which time she met and interviewed Adolf Hitler, an encounter which formed the basis of her book, I Saw Hitler).
In 1936, following years of reporting from Nazi Germany, Thompson earned the distinction of being the first American journalist to be expelled from the country. This is hardly surprising given her outspoken criticism of the Fuhrer, whom she described as "inconsequent and voluble, ill poised and insecure [...} the very prototype of the little man".
This is what she had to say of the subject of dictators in 1935:
"No people ever recognize their dictator in advance. He never stands for election on the platform of dictatorship. He always represents himself as the instrument — the Incorporated National Will. ... When our dictator turns up you can depend on it that he will be one of the boys, and he will stand for everything traditionally American. And nobody will ever say "Heil" to him, nor will they call him "Führer" or "Duce." But they will greet him with one great big, universal, democratic, sheeplike bleat of "O.K., Chief! Fix it like you wanna, Chief! Oh Kaaaay!"
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