The Nazis themselves popularized the terms racist and racism

Evidence

But what does the word racist actually mean? It is a fairly recent innovation in American English, and even more so in British English. Both this word, and the earlier British term racialist, were at first principally applied to the doctrines of the Nazis, including their precursors and their disciples; the Nazis used the words racist and racism of themselves and their beliefs, and thus brought them into general circulation. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 1359

Categorization

• DEFINE: Etymology: ‘racist’/‘racism’ entered English circulation via Nazi self-description, a surprising provenance for a term now used as universal opprobrium.
• CANDY: Compact, striking fact — the word ‘racist’ was originally a self-description, not an accusation.
• XREF: connects to: Nazi-era speech patterns survive Hitler’s downfall as popular communicative forms — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 993; The word racism only entered general usage in the 1930s — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 696