The GOP's Move Toward Authoritarianism
A Warning About Donald Trump and 2024
NY Times, JANUARY 6, 2024
by NY Times Editorial Board
"Mr. Trump does not offer voters anything resembling a normal option of Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal, big government or small. He confronts America with a far more fateful choice: between the continuance of the United States as a nation dedicated to “the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity” and a man who has proudly shown open disdain for the law and the protections and ideals of the Constitution.”
Biden Is Trying to Jolt Us Out of Learned Helplessness About Trump
NY Times, JANUARY 9, 2023
by Michelle Goldberg, Opinion Columnist
"Whether or not it was savvy for Biden to center his first campaign speech of the year on the danger Trump poses to democracy, his words had the virtue of being true. 'Trump’s assault on democracy isn’t just part of his past,' Biden said in the speech. 'It’s what he’s promising for the future. He’s being straightforward. He’s not hiding the ball.’”
How Montana Took a Hard Right Turn Toward Christian Nationalism
NY Times, JANUARY 11, 2023
by Abe Streep
"Jason Small, a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe and a moderate Republican state senator, told me he sensed a more fundamental shift. “One of the Montana values is, if you’re neighbor’s not hurting you, you leave them alone,” he said. “Well, what I see is less of that and more of, ‘You’re just going to do it my way.’”
Yes, Republicans Still Pose a Threat To Democracy
New York Magazine, DECEMBER 5, 2022
By Ed Kilgore, political columnist for Intelligencer since 2015
"When will it be time to happily conclude that Republicans don’t represent a threat to democracy? I’d say it’s when they begin treating voting as a right rather than a privilege; when they look back at the attempted insurrection of January 6, 2021, and its chief instigator with universal contempt; and when they stop fighting every conceivable advance in self-government, as though democracy itself represents an existential threat to their principles."
The Party is Over for Us. Where Do We Go Now?
NY Times, JANUARY 11, 2023
By Bret Stephens and David Brooks, Opinion columnists
Brooks: "The Republicans were destined to turn more populist. The big question is, do they continue on the path to authoritarianism?"
Stephens: "I don’t think the ideas were the core problem, even if not every one of them stands the test of time. The problem was that, when the illiberal barbarians were at the conservative gates, the gatekeepers had a catastrophic loss of nerve. Whether it’s too late to regain that nerve is, to me, the ultimate question."
Trump is not the only threat to democracy
Darrell M. West writes,"...there are several systemic threats to the future of democracy, such as copycat candidates, legal coups, a toxic information ecosystem, the decline of authoritative institutions, and the widespread prevalence of counter-majoritarianism in our political system. Trump represents an existential threat to our current system, but he is not the only challenge facing the country. Brookings Institution, JULY 25, 2022
Election Sabotage at the State Level
The Election Sabotage Scheme and How Congress Can Stop It
The Brennan Center briefly catalogs recent election sabotage legislation... and explains how they threaten our democratic system. Specifically, there are four categories of legislation to sabotage the electoral process: (1) legislation to give state officials the power to change or reject election results; (2) legislation to give partisan state officials the power to seize control of the election administration and vote-counting processes; (3) legislation to restrict, control, or punish the conduct of local election officials; and (4) legislation to make it harder to vote. NOVEMBER 8, 2021
State Legislatures Are Torching Democracy
Even in moderate places like Ohio, gerrymandering has let unchecked Republicans pass extremist laws that could never make it through Congress.
The Atlantic AUGUST 6, 2022
by Jane Mayer