Trump Might Govern as an Authoritarian. Is That What His Voters Want?
Donald Trump’s pre- and post-victory pronouncements have raised fears of potential authoritarian governance in his second term. Photo via AP/Allison Robbert
Trump Might Govern as an Authoritarian. Is That What His Voters Want?
Two BU experts parse fears based on president-elect’s statements and nominees and say his supporters felt ignored by DC insiders
During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump said he would be a dictator—only on his first day in office. Some of his other utterances and actions about seeking revenge on opponents and rewarding his most loyal supporters have also unnerved critics, who see his behavior as unsettling, maybe even antidemocratic. But how much of what Trump says is bluster meant only to rile up his base and how much of it is grounded in actions he will actually attempt to take?
The president-elect’s musing about turning the military on “radical left lunatics” led a Harvard expert on democracy to pronounce it “classic authoritarian discourse.” Trump also doubled down, postelection, on his support for the military mass-deporting 11 million undocumented immigrants. That prompted a University of Pennsylvania political scientist to muse about a potential backlash against “Gestapo”-like raids.
Outside of higher education, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey and Boston Mayor Michelle Wu have vowed to fight deportations, drawing the ire of Tom Homan, Trump’s choice for border czar. Democratic state executives, meanwhile, announced a new group, Governors Safeguarding Democracy, to take legal actions to counter what Colorado Governor Jared Polis says are “any threats to our democracy that come from any president or from foreign powers.”
Many Trump voters turned to him to reject a DC establishment they believe has failed them, not necessarily to endorse strongman government, though some extremists do embrace that, says Jonathan Zatlin, an associate professor of history at the College of Arts & Sciences. Zatlin’s expertise is modern European history, including communism, and this spring he will teach Comparative European Fascism.
BU Today asked Zatlin and Timothy Longman, a professor of international relations and of political science at the Pardee School of Global Studies, whether concerns about Trump’s second term in the White House are justified. Longman is a scholar of African human rights, democratization, and the interplay of politics with race and ethnicity, women, and religion.
Q&A
With Jonathan Zatlin and Timothy Longman
BU Today: How concerned should we be about an authoritarian Trump term?
Zatlin: We should be very concerned.
We need to focus on what he does right now, such as who he nominates for office. Trump says a lot of things, some of which are nonsensical, much of which is offensive, but most of which resonate with people who feel that our political and economic system hasn’t been serving them well. His first term was characterized by a lack of preparedness, whether it was Trump’s limited understanding of how government works or his inability to find people to run agencies. The result was incompetence and chaos.
This time around, Trump has nominated people for key offices that have several things in common, none of which indicate a willingness to protect democratic freedoms: personal loyalty to Trump, an understanding of modern media, involvement in serious scandals, and a desire to use the power of the state to punish political opponents.
Take nominees Pete Hegseth [Defense Secretary], and Linda McMahon [Education Secretary]. They are distinguished more by personal relationships with Trump than experience or expertise to lead large government agencies. Both have been accused of serious crimes. Both want to transform the departments they’re supposed to lead in antidemocratic ways. Hegseth wants to recast the military along Christian nationalist, misogynist, and transphobic and homophobic lines, including purging officers who do not share his brand of white supremacy. McMahon has been hired to do away with the very institution she’s supposed to oversee—the Department of Education.
Longman: Donald Trump painted a dark picture of America in decline, where crime is spreading [crime in America dropped from 2022 to 2023, and the most serious crimes were down by a lot (such as murder, rape, robbery), according to FBI data] and traditional values are being undermined. He portrayed himself, and by extension his supporters, as under attack from radical forces. He scapegoated groups that he accused of corrupting culture, limiting freedoms, and taking economic advantage of “normal” Americans—trans youth, immigrants, Muslims, progressive activists, civil servants. He campaigned on a promise of retribution that we should take seriously.
In the last Trump administration, our democracy was protected by other government institutions, resistance from people within his administration, and general incompetence. While Trump’s appointments so far suggest that incompetence might still save us, he is in a better position to achieve his aims this time. He has completely captured the Republican Party and used it to reshape government, so that neither Congress nor the courts will provide substantial resistance. He has learned to surround himself with loyalists who will follow his orders without hesitation, regardless of the consequences and moral implications.
BU Today: How do you explain his popularity with a majority of voters on November 5?
Longman: Authoritarianism is often popular. Many people support a strong and decisive leader. In Africa, which is the focus of my scholarship, military coups have frequently been greeted with dancing in the streets, because people think that military rule will bring order. In Russia, if elections were fully free and fair, Vladimir Putin might still win, because many Russians appreciate his nationalism and militarism.
What distinguishes modern liberal democracies from authoritarian regimes, however, is that they focus not only on the will of the majority, but also on protecting the rights of minorities. This is where many regimes show their authoritarian nature. They scapegoat ethnic, racial, religious, and sexual minorities, seeking majority support by blaming social and economic problems on these groups that are often the most vulnerable. Authoritarian regimes also suppress criticism and limit alternative viewpoints in the name of order. These policies are often popular, but they are destructive, stifling creativity and creating a climate of fear that affects even supporters.
Zatlin: It would be a serious mistake to read the election results as motivated by support for authoritarian rule. Some Trump voters idolize the man to the point that he can do no wrong. There are others who embrace his brashness and aggression or find his message compelling that women, people of color, immigrants, Marxists, and trans people are somehow ruining the country. But I would bet many voted for Trump because they feel that professional politicians and policymakers like Kamala Harris aren’t listening to them, much less helping them overcome the challenges they’re experiencing in their lives.
I think the reason [Harris] lost isn’t simply that she’s a Black woman. The left has done a terrible job of listening to the complaints of those voters who feel our economic and political system isn’t serving them. It’s much easier to victimize vulnerable communities than address the actual causes of social dislocation. But instead of telling a story that spoke to the disaffected, the left tried to discredit Trump by lecturing to them.
BU Today: Courts, Congress, and, on January 6, 2021, the police, constrained Trump’s first term. Will they be able to do the same this time?
Longman: The Republican Party has effectively become the party of Trump. Party members and politicians alike have abandoned many of their core principles—free trade, limited government, American leadership in the world—in favor of Trump’s isolationist foreign and economic policy and intrusive government. With Republicans controlling both houses, Congress is unlikely to provide a check on Trump’s power.
Other institutions are also likely to be less effective at stopping him this time around. In the previous administration, his own cabinet members and others inside the White House often challenged Trump’s most destructive directives, but this time, he is choosing loyalists who will never provide resistance. With a conservative supermajority on the Supreme Court, the judiciary is also unlikely to provide a substantial check on his power. His threats of retribution against disloyal civil servants and military officers are likely to limit resistance in those institutions.
Some state governments will challenge him, but Trump will use executive power, and support from Congress and the courts, to force conservative policies on even progressive states. Trump will run into roadblocks in trying to implement his goals, but they are likely to be less inhibiting than in his previous term.
Zatlin: It’s easy to fall prey to doomsaying. Liberals sounded death knells for democracy after the election of Ronald Reagan and again after the Supreme Court declared George W. Bush the winner in 2000. Conservatives seem to have felt similarly about Obama. That said, Trump 2.0 arguably represents something dangerously new and demagogic.
I don’t see Trump requiring the support of traditional Republicans the way he did the first time around. In his first term, conservatives like [former GOP Senate leader] Mitch McConnell and [general and chief of staff] John Kelly worked with him. This time, however, there are no adults in the room. Those who know better, like Marco Rubio [Trump’s secretary of state–designate], will fall in line because they prefer to wield power.
Second, the radical transformation of government Trump and his proxies are proposing often collides with democratic ideals. If you staff government agencies with partisan political operators whose understanding of democratic rule is limited by hucksterism and machismo at best, or a fealty to Christian nationalism and white supremacy at worst, they will quickly reduce the rule of law to the law of the “Ruler.” Finally, I worry that some of the more outrageous policy proposals, whether it’s mass deportation or the revival of protectionism, will throw us into chaos. Under cover of that disarray, the radicals in his administration will have an easier time enacting policies that most Americans do not support.
BU Today: Do we have analogs in history for Trump’s coming governance?
Longman: As a scholar of African politics, I lived in Rwanda in the year leading up to the genocide there and then returned to study how it happened. My views are shaped by having watched a country move from hope for political change to polarization along ethnic and political lines, and ultimately, violence. When I hear the kind of hateful and divisive rhetoric that the Trump campaign was espousing, I hear echoes of the rhetoric I heard in Rwanda.
Of course, despite our pride in our democracy, the United States has its own history of abuses, from genocide of American Indians to slavery of people of African descent to the internment of Japanese during the Second World War. My studies in Rwanda and beyond suggest a few important points that might be relevant here. Majority support is not needed to carry out massive violations of human rights. It just takes a powerful group committed to action and passivity on the part of most other people.
Zatlin: Calling Trump a fascist, as the historian of French fascism, Robert Paxton, recently did, poses problems for historians. There are just too many differences—between Vichy and the Nazis, between interwar Europe and contemporary America—for the category to fit. It also seems that calling Trump a fascist is less an explanation of his behavior than a mere insult. It gets in the way of understanding why so many people support him and understanding what’s to come.
That said, I’m mindful that many of the right wing strongmen who populated the last hundred years were helped into power by conservatives. Those conservatives believed they could outfox populist demagogues because those figures were crude, ill-educated, or inexperienced. Italian and German conservatives quickly discovered that the people they thought they could control were controlling them. Worse, the Nazis demanded loyalty, but were disloyal in return. That’s because those who view law, procedure, and custom as impediments to power have so little in common with people who are democratically inclined. Men like Trump aren’t simply unscrupulous, they’re playing a different game—chess, when we’re playing checkers.
BU Today: What might protect us from creeping authoritarianism?
Longman: What we are seeing right now is not creeping authoritarianism but a full-frontal assault on liberal democracy. Trump has made clear that he will target the vulnerable and will use the tools of government to take revenge on his perceived enemies. Yet many ways for people to resist remain. Even highly authoritarian regimes must worry about maintaining popular support. Without checks on his power, Trump may overreach in ways that turn off even some of his supporters. Voter turnout was down by five million people this year compared to 2020, suggesting that many people simply disengaged. Policies like massive deportations, high tariffs that raise the price of goods, and excessive attacks on political opponents could turn off many people and get others involved in politics again.
Authoritarian regimes are often much weaker and more fragile than they appear on the surface. I don’t have a lot of faith in the ability of government to limit Trump, but I have a lot of faith in the American people.
I don’t have a lot of faith in the ability of government to limit Trump, but I have a lot of faith in the American people.
Zatlin: We should start by remembering that America was never as inclusive or democratic as we might like to think. It was founded on the Enlightenment ideals of democracy, equality, freedom, and private property rights. But America was also founded on dispossessing indigenous people of their land and culture, seizing territory from neighboring states, depriving Africans of their freedom and exploiting their labor, preventing women from voting and owning property, and persecuting a variety of minorities.
Then we should understand that there is no such thing as totalitarianism. No regime in history—not even Nazi Germany—ever wielded total power. Authoritarian regimes use a combination of intimidation and argument to win over some people and coerce others. Most importantly, we need to stop thinking of ourselves as passive bystanders. By not speaking out against injustice or overreach when we see it, we become the accomplices of those who misuse their power. We should support legal attempts to prevent the erosion of democratic norms. We should also work to increase faith in the electoral process, whether that means countering lies about stolen votes, convincing people that their vote matters—including left-wingers who think there’s no difference between the two parties—because elections have consequences, and volunteering to get out the vote.
But we can’t simply rely on lawyers, political operatives, or canvassers. Change comes from speaking out and speaking up against various forms of abuse. You can do that in class, at your workplace, by writing elected and appointed representatives, and objecting to censorship in all of its forms. Organized speech in the form of rallies is an effective means of making viewpoints heard and demonstrating that not everyone is on board with the supposed “mandate” that Republicans claim to have, in an election that was closer than they think.
Then there’s action. My own experience is that intervening against high-handed or abusive behavior is where you personally can make a difference. Subvert authoritarianism when you’re confronted with it. Do it nonviolently, without shaming people, and in a way that those who hold different beliefs can respect.
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