“Victor Orbán, the Prime Minister of Hungary, very tough man, probably the toughest guy there is, frankly toughest in Europe, a lot of people don’t like him because he’s tough, he says,” GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump told supporters in Ohio, earlier this month.
Trump admires authoritarians, which is nothing new. Yet back in January, Turkish journalist Asli Aydintasbas claimed “another four years of Trump is not enough time to turn America into a dictatorship.”
America’s far right organizations have deep pockets, pockets they are emptying in order to get Trump re-elected. Aydintasbas seems to have set that threat aside. A wealthy and entrenched far right is not the only weakness of her “don’t worry” essay.
After assuming control of the Republican National Committee, Trump seems focused on raising money for his legal bills. Moreover, Trump’s attorney, Alina Habba, ducked a direct question from FOX News about a possible quid pro quo: ““Is there any effort on the part of your team to secure this money through another country, Saudi Arabia or Russia?”
Brynn Tannehill, technical analyst with RAND, went to Twitter today to rebut those Aydintasbas claims, one penetrable guardrail at a time. Possible quid pro quo shouldn’t be our only concern.
Someone sent me this yesterday. The basic premise is that the guardrails of US democracy are so strong that Trump couldn't turn the US into a dictatorship even if he had 2 more terms.
This is hopelessly naïve. Let's break it down. 1/n https://t.co/pnxqVFxtoJ
— Brynn Tannehill (@BrynnTannehill) March 21, 2024
Tannehill referred to a 2016 New York Review of Books essay where Russian-American journalist Masha Gessen warned:
Trump [was] only the fourth candidate in history and the second in more than a century to win the presidency after losing the popular vote. He is also probably the first candidate in history to win the presidency despite having been shown repeatedly by the national media to be a chronic liar, sexual predator, serial tax-avoider, and race-baiter who has attracted the likes of the Ku Klux Klan. Most important, Trump is the first candidate in memory who ran not for president but for autocrat—and won (emphasis added).
(Putin has issued an arrest warrant for Gessen.)
Tannehill then continued:
“The system is too strong” is silly. The Philippine constitution was a near exact copy of the US constitution after WWII. Dictator Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in 1972 using many of the same rationales used by MAGA (leftist plots, need for an autocrat) 3/n
— Brynn Tannehill (@BrynnTannehill) March 21, 2024
Read the full thread (ThreadReader or PDF) and Trump’s Ohio speech transcript at WiredPen.
.
This is a periodic report focused on the stakes facing voters in this presidential election.
.
.
Talk to me: BlueSky | Facebook | Mastodon | Twitter
Known for gnawing at complex questions like a terrier with a bone. Digital evangelist, writer, teacher. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles. @kegill (Twitter and Mastodon.social); wiredpen.com