Day 100: Where we are now

Trump is losing the key to autocracy

In just the past week:

• President Trump backed down on firing the Federal Reserve chair after markets panicked.

• Trump blinked in his escalating trade war with China as he seemed to miscalculate both his adversary and economic realities.

• The administration was forced to backtrack and restore thousands of international student visas across the country.

• The president’s hostile threats toward our largest trading partner backfired, delivering the ideologically aligned Conservative Party of Canada (which, just months ago, was projected to win by 20+ points) a stunning electoral defeat.

• Trump’s attempts to bully academia into political submission were met by a strengthening front of resistance from universities across the country (the most prominent target, Harvard, sued rather than submit).

• His most prominent deputy, Elon Musk, promised to step back from the administration after failing to significantly reduce spending (and amidst a disastrous earnings report at Tesla, driven in large part by backlash against his political activities).

• Department of Justice prosecutors resigned rather than accept political interference in the Eric Adams case.

• The most prominent conservative lawyer in the country agreed to represent a Wisconsin state judge targeted by the Trump administration.

• And the administration was on the losing end of more than a half dozen court decisions on a wide variety of fronts, including a major setback on its dangerous attempt to reshape elections. As of April 28, at least 123 rulings have at least temporarily paused administration actions, and of cases that have reached a decision of some kind, the administration has lost more than 70 percent. (The courts are also showing greater signs of frustration: “Give me a break,” a judge snapped at the administration lawyer in a case on the Big Law attacks.)

More importantly, Trump’s political support is cratering. Most polls find he is now underwater on every issue (including the economy and immigration) and with almost every demographic. More than a quarter of Republican-leaning voters say Trump has gone too far.

In turn, a wide variety of past supporters — people like Joe Rogan and Ken Griffin and Candace Owens and Rod Dreher and Dave Portnoy and the Wall Street Journal editorial board — have all started criticizing the White House.

At the 100 day mark of Trump’s second term, here are the numbers:

Sources here and here and here.

Oh, and the price of eggs is up more than 50 percent since December!

The key to consolidating power is slipping through Trump’s hands

Trump is losing in court, losing the public, losing over and over, which ultimately means he's losing the one thing critical to the success of autocrats: momentum.

To undo democracy and consolidate personal power, autocrats need to force every other powerful actor and institution in a political system to submit to their rule. To, one-by-one, decide not to resist. It’s a domino effect: Each politician, journalist, CEO, or civil society leader needs to look around, see others folding (or even just slightly retreating), and then decide to do the same.

Because of that, autocrats need people to perceive them as unstoppable, like they cannot be slowed — so you might as well get out of the way and save yourself. Leaders committed to democratic legitimacy can (and do) see their political stock rise and fall in their time in office, but autocrats count on consistently increasing power. They need momentum. Otherwise the illusion of inevitability will shatter and they will likely fail.

For the first month or two, Donald Trump had momentum – his shock-and-awe, flood the zone campaign was damaging and dangerous and often lawless, but it created the appearance and reality of momentum. But as we exit the first 100 days, his forward motion seems to have almost completely collapsed. This will make it much harder for him to succeed in his authoritarian agenda.

Harder, but not impossible

Still, I imagine not all of that is fully reassuring. How can it be? To point out how the authoritarian movement’s power is faltering is sort of like learning that stage 4 cancer is no longer spreading. It’s good news, yes, but no victory. And like cancer, Trump’s brand of autocracy has come back from remission before.

So we must remain focused on the ways he is continuing to attempt to consolidate power and override our system of checks and balances. Over a year ago, Protect Democracy predicted that — if he returned to the Oval Office — Donald Trump would seek to implement the authoritarian playbook through six specific tactics: 1) pardons to license lawbreaking, 2) directing investigations against critics and rivals, 3) regulatory retaliation, 4) federal law enforcement overreach, 5) domestic deployment of the military, and 6) refusing to leave office.

Here is an assessment of where we are on Day 100:

On pardon abuses, especially the January 6th pardons that endorsed political violence and cemented alliances with paramilitary groups, we’re in very dangerous territory. The presidential pardon power, intended as a tool for mercy, has been weaponized into a tool to license violence committed in service of the personal interests of the president.

On investigations against rivals, the White House has directed investigations against critics, universities, law firms, and political adversaries — both through the Department of Justice and the IRS. All of these are textbook authoritarian plays (and in the pre-Trump but post-Watergate era, would have been widely considered to be impeachable offences). These orders are intended to have a chilling effect, and they have, but whether our justice system is able to stand up to these abusive tactics will determine how fearsome a weapon these orders ultimately become.

On regulatory retaliation, the list is long. Notable examples include the media, elite universities (which are looking at massive funding cuts unless they submit), and any actor in civil society who fails to bow to the administration’s crusade against diversity, equity, and the rights of the trans community. Here too, it remains to be seen whether the courts will put an end to this assault on the rule of law, but the threat alone of a government that rewards its friends and punishes its perceived enemies has brought much of the private sector to heel. For just one example of how far this regulatory retaliation campaign has progressed, watch this extraordinary (and courageous) clip that aired on 60 Minutes this week.

On law enforcement overreach, the most notable abuses stem from the lawless deportation of migrants, including Kilmar Ábrego García and others who were legally protected from deportation, to a brutal third-country prison in El Salvador. The arrest of a judge in Wisconsin in dubious circumstances is also a red flag. This is all (unfortunately) likely just the beginning of abuses carried out by federal law enforcement.

On domestic military deployment, for now, the White House and the Pentagon seem to have backed off a plan to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807. Domestic deployment of the military for domestic and civilian law enforcement has clearly been discussed at the highest levels, but has not — so far — been widely pursued.

Finally, on refusal to leave office, the third term chatter has increased in frequency and bluntness (such as the Trump Organization selling “Trump 2028” hats, top allied elected officials openly endorsing it, and supporters beginning to make legal arguments). While one purpose may be to create enough doubt to postpone Trump’s lame duck status, another may be to test the waters and begin normalizing an idea that is anything but.

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So at the 100 day mark, two things appear to be true at the same time: The authoritarian movement is stumbling badly and it is making alarming progress. That is part of what makes this moment feel so challenging and uncertain.

But it reflects a larger and reassuring truth about our democracy (and indeed, about democracy in general). Our fate is not sealed. It never is.

To believe in democracy is to believe that we, collectively, have the power to shape our collective future. That we as a society are capable of making choices between a better future and a worse one. And that until democracy is completely vanquished — and then even after — ultimate power rests in the hands of We The People.

We made it out of the first 100 days. That was likely the most dangerous period of this administration. Our democracy is badly battered but it is still intact. It is still ours. We owe ourselves that small celebration, so long as we commit ourselves with redoubled effort to the work ahead.

By standing together — by choosing collective courage over individual cowardice — we can not only make it through the next 1,361 days. We can build a stronger, better democracy on the other side.