Getting over the “believability gap”

Three strategies for talking about the authoritarian threat

If you’re like me, you’re probably still baffled that the United States — a country whose political self-image is built around freedom and resistance to tyranny — could plausibly elect a president running to be a dictator.

Take, for instance, Trump’s latest threats to imprison his political enemies:

Let me translate for you: There was no widespread fraud in 2020. There is no reason to expect it in 2024. At some level, Trump knows this. He is threatening anyone who upholds the Constitution in overseeing a free and fair election. Anyone who organizes for or donates to his opponent. Or even anyone who dares to vote against him. 

Before 2016, this sort of thing would have felt like a thermonuclear bomb. Now it’s just the latest in a high-stakes and impossibly close presidential race. 

Why isn’t Trump’s obvious authoritarianism a nonstarter for the American people? 

Lots of reasons, I suppose. Ranging from the global headwinds facing democracies everywhere to the aspects of our two-party electoral system that — once an autocrat manages to capture one of the two parties — gives extremist politics a serious leg-up. 

For more on the tactics and plans, read our series on “How it Happens Here.”

But I think there’s another reason that doesn’t get enough attention: a “believability gap.” Many Americans simply don’t believe it can happen here. They don’t believe Trump will govern as an autocrat. They certainly don’t expect him to succeed if he tries. 

I don’t think any of those assumptions are true. I suspect you don’t either. 

So here are three strategies for how to talk about the threat in a way that overcomes the gap: 

First, talk about the authoritarian tactics already happening

As my colleague Amanda documented in a viral thread this week, many of the tactics that could be used under a second Trump term are already being field-tested at the state level.

It’s not a question of “can it happen?” — it is happening. 

For example, in Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton created an “election integrity unit” that is raiding homes and searching people for alleged election fraud crimes. To date, 169 investigations have revealed essentially no fraud — but that’s not the point. Per the Washington Post:

Civil rights groups say the charges tend to target Black or Latino voters and volunteers, many of whom are Democrats. The result has been a chilling effect on volunteers and community groups that for decades have worked to increase turnout in a state with one of the nation’s lowest voter participation rates. Critics say the charges are part of a wider effort by predominantly White, Republican state lawmakers to suppress votes in some of the fastest-growing parts of the majority-minority state: urban and suburban communities that lean Democrat.

Or, in Florida, Ron DeSantis’ administration is sending plainclothes police officers to question people who signed a petition to get an abortion amendment on the ballot this year. The Tampa Bay Times reports:

The officer’s visit appears to be part of a broad — and unusual — effort by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration to inspect thousands of already verified and validated petitions for Amendment 4 in the final two months before Election Day.
…
Since last week, DeSantis’ secretary of state has ordered elections supervisors in at least four counties to send to Tallahassee at least 36,000 petition forms already deemed to have been signed by real people. Since the Times first reported on this effort, Alachua and Broward counties have confirmed they also received requests from the state.

In some states, the “knock on the door” from political police is a possibility come next January. In others, it’s already here. 

Second, explain the things that would be worse in a second Trump term

Many Americans wrongly assume that a second Trump term would look roughly like the first. Chaotic, yes. But despite Trump’s effort it didn’t end democracy. 

There are three simple reasons “why the second time will be worse,” as Amanda wrote earlier this year. 

First, the courts are likely to be much more pliant this time around: 

[The Supreme Court] invented a new rule of immunity for “official” acts — a vague, sweeping term that remains largely undefined. What this means is that the courts can no longer be expected to hold a future President Trump accountable for violating our laws. 

Second, Congressional Republicans seem more poised to roll over for Trump’s agenda: 

Elected Republicans have proven that, as a party, they are unwilling to exercise any meaningful checks on Trump’s executive powers, either through investigation or impeachment. Those who have attempted to do so have been ridiculed and purged from the ranks. So long as that remains their posture, impeachment is not a realistic check on Trump’s future abuses of power.

Finally, the people around Trump in a second term would be very different. Potential appointees are being actively screened for loyalty and willingness to override traditional constraints to speedily implement Trump's 2025 agenda. And I don’t just mean that the Mike Pences and John Kellys of the world won’t be in the White House to constrain him (which, to be clear, they certainly won’t). Expect henchmen willing to break the law all the way through the federal government:

Trump has readied plans to gut independent agencies and replace career staff with loyalists, through a Day One executive order known as Schedule F. Doing so will allow Trump to then deploy federal regulatory powers to punish his perceived opponents and reward those he favors.

Last time, the guardrails held. Just barely. We don’t know if they would survive a second assault. 

Third, use examples from around the world

In the debate this week, Trump cited how Viktor Orbán, the Prime Minister of Hungary, is supporting him. 

It was a surprising (if fitting) moment.

Orbán is explicitly Trump’s role model, and not in a good way. Political scientists see Orbán as the paragon of 21st Century autocracy. He’s a master of, as the Journal of Democracy puts it, “using the tools of democracy against democracy.”

Which is to say, as we explained when Orbán visited Mar-a-Lago this year, he is “the MAGA model for returning to power and dismantling democracy.” 

Like Trump, Orban was ousted by voters and then spent time out of office making plans to win the next election, get control of the levers of power and abolish democratic checks in the system so he would never lose again. He envisioned building a “central political force field” that would rule for the next 15 to 20 years.

Which is exactly what happened. 

Orban has now held power for 14 years and counting in a corrupt system of his own making that the European Parliament condemned as a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy.” 

When Orban returned to office in 2010 he knew what to do. He systematically tore down his country’s democracy with a strategy straight out of the Authoritarian Playbook.

Real-world examples like Hungary, where an autocrat has won power through elections then proceeded to dismantle democracy from within, can help make the threat feel more tangible and less theoretical. 

If you have other effective strategies for getting over the “believability gap,” we would love to hear them. Drop them in the comments below. 

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Lies about voting, explained

You heard it in the debate. You heard it in the budget negotiations. You’ve seen it on social media. The lie about who is voting in our elections is reaching a fever pitch. 

What’s going on here? Did you miss something? 

Well, no. As Anna Dorman and Kenneth Parreno explain, in every state you have to be a citizen to vote. Only eligible voters vote! There is overwhelming evidence that our elections are safe and secure. They always have been. 

But that’s not the point. 

Per Anna and Kenneth, these lies are the cornerstone of a three step plan to undermine the integrity of the 2024 election: 

The movement’s top priority: suppress the vote. In addition to targeting communities with large populations of people of color and recently naturalized citizens, state officials have and will rely on these lies to oppose efforts to increase voter turnout. We have already seen this in Texas, which is suing to stop local governments from undertaking measures to increase voter registration among eligible members of their communities. 

Then, legitimize election meddling and gum up the process with last-minute list maintenance and voter challenges that could impact thousands of voters and leave previously lawfully registered voters unable to cast a ballot. These lies could create mountains of work for already under-resourced local election officials, potentially leading to delays in registration, mailing of ballots, and ballot processing.

Finally, subvert the election itself: In the event that the American people do not elect Donald Trump president on November 5, these lies could contribute a false rationale for unlawfully refusing to certify the election results. 

 Important piece. Read the whole thing here. 

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What else we’re tracking: 

• “One issue voters can agree on: We need more choices in our elections.” The Union of Concerned Scientists on why we only have two parties — and why it would be better if we had more. 

• How do we make that happen? My colleagues Grant Tudor and Cerin Lindgrensavage have a piece in the Boston Review on “A Path to Multiple Parties.” (It’s part of a wonderful collection from Lee Drutman, Danielle Allen, Deepak Bhargava & Arianna Jiménez, Tabatha Abu El-Haj and lots lots more smart people.) 

• We have a new series in partnership with Lawfare on domestic deployment of the military. Read about it here. First up, Laura Dickinson on “How the Insurrection Act (properly understood) limits domestic deployments of the U.S. military.” 

• In case you missed it, Michael Sandoval — a proud member of Gen Z — has a great piece in our “How Democracy Survives” series on generational change.

• In Austin, Texas a federal trial is underway in the Davis v. Cisneros case. We brought this suit on behalf of our clients along with our partners at the Texas Civil Rights Project and Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP. To learn more about the case, click here.

• USA Today’s Aysha Bagchi covers why threats to imprison rivals should be taken seriously, according to experts. 

• VoteShield’s Arizona Voter Roll Report uses data we’ve tracked since 2018 to debunk the myth that the state’s voter rolls are not being properly maintained.

• Beware the “slow burn.” TNR’s Greg Sargent explores how — even if the most dramatic authoritarian tactics don’t come to pass — “a legal war of attrition that harasses MAGA’s enemies and transforms government info into propaganda could prove more insidious and harder to mobilize against.”

• If you need a dose of optimism, I recommend this interview on how to have faith in elections between Chris Crawford and Maryland Governor Wes Moore. 

• NYT’s The Morning newsletter is running a series on how government would work under Harris or Trump. Yesterday’s installment: “The stakes on presidential power.” It’s truly a must-read.