John Kelly, the former Marine general who served as Donald Trump’s second chief of staff, thinks the former president “falls into the general definition of ‘fascist.’” Gen. Mark Milley, whom Trump appointed as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, goes further, describing his ex-boss as “fascist to the core.”
Rebutting those charges, John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, says the Republican presidential candidate is not thoughtful enough to be a fascist. Bolton’s take seems more accurate: Trump’s views, which combine longstanding authoritarian impulses with politically convenient positions of more recent vintage, do not reflect any unifying principle other than self-interest.
The incoherence of Trump’s thinking is reflected in the incoherence of his speech, which in rallies and interviews flits from one topic to another for no apparent reason. His randomly capitalized social media rants resemble wacky email missives destined for the trash bin, written by the sort of unhinged crank you would move away from if you encountered him in public.
Trump’s preening, pettiness and prevarication are striking even for a politician. During his four years in office, he could barely open his mouth without lying, beginning with his self-aggrandizing claims about the size of the crowd at his inauguration and culminating in his insistence, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that he had actually won reelection.
That second whopper began as comedy and ended as tragedy. When Trump started arguing that voters could not possibly have rejected him, I thought he would eventually come to terms with reality.
That never happened. Trump’s reckless conduct before, during and after the Capitol riot, when supporters outraged by his stolen-election fantasy violently interrupted the congressional ratification of Joe Biden’s victory, amply justified his second impeachment and should have disqualified him from ever again holding federal office.
Trump refused to play by the rules, which would have been enough to get him booted from my weekly poker game. The requirements for the presidency should be at least as strict.
The rules in the latter case include not just abiding by election results but also recognizing the limits the Constitution imposes on presidential authority. Whatever you think about Kelly and Milley’s use of the f-word, this much rings true: Trump not only did not acknowledge those constitutional constraints; he did not comprehend the idea that his subordinates had a higher duty than obedience to his will.
People who nevertheless support Trump this time around often argue that his illiberal tendencies did not amount to much during his first term. But things are different now in several important ways.
First, Trump has accumulated more grievances against the political opponents he blames for persecuting him. He has repeatedly threatened to punish those “enemies from within” if he regains power, whether through criminal investigations, revocation of broadcast licenses, or other routes of retribution.
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Second, the U.S. Supreme Court has endorsed a broad version of presidential immunity from criminal liability for “official acts.” That license explicitly encompasses a president’s communications with the Justice Department, one of the chief ways that Trump could make life unpleasant for his critics.
Third, Trump during his first term was restrained by calmer voices that are unlikely to get a place at the table during a second term. To give you a sense of what that could mean, Boris Epshteyn, a lawyer who played a key role in Trump’s attempts to reverse the 2020 election results, is reportedly a contender for White House counsel.
Former Vice President Mike Pence, who resisted Trump’s pressure to intervene in the January 2021 tally of electoral votes, has rebuked his former boss for asking him to subvert the Constitution. By contrast, Pence’s replacement, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), says he would have been happy to do Trump’s bidding.
None of this bodes well for a second Trump term. Anyone who dismisses his vows of vengeance as meaningless bluster is asking voters to recklessly assume he does not mean what he says.
Jacob Sullum is a senior editor at Reason magazine. Follow him on Twitter: @jacobsullum.