Back in November, when I concluded that Trump’s dictatorship was a fait accompli lots of readers thought I was going over the top. In retrospect, and with one exception, I was hopelessly over-optimistic. I imagined a trajectory similar to Orban’s Hungary, with a gradual squeeze on political opposition and civil society, playing out over years and multiple terms in office,.
The reality has been massively worse, both in terms of speed and scope. Threats of conquest against friendly countries, masked thugs abducting people from the street, shakedowns of property from enemies of the state, concentration camps outside the reach of the legal system, all happening at a pace more comparable to Germany in 1933 than to the examples I had in mind.
The one exception is that I expected Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act on Day 1. Instead, perhaps to preserve a veneer of legality, he has commissioned a report from the Secretary of Defense (Hegseth) and the Secretary of Homeland Security (Noem), due by 20 April. Unless he faces massive political blowback in the next few days, he will doubtless order these flunkies to recommend invoking the Act, effectively the equivalent of Hitler’s Enabling Act.
Meanwhile, two other crucial issues are coming to a head. First, Trump is openly defying the courts over the illegal deportation and imprisonment in a concentration camp of legal migrant Abrego Garcia and others and is now threatening the same even for native-born US citizens. Second, elements of civil society (notably universities and law firms) that have previously engaged in shameful capitulation are now standing up.
If Trump is defeated on all three fronts, there is a good chance that US democracy could survive his onslaughts, though it will take many years to recover. But a Trump victory on even one of them will spell the end. Defeating the courts would render any legal constraints on his power irrelevant. The Insurrection Act would permit him to use troops to suppress protest and to arrest his political opponents. A victory over civil society would turn the US into a totalitarian state, in which all organisations are controled by the Leader and his followers.
I haven’t given up hope, but I don’t expect that Trump will be stopped. The vast majority of Republican voters support everything Trump is doing, even though he has signally failed to deliver on the economic prosperity he promised. And while it would only take a handful of Republicans in Congress to change sides and stop him, there is no sign that this will happen.
Once Trump’s dictatorship is established there is no way back within the current US system. When his regime finally collapses the models for reform will be those of post-war reconstruction of a defeated and discredited state, a process which is sometimes successful, sometimes not, but always painful
John Quiggin 
It’s depressing, disgusting, ugly and seemingly hopeless, but, I keep watching those “Fight Oligarchy” rallies Bernie and AOC (wow, there’s an impressive woman!) are holding around the country and it gives me hope… but… we’ll see…
I agree with the analysis. If anything, matters could very likely go even worse than J.Q.’s latest analysis, although it is hard to imagine how right now.
Trump is a symptom as much as he is a cause. He was a long time in the making as America showed us time and again, since the early 1960s at least, just how to close it was to becoming Amerika. For a long time it has been trending to fully enabling billionaires to rule with their capital coupled with capture of the state. Finally, this has come to pass. I blame market fundamentalism as much as anything.
Trump and his flunkies are completely incompetent in all positive and productive aspects of economics, governance, statecraft and domestic policy. We can expect critical economic (financial economy and real economy), social and possibly even military disasters for the US henceforth, for as long as this cabal remain in power. The first question is how bad can things get before collapse or revolution? The second question is whether anything at all will be salvageable afterwards? These are very open questions.
More generally, neo-prog complaints about Trumps authoritarianism would carry more moral weight if they had lifted a finger to stop the Deep State/Surceillance State relentless attacks on free speech of conservatives in academia and social media. Or the DEM party machine lawfare against Trump himself. But they stayed tight-lipped because they were holding the whip hand.
What somes around, goes around.
“First they same after MAGA, and I said nothing”…
I agree that Trumps defiance of court orders is executive over-reach, with a vengeance. Especially SCOTUS, which is broadly sympathetic to conservative law.
Trumps overall anti illegal immigration agenda would be better served by:
More generally, there is Perverse Partisan Polarisation (PPP) lawlessness on border regulation: Trump-MAGAs tyrannic approach is a mirror image of Biden-WOKEs anarchic approach.
Anarcho-Tyranny is more or less where the US is heading.
Acceding to Newsweek, Trump admin is considering invoking the Insurection Act to deal with Biden admin border invasion. There is no indication that it will be used to curtail US citizens First Amendment rights of free speech or free association:
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-insurrection-act-deadline-2061875
From the sound of things, Trump admin officials do not think they will need martial law to deal with the current inflow.
One worrying aspect of the Insurrection Act is that it does not automaticalky lapse after statutory time limit. Essentially it is invoked “at the govenors pleasure”and remains in force for so long as he pleases.
There really is nothing more to be said. The human race is too stupid to save itself. The evidence is in:
(a) failure to act on climate change;
(b) failure to act on COVID-19 and the Pandemicene;
(c) failure to act on the rise of Neo-Fascist ideology, Trumpism etc; and
(d) failure to act on market fundamentalism and the destructive power of capital.
There really is nothing more to be said. The damage is too great on all fronts at all levels. We are beyond the point of no return.