Echoes of History: How Fascism Quietly Seizes Control

How Divisions and Complacency Allow Authoritarianism to Flourish…

President Biden told the nation, “American democracy is under attack … [by the] former president of the United States…”

I wrote about this years ago when Trump was trying to overthrow our government, and it’s time to talk again about what an American authoritarian government would look like. Because over the next two months we may — depending on how Americans react to the changes in our form of government Trump has planned — very rapidly slide into a form of fascism much like the old Confederacy in the 1840-1860 era.

Like the old Confederacy, it could feature political violence and threats of violence, rigged elections, and single-party rule combined with a corrupt oligarchy that finances the politicians.

And, like the old Confederacy, it could try to destroy the historic democracy of the United States of America, only this time in 2025 and the three following years.

The word “fascism” gets thrown around a lot, but most Americans have no idea what it would look like or how it would actually play out.

It’s critical to lay out what a fascist America would look like now, because this is what’s being envisioned right now by many in the Republican Party, and it might come to pass in the course of the next year or two.

Republicans don’t talk about it out loud very much, unlike Nixon’s man G. Gordon Liddy, who used to embrace fascism back in the day when he signed memos using Hitler’s SS symbol. But there is a model here and MAGA Republicans do have something in mind.

What could it be? What would it look like? How will it most likely come about?

First, and essential to American fascism, Republicans envision a strong-man Dear Leader who will hold power for as long as he (it’s almost always a “he”) chooses, with the transition to the next Dear Leader determined by The Dear Leader himself.

This has been the primary characteristic of every fascistic government to emerge in the 7000-year written history of the modern world.

When Trump was running for re-election in 2020, at rallies in both Nevada and Wisconsin, he came right out and said that not only would he win that election but that he’d also be re-elected again in 2024 and 2028. He was dead serious, and brought up running again in 2028 just this week.

Sure, our constitution says a president can only serve two terms: so did the Russian constitution, until Putin got it amended. Trump is apparently planning the same, and his followers are — if the response at the rallies when he “joked” about it is any indicator — ecstatic at the prospect.

That single strongman Leader, and his hand-selected toadies at every secondary or tertiary level of government, is the key to understanding everything else that happens when a country flips from democracy to oligarchy and then to fascism.

For example, in a fascist state the way that you as an average citizen ensure your own advancement and economic, personal, and political security is by sucking up to that one man (albeit often through one of his factotums). You either become an acolyte/follower or you find yourself on the outside looking in.

If you think this sounds extreme, just look at today’s GOP, which has become the prototype for how these MAGA Republicans will reinvent the United States now that they’ve gained power.

Liz Cheney spoke against Trump, and the Wyoming GOP expelled her and Trump supported a primary challenger. Five Republicans who voted to impeach Trump faced such a backlash that they decided to retire at the end of their terms: Adam Kinzinger, Anthony Gonzalez, John Katko, Mitt Romney, and Fred Upton.

Republican freshman Congressman Chris Jacobs, representing a district including parts of Buffalo, NY, was forced to withdraw from 2022’s primary (and, thus, he retired from the House) because after the Buffalo massacre he spoke against Trump’s and his party’s embrace of assault weapons.

Not only is fealty to Dear Leader required for political advancement in a fascist state, it’s also a requirement for individual economic advancement. Employers eager for state contracts or Dear Leader’s endorsements of their products or services demote or fire those insufficiently loyal to him.

Psychologist Dr. Bandy Lee was fired from Yale University for tweeting that Trump was mentally ill. Schoolteacher Leah Kinyon was fired from her job for saying that “I hate Donald Trump. … He is a sexual predator. He’s a literal moron.” Juli Brisker was fired from her job with government contractor Akima for giving Trump’s motorcade the finger.

Rebekah Jones was fired by Ron DeSantis for telling the truth about his covering up Florida Covid statistics. Florida’s Orange County Health Director Dr. Raul Pino was removed for encouraging his staff to get vaccinated.

When companies defy Dear Leader they are brutally punished, as DeSantis did to Disney and the Tampa Bay Rays. Soon companies don’t even try to stand up to The Leader, including media companies. The Washington Post and the LA Times both, for example, decided this year to simply “obey in advance.”

This past weekend, Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski made the pilgrimage to Mar-a-Largo to kiss Trump’s royal ass, probably at the insistence of network executives since Trump has threatened the very existence of MSNBC.

Trump than ran to Fox “News” to ridicule the pair, saying they, “congratulated me on running a ‘great and flawless campaign, one for the history books’” and that “it’s too bad that it [Joe & Mika’s ass-kissing] wasn’t done long ago.” He added: “I expect this will take place with others in the media, even those that have been extremely hostile.”

In that, he’s certainly right. Expect more media stars and network executives to do in-person or online versions of the same, just as Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg already have. And expect guests and hosts on MSNBC, CNN, etc. to stop using the “fascism” word to describe Trump, his actions, and his people.

They think it’ll mollify Trump; instead it’ll empower him to become even more brutal, just as we saw in Florida when DeSantis signed legislation giving him the authority to “hold accountable” college professors, reviewing their politics every five years so those who aren’t totally on board with his agenda can lose tenure and be fired. The headline at Salon says it all:

“DeSantis signs bill requiring Florida students, professors to register political views with state: Universities may lose funding if staff and students’ beliefs do not satisfy Florida’s GOP-run legislature.”

You end up doing things on Dear Leader’s behalf, whether you’re an elected official in his party, working at a private corporation, or engaged in the nonprofit sector like teaching at a university or medical center.

Defying or challenging Dear Leader brings opprobrium; supporting Dear Leader is the path to career advancement. The first Trump White House and DeSantis Governor’s Office are filled with examples.

Everything is done for Dear Leader because Dear Leader is the state. The state and Dear Leader have become one.

If you challenge Dear Leader, you’re challenging the state, and that’s treason.As Marjorie Taylor Greene said of speaker Pelosi:

“She took an oath to protect American citizens and uphold our laws. And she gives aid and comfort to our enemies who illegally invade our land. That’s what treason is. And by our law, representatives and senators can be kicked out and no longer serve in our government — and it’s a crime punishable by death”.

Similarly, Trump now openly proclaims that he intends to use the power of the state against Jack Smith and others who tried to hold him to account for the crimes he has committed.

Whatever Dear Leader says becomes the law. This is called “rule by decree” and it’s where every fascist in history has ended up.

The power to rule by decree goes back to the days of kings and is also embedded in our laws about the president’s emergency powers. Trump came close to invoking it with an “emergency declaration” when he lost the election. General Flynn begged him to do it and “temporarily suspend the Constitution.”

Next year he won’t be so restrained and he will have surrounded himself in advance with people like Flynn who will make it happen.

Yet, while it will change how power is distributed in our government, things will still look much the same to average people.

As a fascistic Trump rises to power again in the United States, there will still be all the trappings of democracy.

The House and Senate, state houses and governors, bureaucracies and political systems will remain intact. Everything looks normal on the surface.

But when you peel off the top layer, you discover that all of those people in all of those offices, whether elected or bureaucratic, are serving only one principle and one person and that is Dear Leader.

Be they governors, secretaries of state, United States senators, members of the US House, state representatives, or even a part-time guy working at a polling place in Michigan, they might get a call at any time from Dear Leader demanding that they do something for him, whether it’s legal or not.

There will still be opposition parties and political candidacies in a Republican fascist America, although if any of them seriously challenges Dear Leader or shows the ability to disrupt the status quo, they’ll be discovered to have a secret drug problem or porn habit, or get imprisoned for corruption, tax evasion, or other made-up charges.

Nobody will really notice, though. People will just shrug their shoulders and assume another crook got caught. The swamp is being cleaned up. Just look at Hunter Biden facing years in prison for checking a box on a gun purchase form that an estimated 20 million other Americans checked, and paying his taxes late like other millions of Americans. Selective prosecutions become the norm.

The prosperity of the company you work for depends in part on how well it supports the politics of Dear Leader.

Dear Leader helps a few dozen oligarchs he knows are loyal to him seize control of the nation’s major industries, and every smaller company in each of those industries must directly or indirectly answer to that oligarch.

Those who fail to are bought out, shut down, or simply cannot find customers or supplies because nobody will do business with them.

The industry where this is most visible at first is the media.

Some media organizations will be absorbed by the government itself, as Putin has done in Russia; others will be bought out and run by the Leader’s oligarch buddies, as is the case today in Hungary and Turkey (among others).

Soon opposition voices vanish from all but the most obscure media, and those few opposing voices that are tolerated are pointed to by Dear Leader as proof the nation is still an open democracy.

Jews and people of color may find a rougher time maintaining a job or staying safe from vigilantes, abuse, and discrimination but most whites will be just fine, particularly white men. The majority of Americans, so long as they pay attention to football instead of politics, will tell you nothing much has changed.

There will still be Christmas parties, although people celebrating Hanukkah or Muslims praying may want to pull the shades closed.

Hate crimes and murders by vigilante groups will start happening with such frequency that the media doesn’t bother to report them anymore.

Within a few years a little bit of every business activity in the country ends up in Dear Leader’s pocket. And Dear Leader uses that revenue to enrich himself, his inner circle, and those who are part of his military entourage, his private military.

That’s right: Dear Leader’s private military.

It’d be put together like what Ron DeSantis organized in Florida, a state-sanctioned militia that answers only to Dear Leader, in this case DeSantis. Trump tried the same, flying 700+ Customs and Border Protection and other federal officers into Portland in 2020 where they hit the streets without identification on their uniforms to beat and kidnap people protesting George Floyd’s murder.

When the private militia is created at the federal level it’ll become a substantial national military force with hundreds of thousands of soldiers under Dear Leader’s direct command. Hitler’s was called the SS and answered only to The Führer himself. Mussolini had his, as do Putin, Erdoğan, el-Sisi, bin Salman, and others today.

Citing “national security” and the need to “deport criminal immigrants,” Dear Leader’s private militia will have an undisclosed and therefore vast budget. Outside of times it’s called on to intimidate people or make a public display of power, it’ll largely operate in secret.

Its members won’t have to obey the law because, as agents of Dear Leader who’s above the law, they are, too. If they have to kill somebody, there will be no investigation unless it’s to cover up the crime. If they need to make somebody disappear, that person disappears. At first it’ll be done by stochastic terrorism: lone wolf actors not directly connected to Dear Leader but answering his general call to punish political evildoers. As well as by Dear Leader’s private secret police.

Just ask Nancy Pelosi or Mike Pence, who both narrowly escaped being murdered on January 6th.

Dear Leader’s oligarch buddies and their media machine, along with his well-indoctrinated followers, promote a law-and-order crime ideology that results in high levels of incarceration, heavily militarized police, and a disregard for the general rights of the average citizen, particularly racial and religious minorities.

This is how the kind of government Donald Trump promises he will establish in America has played out, over and over again, across the world and throughout history. If Trump can bring the Senate to heel with his outrageous Cabinet nominations, you’ll know it’s fully here, now.

In our own time we’ve seen it in Egypt, Turkey, Russia, Cuba, Hungary, the Philippines, Venezuela, and dozens of other countries around the world less well known for the democratic nature of the government.

It may call itself left-wing or right-wing, but what really matters is that all power and authority rests with Dear Leader. Stalin was every bit the fascist that Hitler and Mussolini were; his fascism just had a different face and brand.

As “future dystopian” as all this may sound, there are more governments in the world run this way today than there are democracies. It’s “normal.”

Once established it’s almost impossible to dislodge without a crisis like the death of Dear Leader or an actual revolution. Just ask any Russian. Or the women in Iran today.

Some of the governments around the world that are structured like this were democracies that turned fascist, like Russia, Turkey, and Hungary. But many have been this way for centuries, including the hereditary kingdoms in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa.

So, how do the democratic countries that make the transition to fascism allow that to happen? And what is life like in those countries, both during and after the time that it’s happened?

After World War II, a Chicago reporter named Milton Mayer struggled to understand how Hitler was able to flip one of the world’s most stable democracies into fascism.

An American Jew of German ancestry and a brilliant writer, Mayer went to Germany seven years after Hitler’s fall and befriended 10 “average Germans,” asking each how the Nazis rose to power in an otherwise civilized nation.

His book, They Thought They Were Free, is his story of that experience. Intertwined through it — first published in 1955 — are repeated overt and subtle warnings to future generations of Americans: to us, today.

Mayer quotes one of his German friends as describing what happened once The Leader seized power:

“This separation of government from people, this widening of the gap, took place so gradually and so insensibly, each step disguised (perhaps not even intentionally) as a temporary emergency measure or associated with true patriotic allegiance or with real social purposes. And all the crises and reforms (real reforms, too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter.”

Did the German people realize they’d abandoned democracy? That they would soon become international pariahs? The college professor Mayer interviewed answered:

“To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it — please try to believe me — unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop.

“Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, ‘regretted,’ that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these ‘little measures’ that no ‘patriotic German’ could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing.

“And one day it is over his head.”

Is it possible this could happen in America? That all these “small steps” would one day lead to a dictatorial form of government that has so cowed the people, the politicians, and even the business community and media that it can’t be challenged?

Doesn’t the nation rise up and protest the destruction of its own democracy? Don’t the people pour into the streets?

Mayer’s professor gave us the answer:

“You see, one doesn’t see exactly where or how to move. Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for the one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow.

“You don’t want to act, or even to talk, alone; you don’t want to ‘go out of your way to make trouble.’ Why not? — Well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And it is not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty.”

We can’t say we weren’t warned by our own people, our own politicians, the most senior members of our own institutional power structure.

In a speech that was hysterically criticized by Republicans and Fox “News“ pundits, former President Obama came right out and said it:

“You have to tend to this garden of democracy, otherwise things can fall apart fairly quickly. And we’ve seen societies where that happens.”

Yes, the former President of the United States was invoked Nazi Germany seven years ago while Donald Trump was President, adding:

“Now, presumably, there was a ballroom in Vienna in the late 1920s or ’30s that looked and seemed as if it ― filled with the music and art and literature and the science that was emerging ― would continue into perpetuity.

“And then,” President Obama said, “60 million people died. And the entire world was plunged into chaos.”

The warnings have been there all along. I wrote of this in 2005, quoting Mayer and going off on Bush and the PATRIOT Act as the prequel to fascism.

Americans have been shouting about it lately, in venues like The New York Times and Madeline Albright’s book and from legislators like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

And now the President of the United States makes a prime-time address to the nation, warning Americans that fascism is at our door. It gets only a passing mention in the news.

But, still, how do we know? Is there a sudden proclamation by The Leader that the nation is now “officially fascist”?

Back to Mayer’s German friend in 1954:

“But of course this isn’t the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next. Step C is not so much worse than Step B, and, if you did not make a stand at Step B, why should you at Step C? And so on to Step D.

“And one day, too late, your principles, if you were ever sensible of them, all rush in upon you. The burden of self-deception has grown too heavy, and some minor incident, in my case my little boy, hardly more than a baby, saying ‘Jew swine,’ collapses it all at once, and you see that everything, everything, has changed and changed completely under your nose.”

Next year and in 2026 many of us will no longer be able to know if our voices, our attempts to vote, will actually decide who leads our nation.

Many of us will show up at the polls in two years to discover we are no longer registered to vote. Many of our mail-in ballots will be “challenged” by Republican vote observers and we won’t learn about it until after the election is long over.

Five Republicans on the Supreme Court ruled in 2018 that you can be purged from the voting rolls on a whim. In the majority of US states Republicans can take over electoral precincts, install their people (as we just learned they are doing right now) and run them under whatever rules they want.

Already in some states when the GOP inflicts 10-hour lines to vote on their people, for example, you go to jail if you bring them water. If you make a mistake on your voting registration or ballot, or help another person register to vote, they can send you to prison for five years or more.

Somehow, of the many people from both parties who are busted for this, it seems only the Democrats end up going to jail. Particularly Black Democrats.

And yet everything seems “normal.” As Mayer’s professor friend told him, when Dear Leader finally seizes control of all the levers of power from political to economic to spiritual, everything changes but everything also stays the same:

“The world you live in — your nation, your people — is not the world you were in at all. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays.

“But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed.

“Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves; when everyone is transformed, no one is transformed. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God.”

We’re already quite a ways down this road, which is why our democracy has been rated by numerous international groups as being “at risk” or similar designations.

Voter suppression, gerrymandering, the proliferation of phony media selling rightwing propaganda as “news,” armed militias on our streets (and the GOP recruiting them for “election monitors”), the media bending its collective knee to Trump, are the visible tip of the proverbial iceberg.

“How is this to be avoided, among ordinary men, even highly educated ordinary men?” Mayer’s friend asked rhetorically.

And, without the benefit of a previous and recent and well-remembered fascistic regime to refer to, Mayer had to candidly answer: “Frankly, I do not know.”

That was 1954; this is 2024. We now know.

We know how the poisonous hate that animates fascism seeps into a society because we saw it ourselves during the first 4 years of the Trump administration and throughout the past year’s campaign.

We’re watching it in Red states across the country as MAGA Republicans replace honorable Republicans like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger.

We know how easily a government can be toppled and how close we came on January 6, 2021: if just five Republicans had not refused to go along with Trump we would have been thrown into this fascist dystopia four years earlier.

We can’t pretend we don’t know what’s happening and where it will lead if it’s not stopped. And now that we do know, we can’t escape the moral obligation to resist with everything we have.

The song that was inspired by this article is here.
My reading this article as an audio podcast is here.
My newest book, The Hidden History of the American Dream, is now available.