Kleinfeld is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a board member of the National Endowment for Democracy, Freedom House and States United for Democracy.
What separates a democracy from a dictatorship? The ability for the will of voters to determine who governs them. The rule of law, a force that holds even the most powerful to a set of rules and institutions independent of the will of any one man. The peaceful transfer of power between parties.
This month, Americans are learning how thin that line can be.
As Cassidy Hutchinson described Donald Trump’s plan to march with his followers to the Capitol, I heard echoes of Benito Mussolini’s March on Rome – when conservative leaders handed the country to a dictator without a shot.
On Oct. 28, 1922, about 25,000 of Mussolini’s black-shirted supporters gathered on the outskirts of Rome, threatening a march on the capital. The prime minister had been warned just a few days before – but refused to believe the threat was real. The military could have overwhelmed the marchers – but the government decided not to.
Mussolini’s Fascists were already the country's strongest political party, having used persuasive fears of communism mixed with street violence to get business leaders and others on their side, one locality at a time. Conservative elites thought they could pull the strings and control Mussolini, using his popularity to forward their agendas. By the time the marchers entered the capital, Mussolini had already been handed control of the country by the king and conservative party leaders.
Americans are rightfully stunned by the revelations of the select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol. The president of the United States was aware that his followers were armed. He knew that the armaments were not intended for him. He directed the armed mob to march on the Capitol to pressure his vice president to overturn a legitimate election, after his own calls that morning had not succeeded. When Mike Pence did his constitutional duty, Trump was willing to let the man next in line for the presidency be killed by the angry mob he had summoned.
For two more weeks, this leader – a man who allegedly grasped for a steering wheel from the back seat so that he could lead his marchers to a transfer of power by force, whose word can launch thousands of nuclear missiles – remained in charge of the United States of America.
The country should be shocked by these devastating revelations. But they are not a surprise to the members of Congress who had been involved in the plotting and later sought pardons. They were not a revelation to the Republican Party and state leaders who had been privy to nearly two months of attempts to grasp at power over a lie through false accusations, demands to “find votes,” and fake elector schemes. They were not a shock to his staffers or his Cabinet, who failed to invoke the 25th Amendment, as was their constitutional duty.
Trump’s character was well-established during the 1,446 days he was in power before the events of Jan. 6. The intimidation and violence Trump directed his supporters to launch at anyone who stood in his way was also well known. Oathkeepers and other organized violent movements had provided volunteer security during his first inauguration and at multiple campaign events. The violent threats and armed protestors a Trump tweet could direct at the home of a Republican who voted for his impeachment, supported bipartisan legislation or otherwise opposed his will had been occurring for years.
Trump failed to take over our democracy by force on Jan. 6. But like Mussolini, his popularity and threats of violence led conservatives to hand him power well before the march.
More concerning is his continued grip. Weeks after the election was decided, Republicans in leadership positions refused to allow classified security briefings and other necessities that enable our country to continue to function during a time of government transition. The MAGA faction of Republican elites continued to pay obeisance after Jan. 6, building Trump’s power by repeating lies about the election that they knew were untrue. And as Republican primaries are demonstrating, Trump continues to hold sway over local Republican elites.
America needs a conservative party to serve the tens of millions of conservatives whose beliefs deserve representation. But a two-party democracy cannot function if one party allows an authoritarian to take the helm. Judge J. Michael Luttig has warned that the Electoral Count Act, which determines the presidency, is not up to the challenge of another attempted takeover. We remain in “clear and present danger.”
But Congress can reform the Electoral Count Act. They can protect election officials like Shaye Moss from intimidation. State GOP leaders can stop using violence to buttress their own power and instead prosecute people who intimidate and threaten. Republican voters can reject lies and threats. Democrats can stop supporting anti-democracy Republicans in the hopes that doing so will help Democrats in general elections. It is time to take back our elections from a potential dictator and his mob.
A view of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on June 25, 2026. President Donald Trump jolted Republicans during a fiery appearance at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, scrapping a housing bill signing ceremony and clashing behind closed doors with a party rebel who challenged him over the Iran war. Trump had been expected to sign the bipartisan housing.
Only Trump doesn’t care about housing
It was August 15, 2024. Then candidate Donald Trump stepped out of his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club’s columned clubhouse to a gaggle of reporters. He was flanked by tables of groceries and signs showing the rising cost of food. Also on one of the tables was a dollhouse, meant to represent the equally alarming rise in housing prices.
It was a speech about the economy, the single most important issue of the 2024 election cycle, full of promises that went right to the heart of Americans’ anxieties. While former President Joe Biden and then Vice President Kamala Harris were contorting themselves to posture a good economy that just needed more time to recover from the pandemic, Trump was preying on voters’ very real fears of unaffordable gas, groceries, and homes. It was obviously a winning message.
In that speech, Trump promised, “We’re going to open up tracts of federal land for housing construction. We desperately need housing for people who can’t afford what’s going on now.”
As of mid-2023, there had been a housing shortage of nearly four million homes, according to the National Association of Realtors. Americans all over the country were either priced out of buying new homes due to low inventory, trapped in their existing homes by sky-high mortgage rates, or facing exorbitant rent hikes thanks to corporate investors buying up rental properties. Americans needed help, and Trump promised it.
Cut to March of 2026, when Trump reportedly told House Speaker Mike Johnson, “No one gives a sh*t about housing.”
That kind of thinking may explain why Trump this week suddenly announced he was canceling a signing ceremony for the bipartisan “21st Century ROAD to Housing Act,” a housing bill co-sponsored by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Tim Scott that passed the House 358-32 and was approved in the Senate on Monday.
Trump instead demanded Congress pass the SAVE America Act, his controversial election grievance bill that doesn’t have enough Republican support to get passed in the Senate.
It’s just the latest in a line of policy self-owns where Trump has seemingly intentionally made life more difficult for Republicans hoping to keep their majority. Despite midterm elections occurring in the midst of a blistering economy and an unpopular war, they were surely hoping the housing bill would give them something — anything — to brag about when they returned home to their districts.
And very much to the contrary, Americans do give a sh*t about housing. According to a recent survey by the Bipartisan Policy Center, a whopping 79% say the cost of housing is extremely or very important to them. Eighty-three percent say Congress should take action on the issue — like it just did. Eighty-nine percent say the House and Senate need to work together to pass affordable housing legislation — like they just did. And 63% say they would be more likely to vote for a lawmaker if they helped pass legislation to build more affordable homes and lower housing costs — like they just did.
There aren’t many issues that unite Americans like housing does, and very few bipartisan policy wins Congress can point to, and yet, Trump is holding that bill hostage in order to get his pet project — which doesn’t even have the support of his own party — pushed through.
If you’re trying to make sense of something so nonsensical, as I’m sure many Republican lawmakers are, it’s certainly sad but not actually all that complicated. Trump said what he needed to get reelected and then promptly abandoned his promises in order to pursue his own self-interests, even if those interests are bad for Republicans and bad for voters.
That’s just the kind of guy he is.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.