Now it Begins

David Frum’s essay in the October issue of The Atlantic, headlined “Building an Autocracy,” was much noted. But included in that essay was a largely unnoted warning that a Democratic return to Congressional power would not necessarily reverse the damage done to American democracy during President Donald Trump’s first two years in office. In fact, Frum cautioned, there is some chance that Democratic gains will actually accelerate our slide to autocracy. He gave three reasons.

First, without Republican control of Congress, Trump “may begin testing the limits of [executive] authority more aggressively.”

Second, with power no longer divided among Republicans but between Republicans and Democrats, and with Democrats certain to embattle Trump with investigations, previously Trump-skeptical Republicans will have their partisan loyalties engaged in Trump’s support. Frum quotes a conservative pundit: “I didn’t like Nixon until Watergate.”

Third, a Republican Party defeated at the polls in November might “radicalize further as it shrivels, ceasing to compete for votes and looking to survive instead by further changing the voting system.”

We’ve already seen Frum’s third point proved, most egregiously in Wisconsin, where a defeated lame duck Republican governor and a gerrymandered Republican legislative majority enacted a series of measures transferring power from the governor to the legislature. Around the country, Republicans have demonstrated their willingness to obstruct voting by those not inclined to vote for them, and to rig the drawing of legislative districts so that their hold on power survives even large popular vote losses. Republicans are resolved to use present power to determine future elections; failing that, Republicans are resolved to keep power even after losing elections. The two core distinctions of democracy from autocracy – expression of popular will by fair elections and peaceful transfer of power in accordance with that expression – are being blurred.

Frum didn’t say that increased Democratic power in Washington would certainly speed the slide to autocracy, but he gave reasons that it might. (And he nowhere suggested that the possibility constituted a reason not to vote for Democrats in the midterms.) I think Frum may have underestimated the risk, because he left out one of the most important reasons.

More than anything else, Trump likes a fight. The last thing Trump wants, for example, is to actually end illegal immigration. Without illegal immigrants to rail about, Trump’s presidency would be drained of much of its purpose, and his alliance of the aggrieved would be diminished. Trump without grievance just isn’t Trump; a deep sense of unfair treatment is central to his own thinking and to his appeal to his base.

Trump has from time to time been critical of Republicans in Congress, just as he has been critical of his own executive appointees, when he thinks that such criticism will rally the resentful. The hallmark of Trump’s presidency, and of his campaign before that, is his willingness to deprecate any institution, any tradition, any norm, and certainly any person, in giving voice to grievance and resentment. No price is too high to pay for the vindication of Trump’s sense of unfairness.

Senate filibuster rules allow Democrats to block legislation – prompting Trump to demand repeal of those rules, notwithstanding their long history and their important purpose of promoting moderation and compromise. With Democrats taking control of the House next month, Trump will have a whole new target, and a whole new institution to degrade: the United States House of Representatives, the People’s House.

Democrats – and democrats – underestimate Trump at their peril. He is acutely intelligent, even as he is intellectually lazy and undisciplined. And he has a narcissist’s nearly boundless energy, waking up early in the morning to tweet out masterfully devised fantasies that are no less effective for their factual vacuity. (Remember how effectively, for example, Trump tagged the Clinton Foundation as corrupt; how effectively Trump tagged Hillary Clinton as a tool of corporate interests.)

The House of Representatives will join Trump’s pantheon of demons, which already ranges from the European Union to Saturday Night Live. The onslaught will be devious and divisive, and it will be relentless. In the short term, it will rally Trump’s base to war.

Whether Trump will do long-term damage to the House remains to be seen. By comparison, even while Trump’s attacks on Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation have produced dropping public support for the investigation, the public increasingly believes that Trump has not been truthful about the investigation. It’s cold comfort that, in damaging one institution of democratic rule of law, Trump has also damaged the institution of the presidency.

For all Trump’s self-touted deal-making prowess, what defines Trump is not his taste for cooperation and compromise, but for combat. Trump perversely prefers battle to victory, stalemate to success, confrontation to compromise. Abroad, he bullies our allies and allies himself with bullies. Trump does not work within rules, he blows them up. It is not reasonable to expect Trump now to become a negotiator, to work out important legislative deals with Democrats. What is reasonable to expect is that Trump will adopt the same slash-and-burn approach to the House that he has taken toward every other person, institution, tradition or norm that might serve to constrain him.