How will Trump Become Dictator?

The totalitarian handbook and how Trump will play it

Numerous people naively believe that Trump cannot establish a dictatorship because he did not do so when he was in power last time. If you are one of those people, I am going to explain what you get wrong and why it will be different this time. Dictatorship doesn’t happen immediately. Why not? Because most Western democracies are specifically constructed to be resistant to takeover by a dictator.

We have a separation of powers with an independent parliament, judiciary, media and so on. Thus, to gain full power requires skillfully taking over all the different parts of government in a way that doesn’t set off alarm bells and outs you from power through an impeachment process.

Few famous dictators in modern history just took power at gunpoint. Even Hitler did not do that. It was a step-by-step process. Hitler did this in record time. It took him 18 months from winning elections to becoming dictator. So why did Trump not achieve the same? Because we cannot compare Hitler to Trump when they won elections.

When Trump won in 2016, he was a wildcard. There are many indications that he had no intention of winning the elections. Former Trump confidants and campaign insiders, like Michael Wolff in his book Fire and Fury, alleged that Trump didn’t expect to win and entered the race for exposure. The idea was that he could leverage the campaign’s visibility to promote his brand and potentially set up new media ventures.

Roger Stone, a longtime Trump ally, has implied that Trump initially sought to boost his media profile and didn’t expect to win. Stone has hinted that Trump’s primary goal was initially to bring attention to himself rather than to pursue policy or presidential ambitions.

There are many other facts that support the narrative that Trump was not prepared for actually winning. Like many other things in his life, he was winging in and strategies were changing on the fly.

Comparing Trump Rise to Power With Hitler

We can contrast this with Adolph Hitler, who joined the German Workers’ Party (DAP) in 1919. He becomes German chancellor in 1933, a whole 14 years later. In 1921 Hitler took control of the Nazi Party and became its undisputed leader. His charisma and speaking skills attracted followers, and he established the Sturmabteilung (SA) or “Brownshirts” as a paramilitary wing. The SA was used to intimidate political opponents and disrupt rival meetings.

In other words when the Nazis gained power they had a far more sophisticated, large and powerful organization to push through their agenda. Trump, in contrast, stumbled through the door to the White House. He had no plan and no political experience. The Republican Party was not his party unlike the Nazi party.

In other words, Trump’s first term is no proof that he has no interest or capability in pursuing an autocratic regime. But let us get realistic. Trump is not seeking revenge from humiliating defeat in a world war. He is not living in a world where there have been large communist revolutions in neighboring countries. The world of 2024 is a lot less extreme and dangerous than the world of 1933.

So to understand what a Trump dictatorship would look like we need to look at more modern history. I think Viktor Orbán’s Hungary, Putin’s Russia and Singapore are useful countries to look at. These countries don’t really look like stereotypical dictatorship like Stalin’s Russia, the Third Reich or North Korea.

How Putin Became Dictator

Most people today would likely consider Putin’s Russia a dictatorship, but few can point to the exact date where it became a dictatorship. That was such a gradual process. It might be instructive how Putin did it to get an idea of how Trump could do it.

First Term (2000–2004): Initial Consolidation

• Media Control: By 2003, Putin’s administration had effectively taken over independent media, particularly TV networks like NTV, previously critical of the Kremlin. This control allowed him to shape public perception.
• Oligarchs and Opposition Suppression: Putin’s first major crackdown on dissent came in 2003 with the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a wealthy oligarch who opposed him. This sent a strong message to other potential opposition figures and oligarchs.
• Chechnya and Terrorism: In the early 2000s, the government used terrorist incidents, like the 2002 Moscow theater hostage crisis, to justify increased power. The 2004 Beslan school siege, which killed hundreds, allowed Putin to further centralize control by appointing regional governors instead of allowing direct elections.

Second Term (2004–2008): Erosion of Democratic Institutions

• End of Regional Elections: Putin abolished the direct election of regional governors in 2004, consolidating power and reducing the influence of local leaders.
• Increased Control of Parliament: Through Kremlin-friendly parties, he engineered a loyal parliament that would pass legislation favoring his agenda, making it harder for opposition voices to have any real power.
• NGO Crackdowns: By 2006, restrictive laws were introduced to control NGOs and limit foreign influence, particularly on groups critical of the government.

Key Moment: 2007–2008 Transition to Medvedev

• Rather than cling to power outright, Putin appointed Dmitry Medvedev as his successor in 2008, effectively maintaining control from behind the scenes. The 2007–2008 election process was tightly managed, demonstrating Putin’s influence over Russia’s political structure.

Return and Consolidation of Authoritarianism (2012-Present)

• Return to Presidency: Putin’s 2012 return marked a significant shift toward overt authoritarianism. Mass protests erupted against alleged fraud in the 2011 parliamentary elections, and Putin responded with a wave of anti-protest laws, repression of civil society, and stricter internet controls.
• Legislative Changes: By 2012, laws targeting NGOs as “foreign agents” and imposing heavy restrictions on media and public gatherings became commonplace.
• Removal of Term Limits: In 2020, Putin introduced constitutional amendments allowing him to potentially stay in power until 2036, eliminating any doubt about his long-term ambitions.

Timeline Overview

• 2000–2004: Consolidation through media and economic control, repression of oligarchs.
• 2004–2008: Erosion of democratic institutions (parliamentary control, end of regional elections).
• 2012 and Beyond: Explicit authoritarian measures with anti-protest laws, NGO crackdowns, and constitutional changes.

In sum, Putin’s Russia didn’t transform into a full dictatorship immediately after his first term. Instead, authoritarianism emerged gradually, with a significant shift after his 2012 return, as he implemented measures that removed most checks on his power. The turning point was likely 2012, when he decisively moved to stifle public dissent, marking a transition to an overtly authoritarian regime.

Viktor Orbán Style Authoritarianism

Viktor Orbán’s Hungary is a better example of what dictatorships and fascism looks like in the 21st century than North Korea, Hitler’s Third Reich or Stalin’s Soviet. We live in more civilized and prosperous times and thus authoritarianism is also more civilized. Society progresses. Even Stalin’s Russia was very humanitarian compared to earlier reigns such as the Mongols or even the Roman Empire. Likewise, we must expect authoritarianism is modern countries today to be less horrible than those in the 1930s and 1940s.

But whatever time period you look at the mechanisms of ceasing power has a lot in common. Viktor Orbán like Hitler also plays on nationalism and traditional values. Liberalism, socialism, feminism and so on are portrayed as the enemy. Ironically, Orbán isn’t really a religious person but still presents his ideology as a defense of traditional Christian values. He understands well the power of religion to control the masses. Putin has also learned this lesson and use the Russian church as an instrument of power. In my native Norway, right-wing terrorist Anders Behring Breivik presented himself as a knights-templar and used a lot of crusader imagery. Ironically, he wasn’t a believer in God. If you read his manifesto you will see a lot of railing against progressive values such as liberalism and socialism. He wants back a traditional morality that Christianity stood for while not actually believing in God.

It is important to talk about ideology because Putin, Trump, Orban, Breivik and Hitler all have in common that they oppose and want to oppress progressive values and ideals. This means getting control over the media, schools, and justice system.

But how do you achieve this is a modern world where direct censorship will not be acceptable and exclusively government controlled media will not be tolerated? You get some hints by looking at Russia. Putin has a lot of power through businessmen associated with the Kremlin. They do his bidding without formally being part of the government. If they don’t they risk falling out of a window.

Viktor Orbán followed a similar strategy. Rather than saying only government media is legal, he got pro-government allies and oligarchs to purchase major media outlets. By 2018, over 500 media companies were placed under a central, government-friendly foundation. This centralized ownership allows pro-government narratives to dominate and leaves little room for dissenting voices.

How does Trump use such a strategy? He already has the American conservative media as effective mouthpieces of his policies and ideology. The Musk buyout of X (formerly known as Twitter) is an example of how Trump can destroy liberal opposition and views. On X (formerly known as Twitter) extreme right-wing views had challenge getting through. This problem was “solved” by Elon Musk buying Twitter. How do you hide that the platform is now a mouthpiece for the far-right? You use rhetoric such as “we believe in free speech,” as an excuse to bring in conspiracy theorists, holocaust deniers and other extremists onto the platform while left-wing voices get kicked off the platform.

It is all about plausible deniability. You cannot kick off so many that it becomes clear how biased you are. So the left-wing is still very much present on X. But there is a new strategy today for censorship which I will explain through a microphone analogy.

We got two people, Jane and Bob speaking into a microphone. If we go far back, the way censorship was deal with was that if Bob said anything Jane didn’t like into the microphone he would get thrown into prison. That was obviously cruel, so the more civilized upgraded version of censorship was to just cut Bob’s microphone when he said something Jane didn’t like.

The modern version is to not cut Bob’s microphone but lower the volume to barely audible while Jane’s microphone gets amped up. Bob isn’t silenced per says but almost nobody can hear what he is saying except if they pay very good attention. Jane in contrast is loud and clear.

Why do it this way? Because it gives plausible deniability. If anyone says Bob is censored, they can reject it by point to the fact that there is sound coming out of his microphone.

This is analogous to how dictatorships work today. Dictatorships want legitimacy, and so they need to pretend they are democracies. That is why opposition parties still exist in parliament. Elections are still happening. It is just that everything is stacked against the opposition. If the opposition shows too much teeth, they might get polonium poisoning if they live in Russia. It is all theatre. You are supposed to play the role of opposition, so the people think you still live in a democracy and foreign governments don’t sanction you.

The same applies to media and free speech. You must give the people the illusion that they have free speech by letting them say whatever they want. Except don’t let them say that very loud. Instead, amplify the people saying what you want with more media exposure. The American right wants to give the false impression that all the media is controlled by the left, but this is very far from reality.

Those in control are different variants of the right. Socialists, and social democrats, have just about no media access in the US. It is popular to claim MSNBC and CNN are very leftist but these are capitalist enterprises who would never let socialists or social democrats get any airtime to criticize capitalism and corporations. The only “leftist” issues they are allowed to talk about are gay rights, feminism and trans rights because none of those issues actually disturb corporate power in any way.

DEI and gender politics has thus become popular because it is not the kind of politics which requires higher taxes on corporations. Thus, one ends up in absurd political landscapes where right-wingers will call California a socialist’s paradise while people are driving on 12 lane highways and the poor are sleeping in massive tent cities. It should be obvious to anyone that there is no socialism or social democratic politics going on in these places. It is capitalism all the way. So how can the far-right mask and cover up this reality? They invent a new term “cultural Marxism”. That way they can pretend socialism still has influence while in reality capitalism still dominate throughout society, in politics, in business and in the schools.

They say the left controls the schools in the US, but that is only in a cultural sense. Capitalism is still sold as the only true way. You can listen to socialist economist Richard D. Wolff for instance. His point is that while it should be your choice whether you believe in a more socialist or capitalist perspective on the world, shouldn’t you learn about both? Wolff remarks that when economics is taught in the US there is only one narrative. Criticism of capitalism and market economics are given no time slots. Ironically, the right loves the slogan “teach the controversy.” It is used as an argument to teach about creationism as an alternative theory to evolution. The problem is that this is not scholarly at all. It doesn’t even amount to a hypothesis. In contrast, lots of serious work criticizing capitalism exists but most students in the US are not allowed to learn that.

In general, the views of anyone challenging corporations and capitalism are silenced. People with leftist views or trying to promote or encourage unionization have a long history of being fired in the US. In the US unlike Europe there is no protection of free speech at corporations. Corporations can decide what speech is acceptable or not. It means it is actually the right which has the strongest power. They simply don’t have the full power in the cultural wars in the US.

That is what modern authoritarianism is about. It is about ceasing power in the cultural landscape as well. They scream about protecting speech while they eagerly ban books in schools. Literature raising issues of the American racist past will be labeled unpatriotic. Promote tolerance of gay people and it will be labeled pornographic and degenerate.

Media with a message the right doesn’t like will be labeled fake news media and hatred and violence against these news organizations encouraged to intimidate and silence them. Journalists already get attacked. Norwegian journalists covering the US have experienced violence. The right is not defending press freedom. Quite the contrary, they are encouraging and celebrating attacks on journalists. Such tactics have a lot of resemblance to Hitler’s use of brownshirts like the SA to intimidate political opponents into silence.

To quote Norsk Journalistlag, which looks after interests of Norwegian journalists:

Å være en journalist som dekker protester, er nå blitt like farlig i USA som i mange 3.-verden land vi vanligvis ikke pleier å sammenligne landene våre med.

A rough translation to English is that it is now been found that covering protests in the US is a dangerous as operating in a third world country. In the linked article they go on talking about how they need to talk to American authorities about ensuring safety of journalists because it has become so bad.

Violence works. In Europe, we have seen this repeatedly when criticizing Islam. Norwegian publisher William Nygaard was shot for publishing Salman Rushdie Satanic verses. We had the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy where attempts to create a debate about intolerance within Islam against criticism and satire were exposed. The result was riots, violence and countless assassination attempts. The outcomes were even worse for the french satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

In this case, numerous employees and cartoonists got killed in terror attacks. Sweden experienced burning and riots when an Iraqi man who had been tortured and abused by fundamentalist Islamic ISIS wanted to protest the violence done in the name of Islam by burning the Quran. He demonstrated very acutely the problem with the book. While this is problems with fundamentalist Islam, the far-right are in essence trying to achieve the same dynamic for traditional values.

The Trump movement can silence its critics in a similar manner. You don’t need laws censoring speech if you got thugs and “brownshirts” ready to silence dissenters. If you got a police force that will not go after these thugs and a judicial system that will not prosecute them then you have de-facto censorship.

Make sure Trump friendly businessmen buy out liberal media and make it preach the Trumpian ideology, and you get an Orbán style dictatorship. Use other creative approaches to silence the left elsewhere by calling it unpatriotic, pornographic, degenerate or whatever labeling works best to silence dissent.

Another approach is to get creative in demonizing the opposition. People like James Lindsay demonstrate how to do it. He is a math PhD who spends his time spinning elaborate conspiracy theories about, so-called “cultural Marxism.” He took a random sentence said by Kamala Harris to argue over ten pages why she was secretly a dangerous Marxist.

This is a tactic Trumpists can use to excuse political persecution of opponents. They can take a leaf from McCarthy Red Scare. The tactic was to label anyone they did not like as dangerous communists. Similar tactic could be pursued by Trumpists to fill schools, media and other places with loyalists and drive out dissenters.

The End Result of Authoritarianism

What does the authoritarianism I talk about end like? Many see authoritarianism as end like the Third Reich. If we don’t see a third world war they don’t think there is a dictatorship worth worrying about. Authoritarianism is for the most part a lot more boring. Most of Putin’s reign isn’t that dramatic. But perhaps the clearest example of what such a society looks like is Singapore.

The same party has held power since the 1960s. Opposition parties are just there to make it look like there is opposition. All to retain the sheen of a free society with democracy. In reality, there is just one ideology that rules.

Singapore exhibits characteristics of authoritarianism in various ways, particularly through its restrictions on free expression, public assembly, and labor rights, alongside a ruling ideology focused on national unity, economic pragmatism, and social order. Here’s a breakdown of how these authoritarian elements manifest and how they compare to fascism, especially in the treatment of progressive ideas.

Key Aspects of Singapore’s Authoritarianism

1. Limits on Labor Rights and Strikes: Strikes are indeed restricted in Singapore. Workers must go through extensive bureaucratic channels to gain approval for strikes, and participation in unapproved strikes can result in fines or jail time. The government strongly discourages strikes, as they view labor peace as essential for economic stability. Unions exist, but they are largely under the control of the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), which works closely with the ruling party, creating a state-controlled union landscape.

2. Regulation of Political Speech and Public Assembly: Singapore has strict laws on public assembly and speech. Public gatherings of more than five people require a permit, and critical speech against the government can lead to charges of defamation or sedition. This control over public discourse limits political dissent, which the government justifies as necessary to maintain social harmony in a multi-ethnic society.

3. Control over Media: Media in Singapore is highly regulated, and most major news outlets are either state-owned or operate under a government-influenced licensing regime. Independent reporting is constrained, and journalists or outlets that cross certain lines face legal consequences, such as hefty defamation suits. These measures allow the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) to maintain a dominant narrative.

4. Use of Legal Mechanisms to Maintain Power: Singapore’s legal system is used to maintain the authority of the ruling party. Defamation lawsuits, for instance, are often used against political opponents, resulting in fines or even bankruptcy, effectively disqualifying them from future elections. Other laws, like the Public Order Act and the Internal Security Act, allow for preventive detention without trial, which the government has used to suppress perceived threats.

I think this sort of authoritarianism is the most likely direction for Trumpism, but there are reasons why it could get ugly. Citizens of Singapore never had a lot democratic and liberal tradition. Instead, they have experience clear improvement in living standards and rights during the rule of the PAP.

Americans, in contrast, are very negative to government control and fiercely independent minded. Liberal America is strong and will not go down without a fight. They will bite back hard which could turn an attempt to go to Singapore or Hungary into a really ugly deal. Furthermore, the PAP is very technocratic and not as overtly ideological as Trump’s MAGA movement. MAGA contains christian fundamentalists, for instance, which will not accept some mere pragmatic technocratic state. Rather they will want to push their beliefs down the throat of everybody else. Liberal America is not going to sit back and take that.

How Things Can Get Ugly

So the problem with introducing a mild authoritarianism in the mould of Hungary of Singapore is that America is not a place doing anything by half measure or with nuance. The American right will likely overreach in one or more ways and you can bet the left will also overreact. You got the makings of a powder keg. Hotheaded Americans armed to the teeth is a dangerous combination.

There are some important lessons here from Renaissance thinker Machiavelli in his works “the Prince.” He writes about how you deal with occupation of former monarchies, tyrannies, and republics. In that era, we could consider a republic, the closest thing to a democracy today. It implies a type of government with a lot of liberty. He observes that replacing a former tyrant is straightforward. Citizens are used to oppression. I believe he covers several more forms of government. But what I remember standing out is his treatment of Republics. He says an occupier must either respect their laws and customs or wipe them out entirely.

That sounds rather harsh, don’t you think? The reason he says is that people in Republics strongly value their liberties and will fight tooth and nail against anyone trying to curtail them. There is simply no way of effectively subjugating them. They will never relent in fighting for their freedoms.

While that sounds positive, it is a receipt for disaster in the United States. Americans will simply not tolerate what happened in Hungary and Singapore to the same degree. They will fight back harder, and that will cause a vicious circle where Trump will have to respond with harsher measures. Harsher measures will result in an even stronger reaction.

My Predictions for Trump’s Second Term

Here is the problem with making predictions. If people actually heed your warnings, the bad things you predict will not come to pass. That is good, right? Absolutely, but it also means those who rejected your concerns will claim your concerns were unfounded.

I have seen so many examples of this. When discussing climate change, I get all these climate deniers telling me that the warnings about the ozone layer prove wrong. “Nobody talks about holes in the ozone layer anymore,” they laugh as if it is a gotcha. But that was a real issue, and we solved that problem because world leaders took it serious and implemented policies across the glove to fix it. The same applies to the issue with acid rain. Now cynics are using our success to claim it was never a problem.

In fact, for global warming we have the same problem. The more dire predictions from the past never came to past. This is by climate deniers used to claim that global warming is a hoax and climate scientists are wrong. Except it is the fact that we acted on the warnings of climate scientists and slowed our growth in emissions which stopped us from experiencing worse climate change.

This is why predictions contain different scenarios that explain different outcomes based on how we act. The worst predictions didn’t come to pass because we actually did put in some effort.

A very similar effect happened with Trump’s presidency. Many on the left made many rather dire predictions about what would happen. Because the worst predictions did not come to pass, his supports use that as proof that there is nothing to worry about. But if you read the insider accounts of the Trump presidency, you will quickly learn that the worst didn’t happen because numerous people worked hard to stop him.

Those people will not be around this time, but it doesn’t mean there will not be others that will try to limit power abuse by Donald Trump. It may very well be that American democracy is intact after four years of Trump. But that does not automatically imply that Trump supporters are right. If American democracy is preserved, it will be because there will be Americans fighting hard for it.

This is what I find hard to predict. I cannot predict how effective the opposition to Trump will be. If Democrats are too naive and meek I will predict that America will edge a lot closer to a flawed Democracy in the style of Hungary. I think that is most likely. To get into a more authoritarian regime will require more years. Four years today is not enough time to create anything looking like a “proper” dictatorship.

But there is a wildcard here. The polarized nature of American society. The armed citizenship and crudeness of American political discourse and rhetoric means that there is a chance that this whole things spirals out of control where violence breeds violence and this leads to ever more oppressive crackdowns.

So far, we have not seen demonstrators with guns fire at each other. If that tipping point is ever reached, then all hell will break loose and the 2nd amendment will be like gasoline on fire.

But what I see as the most likely outcome is that America drops down in the ranking of democracy and get further into the category of “flawed democracy.” I doubt it will become an outright dictatorship, even if I see Trumpism as having numerous similarities with fascism.