Can It Happen Here?

Guest Opinion

By Tom Gutowski | Oct. 26, 2024

The answer depends on how one defines “it.” For example, “it” may be taking young children from their parents and not keeping records that would facilitate the families later being reunited. Or putting innocent people in concentration camps. Or blackballing people for their political opinions or jailing them for failing to report on their friends’ political leanings.

We’ve already done all of the above in this country. And that’s not even considering the history of our treatment of indigenous people and people of color. It’s hardly far-fetched to contemplate the possibility that we might repeat some of our past mistakes, or worse.

The number of people who would need to directly participate in committing egregious injustices would be relatively small. Half a million people, for example, is less than 0.2 percent of the adult population. The other 99.8 percent would need only sit by and do nothing.

Finding people willing to do the dirty work wouldn’t be a problem. The vast majority of Americans are obviously good, decent people. But we don’t lack for those willing to harm others because of differences in skin color, ethnic background, or sexual orientation. The fact that legal, law abiding Haitian immigrants in Springfield Ohio are currently being threatened, harassed, and shunned is just one example.

And there are plenty of armed hate groups who could intimidate much of the rest of the population into staying home with their shades drawn. If you’ve ever been hesitant to wear a hat or T-shirt that advertises your political affiliation, multiply that feeling by a thousand. As the need to speak out increases, so do the incentives not to.

The first victims would be undocumented immigrants. Trump has called them savages, rapists, murderers, and drug dealers. He’s claimed that Haitian immigrants are eating their neighbors’ pets, and says immigrants will come to your house and slit your throat. And a substantial number of adults apparently believe pretty much anything Trump or his major supporters say. Millions claim that Trump won the 2020 election, despite the failure of more than 60 court cases, and that Jan. 6 was a peaceful protest, despite video evidence to the contrary. Marjorie Taylor Green said that meteorologists can create and control hurricanes, and now meteorologists are getting death threats. It’s not hard to imagine that there are people willing to carry out terrible deeds against those identified by their leaders as very bad people.

Trump wants to use the National Guard to run “the largest mass deportation program in history.” We’re talking 15 to 20 million people, which would likely be impossible to pull off. What might actually happen is anyone’s guess. Mass detention camps? Breakup of families? U.S. citizens caught up in the process? Other forms of maltreatment?

There’s no guarantee that government officials would stop the worst abuses. Trump and his inner circle have learned from his last stint in the White House. As described in Project 2025, they plan to fire tens of thousands of nonpartisan federal employees and replace them with Trump loyalists. According to experts, this is how modern dictators obtain and consolidate power: not by militarily overthrowing the existing order, but by subverting it from within, until one day the substance of democracy is gone and only the shell remains. Even Putin—a man who routinely assassinates troublesome opponents—still holds elections.

The process often begins with scapegoating, but it doesn’t always end there. The point is to instill fear in the population so they’ll hand over power to a strongman who they hope will save them from the imagined horrors. (For anyone not paying attention, undocumented immigrants have a violent crime rate that’s about half that of U.S. citizens.)

Once in office, the strongman’s first priority is to secure his own power. Critical journalists, political opponents, and those who dare speak out face the possibility of harassment, prosecution, and imprisonment. Trump has said he’ll order “his” justice department to prosecute his enemies, he constantly vilifies the press, he calls liberals vermin and lunatics, and he’s called for the execution of various people who he claims are traitors, including at least one general in the U.S. army. How far would he actually go? I hope never to find out.

The root of this phenomenon lies in demographic and cultural change combined with a high level of economic inequality and declining social mobility. Some people see their “traditional” way of life—which in many cases means white male ascendancy—being threatened and feel powerless to do anything about it. So they look for someone to blame for their woes, economic and otherwise, and they support a “strong man” who says he’ll return America to a supposedly glorious past. Anyone deemed part of the problem becomes, in Trump’s words, the “enemy within.”

What can we do? “We the people” have the power to ensure that the United States remains a just and decent society that respects the rule of law and the democratic norms that have made it a great nation. That’s because we have the ability to vote. Use it or risk losing it.

Tom Gutowski earned a PhD in history from the University of Chicago before entering the insurance industry, from which he retired.