When Authoritarianism Looms, Old Friends Reunite

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0:28E.J. Dionne Jr.:This is The Opinions, a show that brings you a mix of voices from New York Times opinion. You've heard the news. Here's what to make of it.

0:47Robert Siegel:This is Robert Siegel. I used to host All Things Considered on NPR, which included one of my favorite features, the Friday talk about politics, with two first-class columnists, David Brooks of the New York Times and E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post in those days. Now he's back as a contributing opinion writer at the Times. They were two and remain two very sharp political writers whose curiosity has taken them to exploring American society, religion, how our politics got the way they are. Seven and a half years after our last talk about politics, I was very happy to be invited to moderate a New York Times conversation with David Brooks and E.J.

1:29Robert Siegel:Dionne about the state of America today. E.J., David, it's great to see you both together. Great to be with you, Robert. It's a joy to be with you both. And as I was saying. As you were back then. Let's start with the big question about Donald Trump's second administration, which is, are we or have we slipped into a state of authoritarianism in America? David, what's your answer?

1:50David Brooks:Yeah, I don't think there's a day we're going to wake up and we're in authoritarian land. I think it's a slow deterioration. And we've seen what's happened in the Justice Department and ICE. I don't need to recite all the examples of authoritarian behavior. But I guess the way I see it is a little broader. I think in 2010, a historical tide shifted. And we go through these moments periodically in world history when you get a tide. In the early part of the 20th century, you had a totalitarian tide. You had the Russian Revolution. You had the Chinese Revolution. You had the Nazis. People thought totalitarianism was the way to go.

2:19David Brooks:And then the 1990s, you had a liberal tide, what some people call a neoliberal tide. You had Ronald Reagan, you had Margaret Thatcher, you had Bill Clinton. In their own ways, you had Mikhail Gorbachev and Deng Xiaoping. And since 2010, we've been in a tide of global populism. And that's not only Trump, but it's Viktor Orban. I would say it's also Putin and the way she plays on populist tides. And so to me, what we're looking at is not a momentary shift to authoritarianism, but a generational shift towards savagery. And so what I worry about is the complete deterioration of the global order. And that includes the order at home and the way rule of law works here, but it also includes the global order all around the world.

2:56David Brooks:And so my worry is less how much of our rights are being restricted, which I don't think they are too much right now, but to how much is the global atmosphere deteriorating, is civilization deteriorating? And there, my answer would be a lot. A lot.

3:10Robert Siegel:I was much to pursue there, but I want to hear first from EJ. What's your answer to the same question?

3:15E.J. Dionne Jr.:Well, I think what's happening here in the United States is the issue we have to think about. And I was struck with what Ezra Klein wrote this week. This is not just how authoritarianism happens. This is authoritarianism happening. And again, as David said, we can go through the whole list. And I think we also need to be mindful that there are different kinds of populism. And what's dangerous here is not populism, which often can have a democratic face, can push us to be more equal, more fair, more just. This is an authoritarian wave, but the very particular things that are happening here are what we have to grapple with.

3:52E.J. Dionne Jr.:And I think we don't take seriously enough that what's happened in the Republican Party is quite troubling because we were accustomed to divisions and disagreements within the Republican Party, and those still exist under the surface. But even Republicans are now afraid to express opposition to the president. And you have Senator Tillis leaving, Senator Ernst leaving. I think that tells you that they're worried that their party can't speak up. Members of their party feel constrained in speaking up. And I think that's contributing to this wave.

4:28Robert Siegel:Does that amount to authoritarianism?

4:30E.J. Dionne Jr.:Yes. I think that, again, the list, you know, masked ICE agents who don't even have warrants arresting people, the interference with the election process, the next time with the president telling state legislatures, you have to gerrymander. That is Orban-like. And I think it is, we have crossed the line, I think.

4:50Robert Siegel:Victor Orban of Hungary. David, those immigration crackdowns, which include crackdowns on workplaces, which remind us why people actually come here and stay here, which is there are jobs for them. Does the behavior of ICE, does it scare you? I mean, does it frighten you about the prospect of a national police force of guys who wear masks?

5:14David Brooks:A bunch of uniformed guys with masks seizing people off the street? What's scary about that? You know, I do think it's scary, but it's also a reminder when they went to the Hyundai plant that this is our economy. Derek Thompson is on Substack these days, and he noted that 2025 could be the first year in American history where we lose population because more people will be going out than coming in and the domestic birth rates aren't that high. And that just has a tremendous economic cost. We saw last week a pretty mediocre jobs number. And that was caused by lack of immigration because they can't get people to fill these jobs.

5:46David Brooks:It's worth pointing out that even today, we talk about the loss of manufacturing. There are 500 ,000 manufacturing jobs that are unfilled because we don't have the people with the skills. And so it's not only terrifying to have anybody you know with Hispanic ethnic heritage, whether they're documented or undocumented, everybody I know is afraid. So that's one thing. But the economic costs and the way that drags down the economy is less serious, but also noteworthy. UJ?

6:12E.J. Dionne Jr.:I think it's very scary when you have the Supreme Court saying it's okay for ICE to arrest people if they look Latinos, speak Spanish, and work in a working-class job. And that has, at least for now, been ratified by the Supreme Court. When Trump made his promises, he promised to contain the southern border and to round up people who had committed crimes, something Barack Obama did. This extends way beyond that. And the Congress adding all of these people to ICE at this moment is very troubling because this could become a completely different kind of federal law enforcement agency, very much answerable to the president.

6:55E.J. Dionne Jr.:And yes, David's right. There are also economic consequences that are going to affect a lot of people who are not immigrants. Lots of people in the country need a growing economy, and immigrants can help that if we had a sane immigration law.

7:09Robert Siegel:One question that I have as being retired, I'm not doing trips off to Southern Ohio to ask people what they think about America today. I follow events in the media. And I can't quite understand how many Americans truly feel alarmed by the prospect of mass police or a breakdown of the separation of powers, the loss of the tariff authority from the Congress to the executive branch. I mean, are these things that lawyers and journalists and people who know their constitutional amendments by heart are very concerned about and the rest of the people just want to make a living? Or is there some deep commitment to the way our republic has been working and supposed to work?

7:50E.J. Dionne Jr.:I think the striking thing about the polling in the early period of this Trump term is that Trump is losing a lot of ground with people who were for him. NBC did a survey where the proportion of people saying they are furious, 21 percent, or angry or dissatisfied, far outweighs those who are satisfied, happy or thrilled. There are other categories. Only 10 percent are thrilled with the president. I think all those kinds of numbers you're seeing out there suggest that people who voted for Trump the last time, a significant share of the swing voters who voted for Trump are looking at this and saying, this is not what we're voting for.

8:30E.J. Dionne Jr.:So they may not analyze this entirely in terms of what does the Constitution say? What do I think of that? But they are very uneasy, I think, with the direction this is taken.

8:41Robert Siegel:I just wonder how transactional most Americans are. That is, if things are going well, prices are stable and there are good jobs available and you can afford school for your kids, college for your kids and a house. You know, which branch does what? That's a matter for somebody else to care about.

8:59David Brooks:Yeah, I mean, a significant chunk of my friendship group is Trump supporters. And I'd say over the last two weeks, I've had lunch or dinner or coffee with maybe five to seven of them. And I haven't noticed that a sense of walking away from Trump. The people I tend to know are not would never go to a MAGA rally. If you're going to cover Trump or the Trump movement, do not go to MAGA rallies. That's not the representative sample. Most people I know who voted for Trump don't like him. They find him troubling in a zillion ways. They disagree with certain policies like the tariffs. But they basically buy his story.

9:30David Brooks:They buy his story that the elites have betrayed us. And one of the ways the elites have betrayed us, they would say, and I sort of agree, is by in the Biden years, immigration just massively exploded. I heard from a guy from Montana last week, and he said, talking to progressives, you guys had 40 years to police yourselves, and you didn't do it. And therefore, now it's our turn. You had your shot. And I would say they would say that about immigration. They would say that about the universities. 82 % of college students think they have to lie to professors and pretend they're more progressive than they are in order to get through school.

10:07David Brooks:And that's a form of soft authoritarianism, frankly. And if universities did not police themselves and get more diversity, then somebody was going to crack down. So I would say a lot of the people I know still think Trump is the right answer to a bunch of serious social problems, even if they have a zillion different reservations about the guy.

10:26E.J. Dionne Jr.:Could I just say on that, the people I am talking about who are really showing real qualms about Trump are those who voted for him to solve particular problems like prices, like the situation at the border. They didn't bargain for this. And so I don't think we should underestimate how much that unease could translate into stronger opposition down the road. And in particular in turnout in the next election. I think those strong disapprove, weak approve numbers suggest real problems for Trump down the road.

10:59Robert Siegel:Well, I want to ask you both about the two parties, the two political parties, and what do you think they should be doing now? Let's start with the Democrats. There's a big discussion about what the Democrats should be doing. What's the best step? E.J., you've already cited the essay by Ezra Klein. It was in the Times. Should the Democrats, for example, not provide the votes needed to end debate and thereby keep the government open? Or should they say, so long as this is what the administration is doing, we're for shutting down the government?

11:30E.J. Dionne Jr.:Well, I think that they should not say we're for shutting down the government. I was broadly sympathetic to what Ezra wrote. And I think there was a very good kind of friendly amendment, if you will, to Ezra's argument by Bill Shear in the Washington Monthly, where he said, the point is Democrats shouldn't say we want to shut down the government. Democrats should say we want an on-the-level good faith negotiation. And we can't have that if we know that whatever we negotiate, Trump is going to back off on and Republicans in Congress are going to go along with cuts that we would not have agreed to in a negotiation.

12:06E.J. Dionne Jr.:So I think their position should be, Republicans, if you're not willing to make this a real negotiation. Do it yourselves. You want to end the filibuster, go ahead and end the filibuster. But we are not going to participate in what amounts to a sham process as long as the president of the United States exercises power to not spend money that Congress approved of.

12:30David Brooks:David? Yeah, I think a larger philosophical question is when Trump goes low, should the Democrats go low? And of course, Michelle Obama famously said many years ago, they go low, we go high. And I think the Democratic Party has pretty much dismissed that. I think that's a mistake. So like - The dismissal is the mistake. The dismissal. I think Michelle Obama was right. So when the Republicans redistrict, Gavin Newsom redistricts. The Republicans are threatening to shut down the government. So the Democrats pull a Newt Gingrich and threaten to shut down the government. EJ said earlier, there are a lot of people who are losing faith with Donald Trump.

13:04David Brooks:If that's true, then they are persuadable. And the way you persuade is by telling a moral story where the other side seems contemptible and your side seems kind of admirable. And that was basically the story of the civil rights movement. And to me, the Democrats have an opportunity to do that. But if you're complaining about authoritarianism and lawlessness and the erosion of our cultural and moral norms, then you can't credibly represent that position if you're eroding our moral norms. And so I think the long-term play is for Democrats to show, no, this is how government is supposed to work. We're not going to do things that seem nihilistic and destructive or erode norms.

13:40E.J. Dionne Jr.:It's not nihilistic to just say straight up, this negotiation is not a real negotiation if the president is going to use arbitrary power to overturn the negotiation. And in the case of the redistricting, the Newsom's position is, look, we would way rather keep this commission. And indeed, his bill in California has the commission coming back to draw nonpartisan lines in 2030. But to say we're going to ignore people rigging the rules one way and just sit there and not do anything that, for one thing, does not answer the concerns of all the people who support you. And for another thing, it's pretending that it's going low simply if you respond in a practical way to what you're confronted with.

14:26E.J. Dionne Jr.:And I think that's different from meanness. It's different from being authoritarian yourself. It's just saying this is what's happening. We're going to call it out.

14:35David Brooks:It all depends on what kind of fight we're in the middle of. Back when we were talking on the civilized days of NPR, it was normal. Like George W. Bush, you might like him, you might not. But, you know, Barack Obama, you might not like him. We've crossed a revolutionary situation around the world, which Trump is just, as I say, one part of the global peace. And what populism offers people is a culture, a morality, a way of being, a picture of masculinity and femininity, a sense of belonging. It is a full-service religion as well as a political ideology. The Democrats don't have any of that. They have ideas for policies and tax policies.

15:13David Brooks:So they might have, you might do this on a day-to-day basis. But if you're the Democrats, you have to think we have to create a counter movement to what populism has. We need to create a culture, a sense of belonging, a sense of identity, a sense of right and wrong, a sense of masculinity and femininity, all sorts of other issues. And to me, that's a generational project. Populism didn't just start yesterday. It goes all the way back to America first. It goes back to the Know Nothing movement. It goes back to writers like Sam Francis and Christopher Lash. It took decades to create the culture MAGA is.

15:44David Brooks:It's going to take decades for the Democrats to come up with a counterculture. But positioning themselves on the realm of values and ideas and vision is the first task. And what happens in a legislative game, it's not important.

15:58E.J. Dionne Jr.:We don't have decades to protect our constitutional democracy. Of course, liberalism, social democracy have to have a moral story to tell. I think they do have a moral story to tell about how fairness and justice can undermine better lives for people, better family lives. But right now, we are in a crisis. Either you believe we are right now in a crisis or you don't. I do believe we're in a crisis. And that requires that you act that way. And then we can, in the meantime, have these long-term discussions that you want to have. But I don't think you can just sit there and say, nothing's happening.

16:35E.J. Dionne Jr.:We'll think for the long term.

16:36David Brooks:One little addendum. So, you know, back in April, I wrote a column saying, where the hell is everybody? We need a social movement. We need an uprising. And I was reading all these lefty sociologists, and I was like, hell yeah, yeah. So I was turning into Mr. Saul Alinsky. I like that column, actually. And I still believe that. But to me, the virtue of a social movement is that it's always on behalf of a vision. It's ground up. It's people embodying a certain way of being. And so to me, Chuck Schumer is not going to save you. Hakeem Jeffries is not going to save you. It's not the politicians who come up with a new vision, a new movement.

17:11David Brooks:It's always got to be a much broader social movement.

17:13Robert Siegel:But isn't, I mean, is it that there is no democratic worldview or religion, as you would say, or that there is and it's all about diversity and its main source of moral authority is not citing Jefferson or Lincoln. It's citing Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and that there is a set of beliefs that tie them together. They're just losing beliefs at this particular moment.