Redburn Reads (Nov. 6, 2024)

An American Tragedy

Friends,

It’s early Wednesday morning and as I write now it looks like American voters, by a narrow but crucial margin, chose an ignorant bad man to run the country over a thoughtful good woman. 

I didn’t think this would happen but I was tragically wrong. 

There will be a price to pay. We are a resilient nation and we are in remarkably good shape right now. But I don’t see how we can avoid becoming something much worse.

My friend and former colleague Eduardo Porter wrote an opinion column for the Washington Post ahead of the election. The headline: Yes, America can fail.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the economic disaster that would befall us were incoming President Trump to enact his most cherished plans to deport immigrants at scale and raise tariffs against imports from everywhere. Grim though this forecast might be — the risks, according to one economist, include “a depression” — it does not capture what’s fully at stake for America. . .

Economic prosperity requires institutions that foster risk-taking and innovation: secure property rights that ensure people can enjoy benefits from their investment; predictable enforcement of contracts; free and fair elections that allow citizens to keep a tab on their leaders and replace them when needed. These things, in turn, require the rule of law, independent judiciaries and freedom of the press.

Unfortunately, Trump is itching to undermine all these institutions. As [Darren] Acemoglu, [a Nobel Prize winning economist and co-author of “Why Nations Fail], put it to me, “There are many different ways in which the United States can be hurt really badly.” . .

Economic weakness is a general feature of autocratic populism. One study of the economic fallout from 51 cases of populist presidents from 1900 to 2020 concluded that gross domestic product per capita fell by 10 percent over 15 years after countries embraced populism compared to similar nations where populism failed to take root. This is largely due to macroeconomic instability and the erosion of institutions, as populist leaders muck about with the rules to stay in power and “serve the people.”

Of course, much more than the economy will suffer. Donald Trump told us what he intended to do if he was re-elected. Another friend, Jonathan Rauch, wrote earlier this year that Trump and his allies laid out their plans clearly.

We can do more than just speculate about how a second Trump term would unfold, because the MAGA movement has been telegraphing its plans in some detail. In a host of ways—including the overt embrace of illiberal foreign leaders; the ruthless behavior of Republican elected officials since the 2020 election; Trump allies’ elaborate scheming, as uncovered by the House’s January 6 committee, to prevent the peaceful transition of power; and Trump’s own actions in the waning weeks of his presidency and now as ex-president—the former president and his allies have laid out their model and their methods.

Begin with the model. Viktor Orbán has been the prime minister of Hungary twice. His current tenure began in 2010. He is not a heavy-handed tyrant; he has not led a military coup or appointed himself maximum leader. Instead, he follows the path of what he has called “illiberal democracy.” Combining populist rhetoric with machine politics, he and his party, Fidesz, have rotted Hungarian democracy from within by politicizing media regulation, buying or bankrupting independent media outlets, appointing judges who toe the party line, creating obstacles for opposition parties, and more. Hungary has not gone from democracy to dictatorship, but it has gone from democracy to democracy-ish. Freedom House rates it only partly free. The International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance’s ratings show declines in every democratic indicator since Fidesz took power.

The MAGA movement has studied Orbán and Fidesz attentively. Hungary is where Tucker Carlson, the leading U.S. conservative-media personality (who is sometimes mentioned as a possible presidential contender), took his show for a week of fawning broadcasts. Orbán is the leader whom the Conservative Political Action Conference brought in as a keynote speaker in August. He told the group what it loves to hear: “We cannot fight successfully by liberal means.” Trump himself has made clear his admiration for Orbán, praising him as “a strong leader and respected by all.” . . .

Their playbook:

First, install toadies in key positions. Upon regaining the White House, the president systematically and unabashedly nominates personal loyalists, with or without qualifications, to Senate-confirmed jobs. Assisted by the likes of Johnny McEntee, a White House aide during his first term, and Kash Patel, a Pentagon staffer, he appoints officials willing to purge conscientious civil servants, neutralize or fire inspectors general, and ignore or overturn inconvenient rules. . .

Second, intimidate the career bureaucracy. On day one of his second term, Trump signs an executive order reinstating an innovation he calls Schedule F federal employment. This designation would effectively turn tens of thousands of civil servants who have a hand in shaping policy into at-will employees. He approved Schedule F in October of his final year in office, but he ran out of time to implement it and President Biden rescinded it.

Third, co-opt the armed forces. Having identified the military as a locus of resistance in his first term, Trump sets about cashiering senior military leaders. In their place, he promotes and installs officers who will raise no objection to stunts such as sending troops to round up undocumented immigrants or intimidate protesters (or shoot them). Within a couple of years, the military will grow used to acting as a political instrument for the White House.

Fourth, bring law enforcement to heel. Even more intimidating to the president’s opponents than a complaisant military is his securing full control, at long last, over the Justice Department.

There’s much more that Rauch outlines in his sobering essay for The Atlantic. It’s worth reading. 

There will much written in the coming days and weeks about why Trump won and Harris lost. I doubt if I will have much to add to that debate.

I hope instead, with future Redburn Reads, to do my best to stay focused on the consequences of the choice it appears we’ve just made.

Sadly, 

Tom