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Trump’s Authoritarian Revival: The Final Phase of the American Empire
Ann McFee
The Empire Turns Inward
The American empire, once draped in the language of freedom, is devouring itself. What began as a project of global domination under the banner of democracy has turned its machinery inward — the surveillance, propaganda, and militarization once reserved for distant battlefields now directed at the domestic population. The ascendance of Donald Trump is not an aberration; it is the culmination of a long decay in democratic institutions and civic life.
As D.K. Renton writes in “Trump, Fascism, and the Authoritarian Turn”, the new authoritarianism “emerges from the exhaustion of neoliberal capitalism and the crisis of political representation.” Trumpism, Renton argues, fuses “the populist rhetoric of anti-elitism with the oligarchic practice of class power.” The billionaire demagogue becomes the voice of the forgotten, while serving the same forces that engineered their ruin.
Across academia, intelligence circles, and civil society, warnings are now ubiquitous. The Guardian recently reported that senior U.S. officials and military veterans see the nation “on a trajectory toward authoritarian rule.” NPR likewise found that hundreds of political scientists now classify the U.S. as “a backsliding democracy.” The danger lies not in Trump alone but in the systemic corrosion that made his rise inevitable: decades of economic shock therapy, racial division, and the weaponization of fear.
Trump’s return to power represents a reorganization of American capitalism around a distinctly post-democratic form — a fusion of corporate power, racial grievance, and authoritarian theology. It is not the rebirth of fascism in its 1930s form, but its mutation for a media-saturated, post-truth empire in decline. This is the authoritarian revival — the final phase of an empire collapsing under the weight of its own contradictions.
Economic Shock and the Rise of Reaction
Authoritarianism does not arrive in a vacuum; it is built deliberately, often under the guise of reform. In “Shocking the System” in the 21st Century: Conservative Policy Entrepreneurs and the Plan for Authoritarianism in the U.S., researchers describe how a network of billionaire-backed think tanks, dark-money foundations, and policy entrepreneurs have “systematically pursued a strategy of institutional capture” — remaking the judiciary, state legislatures, and media ecosystems to entrench minority rule.
The authors trace this lineage back to what they call the “shock doctrine” of American conservatism — the exploitation of crises, from 9/11 to the pandemic, to deregulate, privatize, and concentrate power. Each crisis becomes an opportunity to erode public safeguards and extend corporate control. As the paper notes, “the goal is not mere deregulation but de-democratization — the removal of the citizen as a meaningful political actor.”
Trump’s rise was thus not spontaneous but cultivated by decades of strategic planning. The architects of this system — the Federalist Society, the Heritage Foundation, and newer actors like Project 2025 — have fused libertarian economics with cultural authoritarianism. Their message is simple: restore hierarchy, protect property, and punish deviation. The populist stagecraft of Trump’s rallies conceals an elite-driven project to dismantle what remains of the New Deal order and replace it with a permanent oligarchy.
As political economist Edward Moynihan warned in Trump Is Driving America Toward Authoritarianism, this is “a managed transition to illiberal democracy, achieved through legal manipulation rather than coups.” The ballot box becomes both weapon and shield — the veneer of choice masking the consolidation of power.
Fascism in New Clothing
Trumpism is not fascism in its classical 20th-century sense, yet it borrows its tactics, aesthetics, and social logic, mutating them for a media-saturated, post-industrial America. D.K. Renton, in “Trump, Fascism, and the Authoritarian Turn”, observes that the hallmark of contemporary authoritarianism is the fusion of populist rhetoric with oligarchic practice. “The movement,” Renton writes, “derives its energy from mass mobilization against perceived enemies of the nation while simultaneously protecting elite interests.”
Unlike Mussolini’s blackshirts or Hitler’s SA, the modern authoritarian apparatus relies less on street violence and more on digital orchestration, social media amplification, and narrative control. The spectacle of rallies, viral memes, and staged conflicts operates as both mobilization and intimidation. Renton warns: “Trump’s authoritarian turn does not mimic the past; it innovates, normalizing aggressive rhetoric and institutional erosion without immediate recourse to paramilitary violence.”
This “managed fascism,” as scholars describe it, leverages legal and electoral systems rather than overturning them outright. Executive overreach, selective law enforcement, and ideological capture of administrative agencies replace the dramatic coup d’état with a gradual consolidation of power. The advantage is twofold: it preserves a façade of legitimacy while training a base to tolerate, even celebrate, the bending of rules.
The consequences are evident. As reported by The Guardian, former officials and senior analysts warn that the U.S. is “on a trajectory toward authoritarian rule,” citing militarization, politicization of federal agencies, and erosion of checks and balances. Even if full-blown fascism never materializes, the structural foundations of democracy are weakened, leaving the nation vulnerable to institutional decay and normative collapse.
Trumpism’s contemporary fascist tendencies also exploit cultural resentment. Renton highlights how appeals to nationalism, identity, and moral panic act as binding glue, creating a loyal following that sees itself as defending civilization while advancing a concentrated elite agenda. In this sense, the movement is both populist and oligarchic, an authoritarian hybrid calibrated for 21st-century America.
Gender, Power, and the Daddy State
Trumpism is not merely a political movement; it is also a gendered project, intertwining authoritarian desire with patriarchal power. In “Daddy’s Home: Sexual Politics, Authoritarian Desire, and the Re-election of Donald Trump”, scholars argue that Trump’s persona embodies a symbolic “father figure” whose authority is both feared and fetishized. His supporters are drawn not only to policies but to a performance of dominance that signals protection, control, and the enforcement of social hierarchies.
This dynamic is particularly potent among voters for whom traditional gender and social roles are a source of identity and stability. The article observes:
“Trump’s authority appeals to a collective longing for paternal power, offering symbolic recompense to those alienated by social and economic change.”
Here, authoritarian desire intersects with sexualized political culture. Trump’s public persona — hyper-masculine, unapologetically aggressive, and at times overtly sexualized — functions as both spectacle and ideological signal. It conveys not only dominance over political rivals but a cultural claim over women, minorities, and the rules of civility themselves.
The implications for democracy are profound. Gendered authority reinforces obedience, normalizes hierarchical thinking, and encourages followers to prioritize loyalty over critique. When power is coded as “fatherly,” resistance is framed as rebellion against order itself. Trump’s rallies, media appearances, and social media presence thus operate as rituals of reinforcement, binding social and political loyalty into an affective, almost religious experience.
This gendered authoritarianism dovetails with other axes of identity, particularly race and class, creating a layered base that sees Trump’s authority as both personal and symbolic, protective yet punishing. The “Daddy State” is not just a metaphor: it is a mechanism of cultural control, an emotional lever in the consolidation of political power.
Apocalypse as Political Weapon
Authoritarianism thrives on perceived crisis, and Trumpism has mastered the art of making catastrophe both imminent and personal. In Apocalyptic Authoritarianism, scholars detail how the rhetoric of existential threat—climate collapse, immigration “invasion,” cultural decay—functions as a political accelerant. The result is a society primed to accept extraordinary measures and to conflate loyalty to the leader with survival itself.
The logic is simple yet devastating: when citizens believe civilization itself is under siege, democratic norms become a luxury, and exceptional authority becomes a necessity. As the book notes, “fear of total societal collapse legitimizes the centralization of power and delegitimizes dissent”. In Trump’s version, the apocalypse is both external and internal—imagined threats abroad and moral decay at home—creating a perpetual emergency that demands a singular, dominant figure to restore order.
This rhetorical strategy is intertwined with media spectacle. Cable news cycles, social media amplification, and viral misinformation propagate a sense of existential threat, normalizing the suspension of scrutiny. Renton observes that Trump’s messaging turns abstract anxieties into concrete enemies: journalists, political opponents, “illegals,” or even members of the federal bureaucracy. The audience learns to identify personal and national survival with the consolidation of executive power.
Crucially, apocalyptic framing works in tandem with gendered authoritarianism and policy entrepreneurship. The base is emotionally mobilized, hierarchical structures are reinforced, and policy entrepreneurs exploit crises to implement institutional changes that might otherwise provoke resistance. In effect, apocalypse becomes both ideological justification and practical tool, converting fear into compliance and anxiety into political capital.
This dynamic demonstrates how authoritarianism in the 21st century is less about overt terror and more about psychological architecture: shaping perception, amplifying fear, and engineering consent for extraordinary measures that weaken democratic institutions.
Race, Identity, and the MAGA Base
Trumpism’s durability cannot be understood without examining the intersection of race, gender, and authoritarian psychology. In Support for the MAGA Agenda: Race, Gender, and Authoritarianism, researchers demonstrate that support for authoritarian policies correlates strongly with feelings of racial and social dominance. White men, and notably white women, are more receptive to policies that promise hierarchy restoration, while women of color remain largely resistant, highlighting the layered nature of authoritarian appeal.
The study underscores that authoritarianism is not a fringe phenomenon, but a structural alignment of identity, perception of threat, and social positioning. It is racially coded, using anxieties about demographic change, immigration, and multiculturalism to reinforce loyalty. Gender operates similarly: as discussed in the “Daddy State,” adherence is reinforced through appeals to traditional roles, masculinity, and patriarchal order.
The MAGA base, therefore, is both reactive and aspirational. Reactive, in that it fears loss of status, security, and cultural dominance; aspirational, in that it envisions a restored order in which authority is respected and dissent punished. As Moynihan notes in Trump Is Driving America Toward Authoritarianism, the emotional and psychological drivers of this support are as consequential as the policies themselves, enabling the consolidation of power under the guise of popular consent.
Race, gender, and identity are thus not peripheral; they are central mechanisms by which authoritarianism gains traction. Without understanding these dynamics, institutional warnings, legal reforms, or policy interventions risk targeting the symptoms rather than the sociological substrate of support.
Institutional Capture and the Crisis of Democracy
Trump’s authoritarian revival is not only cultural and psychological—it is structural. Institutions that once constrained executive power are being repurposed, weakened, or co-opted. As Trump Regime: Authoritarianism Now emphasizes, this is a regime that relies on legalist manipulation, using the letter of the law to undermine its spirit. Courts, federal agencies, and oversight bodies become instruments of consolidation rather than bulwarks of accountability.
The erosion of institutional norms is compounded by militarization and strategic alignment of security forces. Foreign Policy describes a “particularly authoritarian moment” in which the federal government signals readiness to deploy the National Guard and other security apparatuses to enforce political objectives. This not only intimidates opposition but signals a blurring of lines between civilian governance and militarized control.
Across multiple sources, including The Guardian and NPR, scholars and former officials highlight how this combination of institutional capture, militarization, and crisis rhetoric positions the executive as the ultimate arbiter. Democratic mechanisms—elections, legislative oversight, independent judiciary—remain formally intact but are functionally hollowed, leaving the citizenry with a façade of choice while real power consolidates at the top.
Moynihan warns that this process is incremental yet irreversible if left unchecked: it relies not on abrupt seizure but on gradual normalization of exception. Executive overreach, regulatory manipulation, and selective enforcement quietly establish precedent, conditioning the public to accept authoritarian practices as routine. Democracy is thus endangered not by dramatic coups but by systematic erosion of trust, norms, and accountability.
The Empire Devours Itself
Trump’s authoritarian revival is neither accidental nor ephemeral. It is the logical culmination of decades of institutional decay, cultural manipulation, and strategic power consolidation. Personality, policy networks, gendered authority, apocalyptic rhetoric, and racialized identity have fused into a potent engine of political control, producing a system that appears democratic while functioning increasingly as an autocracy.
As D.K. Renton observes in Trump, Fascism, and the Authoritarian Turn, the danger is not simply overt fascism but managed authoritarianism: a society in which elections continue, but outcomes are predictable, dissent is tolerated only within narrow bounds, and executive power dominates the state apparatus. Moynihan, The Guardian, and NPR scholars concur: the U.S. is on a trajectory where democratic form exists, yet democratic substance erodes.
The consequences are profound. Citizens are not only confronted with political choices but with cultural and psychological imperatives—loyalty, obedience, and affective alignment with authority. Institutions are hollowed, dissent is delegitimized, and fear becomes the currency of compliance. Race, gender, and identity operate as levers of mobilization, transforming social hierarchies into political scaffolding for authoritarian power.
Yet the story is not irretrievable. Historical and comparative examples show that institutional reform, civic mobilization, and ideological counteraction can slow or reverse authoritarian drift. Awareness is the first defense: understanding the machinery, the myths, and the emotional levers at play enables strategic resistance.
Trump’s authoritarian revival, then, is not simply a political phase; it is a symptom of empire in decline, a society turning its power inward as the legitimacy of its democratic foundations decays. The American experiment, once lauded as a global model, now teeters on the edge: whether it survives depends on whether citizens, institutions, and civil society reclaim both the form and the substance of democracy before the facade becomes permanent.
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Trump’s Authoritarian Revival: The Final Phase of the American Empire
Ann McFee
Sources
Trump, Fascism, and the Authoritarian Turn
DK Renton
https://spectrejournal.com/trump-fascism-and-the-authoritarian-turn/
“Shocking the System” in the 21st Century: Conservative Policy Entrepreneurs and the Plan for Authoritarianism in the U.S.
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/14/4/235
Daddy's home: sexual politics, authoritarian desire, and the re-election of Donald Trump
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14791420.2025.2539084
Apocalyptic Authoritarianism
https://academic.oup.com/book/59887?login=false
Support for the MAGA Agenda: Race, Gender, and Authoritarianism
Trump is driving America toward authoritarianism - Moynihan
https://fordschool.umich.edu/news/2025/trump-driving-america-toward-authoritarianism-moynihan
Trump Regime: Authoritarianism Now
https://community-5.com/2025/03/trump-regime-authoritarianism-now/
US ‘on a trajectory’ toward authoritarian rule, ex-officials warn | Trump administration | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/16/trump-authoritarianism-warning
Hundreds of scholars say U.S. is swiftly heading toward authoritarianism
The U.S. Is in a ‘Particularly Authoritarian’ Moment
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