Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 election was an extreme failure for the United States as both a nation and a country. He has open contempt for democracy and the Constitution. He is publicly promising and threatening (and putting in place the means) to rule as the country’s first elected dictator on “day one.” Trump, like other such autocrats and authoritarians, means what he says both literally and figuratively.
A country consists of a defined territory and borders, founding documents, laws and institutions. The United States failed to protect its democracy by putting an autocrat and his larger authoritarian populist movement and cadre of kleptocratic allies in control of its governing institutions — including Congress. This is a great failure of the United States as a country.
