By Lisa Lerer and Jess Bidgood
A campaign marked by Donald Trump’s apocalyptic extremes has turned even darker in its final days.
With voting underway in battleground states, the former president on Friday escalated his threats to prosecute and imprison a wide range of people involved in elections and politics. Hours later, on the hugely popular “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, he said that the “enemy within,” a phrase he has used to describe political opponents, poses a bigger threat to the nation than North Korea.
For eight years, Democrats have warned that Trump’s political ambitions have fueled some of the nation’s deepest divides. But in his third presidential bid, those worries have metastasized into fear that another term for Trump would threaten the founding principles of the Republic. As the campaign comes to a close, a series of people who know him well, including top military leaders and high-ranking former officials from his administration, have warned that Trump, who has sought to project his victory as all but assured, would rule as a dictator if given the chance.
Republicans say such concerns are overblown. But Vice President Kamala Harris has intensified her own alarms about Trump, switching the joyful tenor of the early days of her campaign to stark warnings that he would govern as an authoritarian and curtail what she casts as core American freedoms — like a woman’s right to terminate a life-threatening pregnancy. There are also hints that Trump’s dark promises are affecting the political choices of business leaders and media outlets owned by them.
For Trump, the personal stakes go beyond the outcome of what polls indicate is a dead heat. The former president is running not only for the White House but also to remain a free man. Should he lose, he may very well face jail time.
It has left voters facing a bleak choice over the country’s democracy — one that has never before been litigated in an American presidential election.
In a post on his social media site Friday, Trump wrote that those who “cheated” in the election would face “long-term prison sentences” and would “be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.” The phrasing was almost exactly the same as a post from September. But less than two weeks before Election Day, his words carry new resonance.
Trump has insisted he means what he says, even when some of his allies try to downplay his remarks. This month, he threatened to use military force against liberal politicians and activists and declared them “the enemy within,” alarming experts on democracy. Trump used similar language Friday in his three-hour interview with Rogan, who has 14.5 million followers on Spotify and 17.6 million on YouTube, many of them young men that the Republican campaign hopes to turn out.
When pressed on those remarks in a friendly Fox News interview, Trump insisted that they were “accurate” and singled out two prominent California Democrats, Rep. Adam Schiff and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, as examples of whom he deems the enemy. He repeated the phrase again during his interview with Rogan, when he said the “enemy within” posed a bigger threat to the nation than North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
And on Sunday, he is scheduled to host a rally at Madison Square Garden in New York, drawing a comparison from prominent Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, to the “Pro America Rally” in support of Adolf Hitler that occurred there in 1939. Democrats and even some Republicans have attacked Trump for reportedly praising Hitler, the Nazi leader responsible for the systematic murder of 6 million Jews and millions of others, as having done “some good things.”
“She said it’s just like the 1930s,” Trump said at a rally in northern Michigan on Friday night, referring to Clinton’s comments. “No, it’s not. This is called ‘Make America Great Again.’”
During a town hall-style appearance on CNN on Wednesday, Harris suggested Trump would be “a president of the United States who admires dictators and is a fascist.” She said comments made by his former chief of staff, John Kelly, in which he said Trump met the definition of a fascist and would govern like a dictator if allowed, amounted to a “911 call to the American people.”
Those raising alarms about Trump include a notable number of Republicans now backing Harris. Liz Cheney, a former representative from Wyoming, suggested Trump could bring about the unraveling of American democracy.
“As Americans, we can become accustomed to thinking, ‘Well, we don’t have to worry about that here,’” Cheney said in the Philadelphia suburbs on Monday. “But I tell you, again, as someone who has seen firsthand how quickly it can happen, that is what’s on the ballot.”
Shawn Reilly, the Republican mayor of Waukesha, Wisconsin, also endorsed Harris and told The New York Times that electing Trump could lead the country “down a road of authoritarianism and fascism.”
In Austin, Texas, on Friday, Trump slammed The Atlantic, which first reported the claim about his desire for generals like Hitler had, and went out of his way to note that the magazine was “run by a guy named Goldberg” — a direct attack on the magazine’s editor, Jeffrey Goldberg, that appeared to be an antisemitic dog whistle.
“These are evil people, they’re a threat to democracy,” he said later, after referring again to Goldberg.
There are signs that Trump’s statements may be having a chilling effect beyond the campaign trail on business leaders and media outlets owned by them.
Both The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times announced they would not make an endorsement in the presidential contest, breaking with years of practice. Their decisions prompted speculation that the billionaire owners of the publications were trying to curry favor with Trump.
And Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan who is typically outspoken about his political views, has kept his backing of Harris private, fearing that Trump could retaliate against companies and people who oppose his bid, according to people familiar with his thinking.
While Trump has never denied menacing his political enemies, he has denied making any positive comments about Hitler. Instead, he has deployed his well-worn playbook of meeting his opponents’ accusations with those of his own.
On Wednesday, Harris addressed reporters at her residence, where she invoked the claim that Trump had said he wanted generals like Hitler had while Trump was president.
“It is deeply troubling and incredibly dangerous that Donald Trump would invoke Adolf Hitler, the man who is responsible for the deaths of 6 million Jews and hundreds of thousands of Americans,” Harris said.
Trump then accused Harris of comparing him directly to Hitler, which she had not, and his campaign released a roughly 90-second video featuring a Holocaust survivor demanding an apology from Harris.
“She owes my parents and everyone else who was murdered by Hitler an apology,” the 94-year-old survivor, Jerry Wartski, said in the ad.
The dark tone extended even into a rally hosted by the Harris campaign in Houston on Friday, where 30,000 people cheered for country music star Willie Nelson and Beyoncé, the global phenom.
Traditionally, such megawatt appearances are used to set a celebratory tone for a campaign and energize its supporters. But this year, the darker fears of Democrats coursed from the stage through the stadium.
“I know a lot of people are here because of Beyoncé,” said Wayne Ashley, 42, as he waited in an hourslong line to enter the stadium. “I’m here because I don’t support authoritarianism.”
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