Is the U.S. Experiencing “Autocratic Capture” Under Trump?

A Former CIA Officer's Sober Analysis

Author’s note: I have lived, and worked, in countries that were sliding into autocracy and/or were already there. I never felt America could end up like one of those countries. Until, maybe - now. The events surrounding Kilmar Abrego Garcia over the past few days have taken me several steps closer to what I think of as “break glass in case of emergency.” The administration’s open defiance of a Supreme Court order (cloaked in absurd misrepresentation of what the ruling actually said); Trump’s pledge to send American citizens to El Salvador’s CECOT prison (the dystopian mega-prison that’s become a centerpiece of the “Bond villain” bromance with President Bukele); the flurry of blatant falsehoods willfully misinterpreting the Supreme Court ruling from Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House Advisor Stephen Miller—these developments have escalated my concern to a level I hadn’t quite reached, even during the constitutional chaos of 2020. The question now feels urgent: Is the United States undergoing a process that political scientists describe as autocratic capture?

I do not wish to be an alarmist—not in my writing, and not even in my own internal dialogue. I try to be cautious, fair, analytical, and grounded. I make a genuine effort to examine the evidence with clear eyes and without bias, especially on something as consequential as this. So where i’m headed with this essay is — A) What do the experts say constitutes autocratic capture? And B) Does what we’re seeing match the pattern?

What Is Autocratic Capture?

Political scientists and historians have long studied how elected leaders—often in democratic systems—consolidate power and gradually hollow out the institutions of liberal democracy. The term autocratic capture refers to a pattern in which democratic states are taken over from within, piece by piece. It doesn’t involve tanks in the streets or immediate abolition of elections. Instead, the mechanisms of government—courts, law enforcement, the military, the press, the civil service—are systematically bent to serve the power and survival of a single faction or leader. The question is: Is that happening in America under Trump?

As historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat puts it in Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present, this process usually includes a mix of personality cult, institutional erosion, and loyalty-based enforcement. It’s not always obvious until it's well underway. That’s what makes it effective—and dangerous.

In their book How Democracies Die, Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt outline the key indicators:

• Attacks on the press

• Delegitimization of political opponents

• Undermining judicial independence

• Weaponizing state institutions for personal use

• Undermining electoral confidence

Timothy Snyder, in On Tyranny, adds a psychological dimension—emphasizing how democracies fail when people abandon the belief that the system can work, opening the door to strongman rule.

These frameworks provide useful tools. But they also raise a more pointed question: If this is the pattern, are we seeing it now?

Step by Step: Matching the Pattern

1. Defying the Judiciary

It’s one thing to appoint ideologically aligned judges. It’s another to ignore their rulings.

The Kilmar Abrego Garcia case marks a potential inflection point.
After a federal judge issued a stay preventing his deportation, the administration removed him from the U.S. anyway. The Supreme Court ordered him returned. The administration’s response: he’s no longer on U.S. soil, therefore the ruling is moot. Case closed.

This is defiance, cloaked in transparently false interpretation of the Supreme Court ruling. Will the Supreme Court allow it to stand? Clearly their intent was for the Government to make a serious good faith effort to bring Abrego Garcia back; yet the government is transparently saying they will not even try to do that, and they are saying their actions conform to the Supreme Court’s order. If allowed to stand, it signals that executive actions can preempt judicial oversight and the highest court int he land will just “roll with it.” On the other hand, if the Supreme Court pushes back, it will be a sign of life for the system of checks and balances.

Either way - the behavior of the Trump administration in this matter would seem to fit squarely into autocratic behavior: obey the courts only when it suits power and erode the power of the courts to act as a check.

2. Eroding Bureaucratic Neutrality

Trump fired multiple Inspectors General. Now, with the Schedule F plan and the Project 2025 blueprint, Trump’s has gone further, eliminating thousands of career civil servants and replace them with political loyalists across agencies.

He has also:

• Fired members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, replacing them with officers viewed as more personally loyal.

• Dismissed JAG Corps attorneys (military legal officials) and replaced them with partisan appointees.

• Installed extreme loyalists into roles traditionally filled by politically neutral professionals—most recently by nominating a partisan ideologue as FBI Director.or

This appears to be clear efforts at institutional capture and is qualitatively different from the norm we have seen in this country previously. The FBI director normally serves a 10 year term, for example; the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs frequently spans multiple administrations; nominees for FBI Director are not typically hyper loyalists. This effort to rebuild agencies to serve regime loyalty rather than democratic accountability seems to clearly conform to the requisites of autocratic capture.

3. Weaponizing the State

Trump's rhetoric and actions point toward a view of the state as an extension of his personal will.

He has:

• Declared that he will send U.S. citizens to foreign prisons (specifically, El Salvador’s CECOT) if U.S. courts won't incarcerate them.

• Vowed to launch military tribunals for journalists and critics.

• Said he would build a new federal force to "hunt down traitors."

• Attacked Law firms and forced them to “bend the knee”

• Attacked Universities and is withholding billions in grants unless they accept onerous terms and conditions.

4. Creating a Two-Tier Justice System

• Following his inauguration on January 20, 2025, President Trump issued full commutations and pardons to those indicted and/or sentenced in relation to the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.

• The order explicitly granted clemency for nine members of the Oath Keepers and five members of the Proud Boys, two well-known violent extremist groups.

Meanwhile, his political enemies are being threatened with indictment, prison, or exile.

This appears to be an emerging legal duality—impunity for insiders, prosecution for critics. It undermines the principle of equal justice and is essential to consolidating autocratic power.

5. Eroding Trust in Democracy

A key feature of the slide into autocracy is to create cynicism and erod trust in democracy as an instituation. The front line in this type of effort is the matter of elections and election integrity. Since 2020, Trump has relentlessly pushed the claim that the election was “rigged.” Despite losing more than 60 court challenges, he continues to insist the system is broken. His allies now run “election integrity” task forces that often amount to vote suppression and post-election disinformation.

The restul fo this effort is measurable:

• A majority of Republican voters now believe the 2020 election was stolen.

• Election officials have faced death threats and harassment, causing many to resign.

• State legislatures have passed laws giving themselves new power to overturn results.

This is the bedrock condition of autocratic capture: make the public doubt that democracy ever worked. It seems to be happening.

What’s the Counterargument?

To be fair, there are counterpoints that deserve consideration.

1. The System Still Has Checks and Balances.
   Trump lost in 2020. Courts ruled against him. Journalists still publish. Congress has at times constrained him. If Democrats regain the House in 2026, they could reassert oversight.

2. Much of This Is Rhetoric, Not Action.
   Critics argue that Trump’s authoritarian promises are often performative. His administration has been chaotic and inconsistent, and many of his more extreme ideas have failed in implementation.

3. The U.S. Has Strong Democratic Norms.
   America has a long tradition of institutional resilience. Some say this resilience, even in the face of populist extremism, is proof that the system is ultimately self-correcting.

All are valid points and should be considered. Yes, the system survived 2020—but barely, and only because a handful of officials refused to go along. Rhetoric, when believed by tens of millions and backed by executive action, becomes reality. And democratic norms, as history shows, are not permanent—they are habits that can be broken.

So—Bottom Line — Is This Autocratic Capture?

Let’s return to the question.

We’ve looked not just at inflammatory quotes or partisan behavior, but at structural actions:

• Ignoring judicial orders.

• Replacing apolitical watchdogs with loyalists.

• Reorganizing the state around personal power.

• Pardoning violent supporters while threatening critics.

• Undermining confidence in elections and courts alike.

When you lay the pieces on the table, it becomes difficult—if not impossible—to conclude that this is anything other than a form of autocratic capture in progress.

We may not yet be fully captured. But the machinery is in motion.

Will the remaining guardrails hold or give way? Will some combination of citizens, courts, legislators, and journalists be able to ensure that democracy actually survives—or will America be fundamentally and forever transformed into something that looks a lot like the autocracies that Trump admires so much? It’s not possible yet to know where this will end, but it is clear that processes are under way that meet the conditions of autocratic capture as various experts have defined them. Deal with it, America. This is where you/we are.