We are a country that stands on the precipice, just six weeks away from swearing in, for the second time, a wannabe “dictator” with ambitions to wildly reshape our democracy. There is a desire to tune out. I get it. And while, as a member of the media, I feel a little sheepish making the case to keep reading columns (like this one!), watching the news, and listening to podcasts, it’s a perilous moment for America, and it only serves Donald Trump and his allies to look the other way.
Many people were shocked by Trump’s victory in 2016 and turned to the news media to make sense of what had happened, buying subscriptions and becoming glued to cable news. Eight years later, the legacy media looks like a shrunken husk, with 2024 election night viewership down more than 25% from the last presidential race and a growing perception that the likes of Joe Rogan are ascendant while the old guard is diminished. But even if people are tuning out political coverage, that doesn’t mean the news cycle is going to grind to a halt.
On the contrary, there’s been no shortage of developments the past few weeks as Trump has started assembling a potential Cabinet featuring normal choices, like Marco Rubio for secretary of state, alongside norms-crushers, such as FBI director nominee Kash Patel, a guy who has mused about targeting journalists, and defense secretary candidate Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News host who has railed against so-called wokeness in the military. The public can’t count on Republicans, who will control the Senate next month, to fully vet such nominees, as Tommy Tuberville, for one, said it’s not their job. “Who’s to say we’re a better vetter and picker of people than Donald Trump?” asked Tuberville, who apparently doesn’t grasp that it’s the Senate’s constitutional duty to give “advice and consent” on the presidential Cabinet nominees.
It’s also the traditional role of the media to apply scrutiny to people nominated for powerful government positions. Without the work of journalists, the public wouldn’t know about allegations of sexual misconduct, excessive drinking, and financial mismanagement against Hegseth, who has denied the claims against him. (Trump, meanwhile, is standing by his pick.) The Hegseth coverage has painted a picture of someone who appears unprepared to lead a department with an $849 billion budget and nearly 3 million employees, and is a reminder of the type of accountability journalism needed in the face of Trump’s unreality show.
The transition period has already shown that Trump can be held in check, as even Republican senators appeared to balk at the idea of Matt Gaetz leading the Justice Department. The Trump transition also relented in allowing Cabinet nominees to be vetted by the FBI after “multiple senators in both parties…called for thorough vetting of Trump’s picks,” according to Politico, which suggests that pushback still works with the president-elect. This may seem like a very small victory, but every victory is exactly that—a victory. Protecting norms and institutions is a game of inches, not feet.
Trump is still heading into the White House emboldened. He wants to do a lot, much of which is completely without historical precedent. On Sunday, he told NBC’s Kristen Welker that “we have to end” birthright citizenship, despite that right being enshrined in our Constitution. He called the first section of the 14th Amendment “ridiculous.” No one is surprised that the guy who is musing about pardoning the January 6 rioters is now toying with editing the Constitution, but it further shows how incredibly dangerous this moment is. Utah senator and devoted Trumper Mike Lee followed up the NBC interview by making a nonsensical case on the president-elect’s behalf, showing how far some in the GOP will go to provide a rationale for Trump’s ideas.
There is something especially terrible and tragic about the idea of changing Reconstruction-era amendments like the 14th, which was originally ratified in 1868 to grant citizenship to formerly enslaved people. These amendments are a key part of the democratic bedrock on which America is built—not ideals to which a president can simply take a Sharpie. Worse yet, their demise could also mark the beginning of an even darker future in which he could embark upon wreaking more constitutional chaos, challenging other civil rights that America holds near and dear. Trump may not be able to do this via executive order, but the fact that he’s even discussing it should serve as a wake-up call for all of us.
Americans are exhausted. I’m exhausted too (I used to be young and did not have bags under my eyes). It’s been nearly a decade since Trump came down that golden escalator. But it’s also important to remember that this was a close election with lower turnout than in 2020, and 75 million voters cast ballots against Trump; the man does not have the “mandate” he thinks he has. It may be tempting to despair, retreat into nihilism, and conclude that nothing can stop Trump from taking over our government and remodeling it into some kind of Koch-brother fever dream. But that is very much not true! We were able to protect institutions during the first Trump administration; we can do that again. The question is: How do we best protect the norms and institutions so that they can survive after Trump’s second term?
