Donald Trump’s rise to power as an elected authoritarian was not preordained or an act of destiny. Since at least 2016, there have been multiple moments when the American people and their institutions and leaders could have made different choices that would have prevented Trump’s rise and return to power. Perhaps the most obvious such moment was Trump’s failed coup attempt on Jan. 6, 2021, and the larger plot against American democracy.

“The walls” never did close in; Trump was in fact above the law (and the Jan. 6 funders and other high-level organizers and agents as well); the right-wing extremists on the Supreme Court made him a de facto king and he will likely never face serious consequences for his coup attempt or other wrongdoing. The far more likely scenario is that Trump will fulfill his threat and promise to use all means available to him to punish those members of law enforcement, the government, the news media, civil society and the public who dared to try to hold him accountable under the law.

Instead of being his downfall, Trump and his propagandists and other MAGA people would create a fiction and alternate reality around the events of Jan. 6 and the Big Lie that reimagined one of the greatest betrayals in American history as being an act of democracy, civic virtue and “love.” To that end, the Jan. 6 convicts have been elevated into political martyrs, heroes and saints by Trump, the MAGA movement and the right-wing disinformation propaganda machine. Trump has promised to pardon the Jan. 6 convicts; in all probability, the Jan. 6 convicts will repay Trump with their absolute loyalty as they take on the role of being his personal enforcers.

On the centrality of Jan. 6 to Trump’s fascist power and MAGA personality cult, historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat explains in her newsletter how:

Jan. 6 radicalized the GOP, accelerating its transformation into an entity dependent on lying, corruption, and the threat and reality of violence against internal enemies. But it is fear, as well as fanaticism, that has kept the GOP disciplined in the years since the insurrection, no one wanting to be a target.

Because Donald Trump won the 2024 U.S. election, we did not see the expected waves of political violence “from below” in November. Nor was it necessary to stage some form of replay of the Jan. 6 coup attempt. Instead, we are bracing for the start of institutionalized violence from above. On “Day One,” mass deportations of undocumented people will supposedly start, assisted by the U.S. military –or so the incoming administration hopes.

Authoritarianism is the conversion of the rule of law into rule by the lawless. It makes perfect sense that a convicted felon and the man who sent the violent mob into the Capitol on his behalf would initiate an American autocracy.

Fascists believe you have to destroy to create, and Jan. 6 has already been canonized because of its violence as a foundational moment of the New Era of Trumpism. If authoritarian history is any guideline, Jan. 6 could become a holiday one day.

In an attempt to make better sense of Trump’s surreal second election, how the events of Jan. 6 led to Trump’s return to power and what the American people can do to protect their democracy and society, I recently spoke with Alan Jenkins and Gan Golan. They are the co-writers of “1/6: The Graphic Novel.” (Issue number 3........

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