MAGA: Make Autocracy Great Again

Trump doesn’t want to rig elections anymore; he wants to erase them entirely, replacing democracy with grievance, permanence, and a ruler who never fears voters again.

Guest article by Michael Cohen

Source: Hadrian / Shutterstock.com

I’ve said this before, and I’ll keep saying it because repetition is the point when you’re dealing with a cult leader who learns through osmosis, not reflection. Vladimir Putin once famously remarked that it doesn’t matter who you vote for, only who counts the votes. Donald Trump loved that line. Rolled it around on his tongue. Treated it like a business mantra. And as with everything Trump touches, he didn’t just repeat it; he tried to one-up it.

Because why stop at rigging elections when you can eliminate them altogether?

Welcome to the logical endpoint of Trumpism, where democracy isn’t just inconvenient; it’s optional. A relic. Something you phase out like fax machines or truth.

The sitting president of the United States has now openly mused, on more than one occasion, about the radical idea that maybe we shouldn’t even bother with elections anymore. Why go through all that hassle? The lines, the ballots, the counting, the courts, the losses, the tantrums. Why not just skip straight to the coronation?

This isn’t satire. I wish it were. This is a president who currently occupies the Oval Office and, with a straight face, suggests that because he believes he’s done such a “great job,” the country could probably take a pass on voting. Think about that. Not because elections are unsafe. Not because of war or catastrophe. But because, in his own mind, he has earned immunity from accountability.

That’s not confidence. That’s authoritarian cosplay.

Trump has been laying this groundwork since 2016. Back then, it was all about “rigged elections.” Then it became “I’ll only accept the results if I win.” Then came January 6, where democracy was treated like a speed bump on the way to permanent grievance. Now we’re at the next phase: Why even pretend anymore?

He complains that voters psychologically want to “check” the party in power during midterms, as if elections are some annoying reflex rather than a constitutional right. And when confronted with the historical reality that sitting presidents often lose seats, Trump’s instinct isn’t introspection; it’s preemptive excuse-making. If Republicans lose, it’s not his fault. It’s tradition. Or psychology. Or sabotage. Or, preferably, the existence of elections themselves.

This is where it gets darkly funny, in that dystopian way where you laugh because screaming would require oxygen. Trump’s argument boils down to this: elections are fine when they confirm his greatness, but unnecessary when they threaten his ego.

In other words, democracy is a performance review he refuses to take.

And let’s be clear about the three massive problems with this line of thinking; though calling it “thinking” may be generous.

First, the premise is absurd. Trump is not some wildly popular leader begging the people to stop applauding. He is one of the most divisive, unpopular presidents in modern history, a man who governs by grievance and measures success by crowd size and cable news loyalty. The idea that his “accomplishments” are so self-evident they nullify the need for elections is laughable; if it weren’t so dangerous.

Second, elections are not punishments. They are not referendums on Trump’s feelings. They are the mechanism by which a free people decide their future. Americans don’t vote because a president deserves it; they vote because it’s their right. Trump’s inability, or refusal, to grasp this reveals his deepest fear: that power ultimately belongs to the people, not him.

And third, none of this is hypothetical. He has floated the idea of cancelling elections while in office. He’s joked about it from behind the Resolute Desk. He’s tested it in rooms full of loyalists to see who laughs, who claps, and who stays silent. He invokes wartime exceptions even when no such war exists, because autocrats always need a reason to suspend democracy; and if one doesn’t exist, they invent it.

Authoritarianism doesn’t arrive with tanks in the streets. It arrives with “just asking questions.” With jokes. With hypotheticals. With “wouldn’t it be easier if…?”

I know Trump. I didn’t read about him. I didn’t speculate from afar. I sat in rooms where power was treated like a personal asset and loyalty like a non-disclosure agreement. When he talks about eliminating elections, he’s not being provocative; he’s being aspirational.

And here’s the punchline, the cruel irony of it all: Trump doesn’t want to abolish elections because he’s strong. He wants to abolish them because he’s weak. Because deep down, he knows that the one thing he can’t control forever is the will of the people.

So when the president asks, “Why are we having an election?” the answer is simple; and terrifyingly necessary.

Because without them, America doesn’t fall; it converts, quietly, into a place where the ruler always wins and the counting happens long before anyone votes.

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