Trump’s Latest Executive Order Lays Bare His Authoritarian Ambitions
The highest form of freedom in a democracy isn’t just the right to vote or protest—it’s the right to speak truth to power. To call out corruption. To challenge lies. To stand firm when the powerful demand silence. This is the freedom that sustains all others.
And it’s the one Donald Trump tried to crush Wednesday with the stroke of a pen.
When he signed an executive order directing the Justice Department to investigate Chris Krebs and Miles Taylor—two public servants whose only crime was telling the truth—Trump didn’t just abuse his office. He weaponized the government against honesty itself.
This wasn’t law enforcement: It was political vengeance. This wasn’t democracy: It was a warning shot from the edge of autocracy. And if we let this slide—if we treat it as just another Trump headline—we are inviting the next strongman to do the same, only worse.
The freedom to speak truth to power is either sacred, or it’s gone.
Thus, Donald Trump just moved America miles down the road toward our becoming a police state. There’s no other way to describe it.
His E.O. demanding criminal investigations into Chris Krebs and Miles Taylor—and his public statement that Taylor is a “traitor” guilty of “treason”—are nothing short of a blatant assault on the rule of law and a perilous step toward turning America into a dictatorship.
This isn’t just about settling personal scores; it’s a calculated move to instill fear, silence dissent, and dismantle the very foundations of our democratic institutions.
Can you imagine yourself being called a traitor by the president of the United States and thus potentially facing prison? Having to hire expensive attorneys, which may well force you to sell your home to pay for defending yourself? Not to mention having to protect yourself and your family from the........
© New Republic
