Trump’s three-pronged threat to American democracy

July 21, 2026 — 5:00am

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Donald Trump, famously, is unpredictable. He promised to not start wars, then started one. He denounced the idea of regime change as a “proven, absolute failure”, then embraced it. He abuses critics and then embraces them.

He exultantly imposed Liberation Day tariffs on almost all countries, then paused them a week later. That generated the acronym TACO – Trump always chickens out.

He revels in his own fickleness: “You call that chickening out?” Trump replied to the accusation. “It’s called negotiation.”

Former aides have attested that he will sometimes reverse his positions out of sheer perversity.

Paradoxically, his erraticism is one of his few consistencies. A decade ago, he celebrated it with the words: “It’s very important to be unpredictable.”

But in three of the fundamental themes of his second presidency, he is consistent and persistent. Not exactly predictable, but reliable.

First, he uses the presidency for the self-enrichment of himself and his family; second, for self-aggrandisement, usually at the taxpayer’s expense; third, for attempting a consolidation of authoritarian power. We saw striking examples of each in the past week.

The act of enrichment was the announcement that the Trump Media & Technology Group would provide priority access to the president’s Truth Social account – for a fee. Trump uses his Truth Social account to make statements and announcements, big and small, every day. Last month, he posted 676 times.

As The Wall Street Journal summarised: “Milliseconds matter on Wall Street, and Truth Social wants to charge traders to get faster access to the president’s posts.”

Trump Media, 41 per cent owned by Trump........

© The Sydney Morning Herald