The Four Horsemen of the Trump Apocalypse Are Here

Trump’s shambolic rule and daily trespass on common decency grab media attention. Meanwhile, his four horsemen stalk the land.

Coercion

At the United Nations, Trump boasted, “We’ve recently begun using the supreme power of the United States military to destroy Venezuelan terrorists and trafficking networks.” Never mind that attacking ships in international waters is a crime. Never mind that instead of stopping the ships to show the world they were in fact carrying drugs, Mr. Trump simply ordered them, and everyone aboard, blown out of the water.

He boasted that America bombed Iran. Never mind that American and Iran are not at war.

He boasted that he has used the National Guard in our cities. His claim that “the crime capital of America” was made “totally, after 12 days … totally safe,” is nonsense. What he did was make it safe for him to deploy troops in American cities.

Trumpian coercion encompasses more than the use of force. His use of economic pressure, sometimes by withholding federal grants, sometimes by threatening to block mergers, sometimes by dangling federal contracts, has brought to heel great universities, powerful law firms, important media companies, big tech, and America’s billionaires.

Corrupt Oligarchs

Every autocrat needs a powerful court. Trump is creating his own group of Oligarchs — wealthy men who will serve his interests. Because of Trump’s tax cuts, the country’s richest 400 people have gotten $1.2 trillion richer in one year.

Trump decides whether to punish or reward these super-rich knee-benders by imposing or removing tariffs on their industries, withholding or approving their corporate mergers, threatening them with prosecution or looking the other way from their crimes.

In return, these new Oligarchs dine on what used to be the White House Rose Garden and in the gold-trimmed ballroom at Mar-a-Lago. Trump is now building a $200 million ballroom for their grand parties inside the White House. Out of gratitude and fear, the oligarchs do his bidding, buying up media companies to spread his lies, funding his campaigns, doing his legal work, firing workers who speak against the regime.

Racism and Fear

Trump’s gospel teaches that God made America for Americans, and by Americans God meant white Christian men who would rule over everyone else. Firmly rejecting the idea of a country built upon many customs, many religions, and tolerance of differences, he told the United Nations that every nation must, “protect their communities and prevent their societies from being overwhelmed by people they have never seen before with different customs, religions, with different everything.”

At home, he purged women and Black leaders from the military. He resurrected the reputations of successionist slaveholders and frequently elevates the symbols of the antebellum south. He ended government efforts to improve the civil rights of all Americans and launched new efforts to prosecute organizations that defend them.

To sell his hatred, he counsels fear. Fear of young Black men. Fear of immigrants. His language is stark: “People from foreign lands … trample our borders, violate our sovereignty, cause unmitigated crime, and deplete our social safety net.”

The Destruction of our Planet

Trump told the world, “We’re getting rid of the falsely named renewables … [Climate change] is the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world.” He boasted that “I have a little standing order in the White House. Never use the word “coal,” only use the words “clean, beautiful coal.”

He ended government efforts to build a clean energy future. He expanded government efforts to produce, consume, and export fossil fuels.

These four horsemen ride together.

He promised corrupt oil industry Oligarchs that he would protect their interest if they gave him money. He gave corrupt Oligarchs a merger they lusted after and got his own censor in the CBS newsroom. He stokes racism and uses fear to get what he wants, and if that fails, he uses the civil and military power of government to coerce. These riders are amongst us. They will destroy everything if they can.

And yet, we know how to stop them.

Say this out loud: We still live in a constitutional democracy and what you do matters. Donald Trump got elected and proceeded to launch the most lawless, most corrupt, most dangerous administration in American history. And yet, what you do matters.

Love your neighbor and hate has no power. Love yourself and you will not bow down. Stand together and he cannot win. Lift up your gaze: a better America is coming.

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A Modest Proposal

Stuart Stevens · May 2

Editor’s Note: In the 18th century, author Jonathan Swift penned a satirical essay suggesting that poor Irish families could subsist by selling their offspring as a culinary delicacy for the elite. In that spirit, Stuart Stevens presents to you a fitting proposition for the Trump era.

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