It was at a town-hall-style event in Iowa last week when Donald Trump first endorsed the idea of becoming a “Day One” dictator. When Fox News’ Sean Hannity tried to help the former president, the Republican brushed off the effort.
“I love this guy,” Trump said, referring to the host. “He says, ‘You’re not going to be a dictator, are you?’ I said: ‘No, no, no. Other than Day One.’ We’re closing the border, and we’re drilling, drilling, drilling. After that, I’m not a dictator.”
As we discussed soon after, the assembled GOP voters didn’t recoil. On the contrary, the Iowans applauded the Republican’s rhetoric. They heard their party’s likely 2024 nominee voice support for exercising authoritarian power, and they liked it.
Five days later, Trump delivered remarks in New York and reiterated his ambitions. “I said I want to be a dictator for one day,” the candidate said, in a line that will almost certainly appear in campaign advertising. “You know why I wanted to be a dictator? Because I want a wall, and I want to drill, drill, drill.”
Once again, the rhetoric was met with enthusiastic applause.
It’s possible that the audience cheered, not because Trump touted a dictatorial vision, but because these Republican voters like the idea of a giant border wall and increased oil drilling. In other words, maybe they were cheering the issues, not the authoritarianism.
But even if that were the case, it’s hardly reassuring: It suggests there are GOP voters who agree with Trump’s plans — and they don’t much care whether he operates within the confines of the law or our system of government or not.
The other possibility, of course, is that those in attendance applauded the former president’s rhetoric precisely because they approved of his “dictator” comments. As a Washington Post analysis summarized, Trump’s vision for a “day-one dictatorship” has effectively become “an applause line.”
Keep in mind, we’re talking about a politician who has previously said he bases his views in part on audience reactions to random ideas he vocalizes without forethought. When Trump hears audiences applaud references to a temporary dictatorship, he’s likely to believe the support is evidence that he’s on the right track — and should keep going.
Republican officials initially insisted that the former president was kidding about creating a temporary dictatorship. On Saturday night, Trump stepped on their defenses and left little doubt that he was quite sincere.
But as discouraging as the reactions from GOP officeholders have been, it’s the reactions from Republican voters that arguably matter more.