Authoritarianism can’t happen here. Or can it?

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A filmmaker and camera crew flew to Minnesota in June to interview me about threats to liberal democracy. His previous documentary about Dr. Charlie Clements — a U.S. fighter pilot who refused bombing missions in Vietnam, became a pacifist doctor and worked with war-ravaged Salvadorans — won an Academy Award. I’m not the subject of his new documentary, but he was interested in a book I’d published in 1992 explaining how and why after World War II the U.S. supported authoritarian national security states in Latin America and much of the so-called Third World. He thought I could shed light on present-day threats to our democracy, including the rise of authoritarianism — strict obedience to authority at the expense of personal liberty, and autocracy — the emergence of a leader wielding nearly absolute power. I described characteristics of national security states and reflected on their relevance for today.

U.S.-supported national security states were led by military dictators or strongmen backed by repressive militaries and paramilitary groups. Nations facing existential threats could only be defended or saved by authoritarian leaders.

Candidate Donald Trump fuels insecurities and fears. Our nation is being destroyed by external and internal enemies. He alone can save us. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott told the Republican National Convention: “The president’s most sacred duty is to secure the country.” If he returns to office, Trump will consolidate power in the presidency. He promises to use the military to stifle dissent, run detention camps and deport millions of migrants. He has close ties to well-armed extremist groups and the head of the Heritage Foundation said recently that Trump’s American revolution “will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”

Leaders in national security states viewed authentic democracy, including free and fair elections, with contempt. Democracy was subversive and promoters were enemies of the state. The United States carried out coups against democratically elected governments, and elections, if allowed, provided cover for authoritarian rule by giving the appearance of democracy while obscuring how power was actually exercised.

Republican Party leaders and their foot soldiers are working tirelessly to undermine confidence in elections and to dismantle historic guardrails that ensure their reliability. It is the party of the “big lie.” Two-thirds of Republicans believe the previous presidential election was “stolen.” The only legitimate election is one that Trump wins. He recently told conservative Christians that if he becomes president they will never need to vote again.

National security states governed for the benefit of privileged groups. Beneficiaries often included large landowners, the country’s military, the dictator or strongman, business leaders, the traditional church hierarchy and foreign stakeholders. The U.S. supported national security states because they protected the interests of powerful U.S. businesses that partnered with local elites. George Kennan noted the rationale in 1948. The U.S., he said, had half the world’s wealth. In order to maintain the disparity we had to “cease to talk about vague and … unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of living standards and democratization” and instead “deal in straight power concepts.”

Authoritarian populists offer narratives that conceal primary objectives which almost always line their pockets and worsen pressing social problems. In the U.S. today, stark divisions, inequalities and frustrations, some manufactured and others legitimate, are fertile ground for candidate Trump’s apocalyptic narrative and grievance-driven rhetoric. He mesmerizes followers, many of whom will be hurt by his policies that likely will lead to higher unemployment and inflation, greater inequality, more gun violence and rising crime, lower-quality health care, rising medical and national debt, a less-secure retirement, and myriad other problems aggravated by climate change. It’s not surprising that some people long for a strong man to fix things. It is surprising how many people place their hope in a narcissistic con man.

National security states were obsessed with enemies. The future of the nation hung in the balance because depraved and ruthless enemies lurked everywhere. Subversive groups included unions, professors, foreign aid workers, journalists, priests and nuns, peasant movements, agricultural cooperatives, women’s groups, judges, opposition political parties, the media, human rights organizations, students and many others. Enemies had to be defeated using any means necessary.

The Army opened the School of the Americas in 1946 in Panama, a training center that became known throughout Latin America as a school of assassins, dictators and coups. A top-secret report prepared for the White House in 1954 rationalized support for brutal thugs: The U.S. was “facing an implacable enemy.” “If the United States is to survive … we must [reconsider] longstanding concepts of fair play” and “learn to subvert, sabotage and destroy our enemies by more clever, sophisticated, more effective methods than those used against us.”

In the U.S. today, election workers, teachers, school boards, journalists, independent judges, historians, librarians, environmentalists, professors, Democrats generally, and any individual or group connected to “the deep state” are considered legitimate targets. Spreading irrational fears among the MAGA base reinforces a narrative in which defeating enemies becomes the primary responsibility of the leader. Jamelle Bouie wrote in a New York Times opinion piece (June 25) that “the [MAGA] goal is always the same: to label the enemy as an urgent threat to society and to try to win power on the promise to destroy that enemy by any means necessary.”

National security states ruthlessly controlled information and messaging, spread disinformation, operated secretly, threatened independent media and intimidated and silenced journalists. Governmental and civic institutions were subservient to the leader, who along with his minions, determined the veracity of facts.

Project 2025, which provides detailed plans for a second Trump administration, offers a blueprint to restrict personal freedoms, consolidate power in the presidency, and undermine the independence of governmental and nongovernmental organizations. Candidate Trump’s plans to politicize the FBI, Justice Department, Supreme Court, Federal Reserve, and to turn thousands of civil service employees into party hacks would end democracy as we know it.

Finally, national security states required the dominant religious group (in Latin America, the Catholic Church) to serve the ideological and political imperatives of authoritarian leaders. For many decades the church hierarchy was a willing partner in the oppression of the poor. Dominant theology reinforced obedience to religious and political authorities. It promised heavenly rewards to those who endured social injustice and misery. When a people’s church lived out a gospel in which Jesus identified with the poor and those working for justice, it was brutally repressed, often with assistance from the United States.

The religious dynamic we face is striking. A huge percentage of white, evangelical Christians, many aligned with white supremacist groups, embrace authoritarianism and work to bring an autocrat to power. Christian nationalism is on the rise with allies in the Supreme Court and champions throughout the MAGA universe. Their support for candidate Trump is ironclad with many believing he is chosen by God to defeat his enemies and save the nation.

The vast majority of Republicans embrace authoritarianism and want autocrat Trump to take power. Many other Americans, to our own peril, downplay present dangers. Defenders of democracy must exercise our power, first at the ballot box this November, and subsequently with determined actions to build a more perfect union.

Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer is emeritus professor of justice and peace studies, University of St. Thomas.