CrimethInc. Frames Second Trump Administration as Authoritarian Collapse and Calls for Escalatory Resistance
Source: CrimethInc.
Executive Summary
CrimethInc. published a lengthy strategic analysis arguing that the second Trump administration represents a decisive transition from liberal democracy to open authoritarianism in the United States. The article frames Trump’s return to power as the inevitable outcome of long term capitalist inequality, state capture by billionaires, and the erosion of democratic legitimacy. It asserts that repression has reached a plateau and claims that sustained unrest and direct action now present an opportunity not only to defeat Trumpism but to dismantle the underlying political and economic order.
Analysis
The article presents the Trump administration as an authoritarian regime already consolidating power through repression, institutional purges, and militarized domestic control, while portraying grassroots unrest as the only viable counterforce.
CrimethInc. argues that wealth concentration and speculative capitalism enabled Trump’s rise, citing figures such as Elon Musk as evidence that democracy has become subordinate to oligarchic power.
The piece claims that the administration has largely completed an authoritarian program including purging federal agencies, weaponizing ICE and the DOJ, suppressing media and universities, and normalizing domestic military deployments.
It frames ICE operations, National Guard deployments, and federal raids as deliberate efforts to accustom the population to fear and suffering rather than to maintain public safety.
The authors highlight protests in Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, and nationwide No Kings demonstrations as proof that confrontational unrest weakens regime momentum and fractures elite alliances.
The article explicitly rejects electoral politics as a sufficient response, arguing that elections function as a distraction while real power is consolidated through force. It promotes a theory of resistance based on sustained disruption, rapid response networks, and direct action designed to fracture Trump’s support base, particularly corporate and elite backers. Historical analogies to fascist consolidation in Nazi Germany and modern autocracies are used to justify escalation and to argue that restraint only accelerates repression. While the piece stops short of issuing operational instructions, it clearly normalizes militant confrontation with state institutions and frames violence and disorder as historically necessary drivers of political change.
