Yale

“The Republican Party is betraying democracy,” a Yale professor and expert on facism told Insider, adding that “someone has got to push back.”

If Americans are concerned that President Donald Trump and Republicans are moving the US toward becoming a one-party, authoritarian state, they are running out of time to stop them, experts warned.

Trump has exhibited autocratic impulses since his 2016 campaign and from the moment he entered the White House.

The president has attacked virtually every democratic institution in the US when he’s felt its actions were unfavorable to his agenda or public appearance. Meanwhile, he pushed traditional US allies away while openly embracing many of the world’s most repressive leaders.

These trends have raised concern among top experts on authoritarianism, fascism, and democracy, but they’ve often said that the robust political system in the US, with its checks and balances and constitutional norms, has prevented Trump from becoming a full-blown authoritarian and doing whatever he wants.

Since Trump was acquitted in the Senate earlier this month after being impeached in the House over his dealings with Ukraine, there’s been a White House purge of impeachment witnesses, and Attorney General William Barr has intervened in the trial of a close associate of the president, Roger Stone. And the experts’ tone has changed dramatically.