Donald Trump has made a hobby of defying democratic norms. Some norms aren't important, of course, and many of them need to die, but there are norms that are critical for society to function and for people to have confidence in their government. For example, people in elections shouldn't be calling for their opponents to be arrested, or threatening to arrest them should the election go a particular way. That sort of behaviour can destroy a democracy. Another key norm is that politicians agree that if they lose an election that they will peaceably accept the result, rather than insisting on becoming a dictator or instigating a civil war.
This last norm is one Trump has been insistent on ignoring in recent times, and it is a terrifying prospect. Trump hasn't outright said that if he loses that there should be a civil war and he will stay in office indefinitely as a dictator. He knows that saying that right now would be too much. It would be a risk for him personally, as calling for civil war is the sort of thing that can get you impeached, imprisoned, or killed. Vaguely avoiding the question of abdicating power and suggesting that the electoral process is tained and fraudulent won't get you put in prison though, so it is safe. Safe for Trump, at least, but it absolutely threatens democracy in the US.
I think Trump has a plan here. He is a fool and an asshole, but he has plenty of raw cunning, and he knows that if he gets up and yells "White people rise up, destroy the government and install me as dictator for life!" that he risks everything. If instead he merely tries to convince people that elections are pointless and cozies up to white nationalist militias, he might find himself installed as a dictator anyway if the election doesn't go his way. He can get people riled up and ready to fight if he loses, especially if the margin is tight. If they don't rise up for him, well, he lost anyway, so no great loss. If they do rise up for him and win, well, great, then he wins!
Classic Trump. He aims to get other people to take all the risks that will make him personally a huge profit, and if things go south he has it set up so he can jettison them completely and sail off unscathed.
I am deeply concerned. Demonizing of the free press, constant talk of fradulent elections, musings on delaying elections as an obvious power grab, these are things you see in states that are about to fail and collapse into dictatorships.
People often yell about how *this* election is the important one, much more important than the others. I usually don't buy into that. Every election matters, and we constantly get on about how the stuff happening right now is the most important stuff - it never fails. The likely upcoming election in Canada, for example, is one where I have district preferences for who wins, but I am not fooling myself into thinking that this is *the* election. It is just *an* election.
But in the US I think we might actually be looking at a decision point between a dictatorship and democracy. If Trump wins or loses handily there will be rumblings, no doubt, but the thing that scares me most is if he barely loses. He has made it clear he has no intention of leaving office should there be any doubt in the result, and he has a Supreme Court packed to defend him no matter what he does. I worry that he will simply announce that the election wasn't legitimate and he will stay in power until he can arrange a proper one, at a time to be decided later.
A lot of Republicans, and a lot of the power structure, will absolutely stand by him if he does this. Does that end in a civil war? A dictatorship? A quick coup / impeachment? I don't know, and neither do you.
This is where the erosion of norms takes us. We need our leaders to model the behaviour of accepting election results, or the populace won't accept them, and that leads to catastrophe. Trump is much like Littlefinger from Game of Thrones - he is happy to burn down the kingdom as long as it gives him a shot at ruling over the ashes.
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