Thread by @JoyceWhiteVance

1/There's a story about Ben Franklin emerging from the Constitutional Convention & telling a woman who asked what type of government they’d created, “a Republic, if you can keep it.” The 2024 election is the moment where we find out if we can.

2/If Trump wins in 2024, we lose the Republic. That’s not drama, and that’s not overstatement. That’s what Trump is promising. It's what he's been working on since at least October of 2020. Read the full explanation here: joycevance.substack.com/p/frogs-boiled…

3/On Sunday @washingtonpost reported onTrump’s plans for a 2nd term. It’s not the first time there has been reporting on Trump’s plans for 2025 if he wins a second term, but this article goes the furthest in laying out Trump’s plans in clear reporting. It starts like this:

@washingtonpost 4/It sounds positively Stalinist. most frightening thing about this, to my mind, is that it’s not new. People simply aren’t paying attention. In Oct 2020, before the last election, Trump was already taking steps in this direction. trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-a…

@washingtonpost 5/Trump signed an executive order making a change in civil service rules that made it possible to fire employees in policy positions “at will”—for no reason at all. It was too far in the weeds to resonate with folks, when everyone was focused on the upcoming election.

@washingtonpost 6/The order undid the pesky civil service protections that made it impossible to fire FBI agents who were investigating Trump or government lawyers who insisted he play be the rules. It was a harbinger of Trump’s plans for 2025. One of Biden's 1st steps was rescinding it.

@washingtonpost 7/By summer of 2022, there was reporting top Trump allies were working on plans to radically reshape the executive branch of the federal government if Trump won in 2024. They were preparing to purge career federal civil servants and lining up Trump loyalists to replace them.

8/The Washington Post story goes far beyond that, detailing Trump's plan. You should read the whole story. Gift link: washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/…

9/Also mentioned, a plan for putting down any protests against Trump using the military. It’s the stuff of banana republics. It’s a menu for the end of democracy.

10/Trump’s campaign spokesman declined to respond to the Post’s story, saying only, “President Trump is focused on crushing his opponents in the primary election and then going on to beat Crooked Joe Biden,” and “President Trump has always stood for law and order, and protecting the Constitution.” It reminds me of what we’ve learned this week in New York Judge Arthur Engoron’s courtroom: if a witness refuses to answer a direct question, the judge is entitled to draw a negative inference from that failure and reach the conclusion the witness isn’t answering because the answer would be damaging to him.

11/Donald Trump plainly wants to end democracy. That’s not being alarmist, it’s just the truth. as we head into the election, I hope you'll sign up for my Newsletter, Civil Discourse. Let's work together to keep the Republic: joycevance.substack.com/p/frogs-boiled…