Dilan Esper Profile picture
Jul 5, 2025 5 tweets 1 min read Read on X
Prediction: there will not be an autocratic takeover of the American state in the next 3 years, and when it doesn't happen the academics like Skocpol who predicted it will face no loss of standing in elite discourse, just like foreign policy pundits who supported the Iraq War.
There's a whole Cry Wolf Caucus in academia who are constantly telling us we meet, e.g., 16 of the 17 signs of Hitler taking over. In an ideal society this sort of thing-- which is CLEARLY politically motivated and careerist-- would cost people credibility when it doesn't happen.
At any rate we have very strong institutions against any sort of Hitler-style takeover. There's a lot of stuff the Trump Administration is doing that I think is very bad, including, for instance, the Medicaid cuts he just signed or the immigration policies.
But American democracy will survive. There will be free elections in 2026 and 2028 and most likely the Republicans will not do well in them.
And while President Trump will have a lot of power to do damage in the area of immigration, Presidents have always had lots of power over immigration (Joe Biden did too) and it is inaccurate to label that an autocratic takeover and destruction of federalism.

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More from @dilanesper

May 11
I'm not an expert on employment discrimination law so I am not really your source on what will happen in the NY Times reverse discrimination lawsuit.

But I can tell you about a broader more "cultural" trend about this issue, which is a lot of people don't realize this is illegal
Discrimination against white people because of their race has been illegal ever since the civil rights statutes were passed (and was illegal before that under the Constitution with respect to state actors).

TBC, there were exceptions for very specific types of affirmative action
But those exceptions, even when they existed (and it is unclear any of them still do after Students for Fair Admission), were very narrow. E.g., even many college affirmative action programs were illegal and SCOTUS struck a bunch of them down.
Read 9 tweets
May 3
(a is Justice Thomas' argument in his concurrence. And it's a TERRIBLE argument. Exactly the sort of "gotcha' textualism that gives lawyers a bad name.

The 1982 amendments to the VRA were literally passed to address districting. Everyone thought that was what they were doing.
The only reason they were even changing the VRA in 1982 was to address the holding of a case called Mobile v Bolden from 1980. Bolden involved a challenge to an at large districting system. SCOTUS applied a discriminatory intent test Congress thought too strict.
So, they passed the amendment you see quoted in Callais. Yes I know it doesn't use the word "districting". But that's a totally silly and un-legal argument-- things can be about a topic without using the word.
Read 8 tweets
May 1
By popular demand! Tomorrow is the 4th anniversary of the Dobbs leak. Let's talk about what did and didn't happen after Dobbs.

Obviously lots of states passed or brought into effect abortion bans after Dobbs. But while pro-lifers won the battle, pro-choicers are winning the war.
First, a number of states with initiative processes have enacted or reinstated abortion rights.

For example, Ohio passed Issue 1 in 2023, creating a state constitutional right to an abortion before viability.
In 2024, 7 states passed abortion rights ballot initiatives. Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, New York, and Nevada all enacted broad abortion rights. A majority of Florida voters also voted for one, but were stopped by a 60% threshold imposed by GOP lawmakers.
Read 26 tweets
Apr 4
i am so angry at some of my fellow Americans. i am not even the biggest NATO booster but there's no way you can tear the thing apart while Russia is waging war for territory in Ukraine.

These people want to blow up NATO because WE were morons who attacked Iran.
A bunch of people on the Right are now committed to an absolutely idiotic war that caused a global oil shock and failed to change the Iranian regime because (1) President Trump ordered it and (2) they have an irrational love of wars.

Europe, hurt by the shock, is pissed at us.
Thus, in the war supporters' deranged calculus, Europe must be punished because how dare they get upset at us for raising their energy prices and causing shortages.

You literally have to be so incurious as to not even WANT to understand other leaders' feelings to think that.
Read 5 tweets
Apr 3
Thread: Justice Clarence Thomas has an incredible intellect, even though I often disagree with what he says.

My thesis is almost every member of an oppressed group who on the Court gets stereotyped, and the Justices of Color are specifically falsely accused of being dim.
First, a reading assignment. Read Thomas' dissent in Grutter v. Bollinger. It's a bit long. And I'm not expecting you to agree with it (or disagree with it). Just read it. Appreciate how tightly argued it is. See how he makes good point after good point.

supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/…
Obviously Clarence Thomas has thought quite a lot about affirmative action, ever since he was the recipient of it and perceived how it stigmatized a Black kid from rural Georgia as he attended elite white universities.
Read 19 tweets
Mar 13
This is just a really important lesson from the Iraq War (and some other things, like Katrina) that conservatives, with their massive media apparatus, never learned. They think they can BS and spin their way out of anything, but no, sometimes you just have to get the policy right
If the administration gets the Straits of Hormuz open and oil prices down and puts a stop to Iranian attacks on neighboring countries and forces political moderation in Iran (all things I hope happens), they can claim success. But if the bad stuff keeps happening....
As I said in my tweet, the original demonstration of this proposition didn't even involve a conservative President-- it was LBJ constantly telling the public that the light was at the end of the tunnel and we were winning in Vietnam. Generals obsessed about press coverage.
Read 6 tweets

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