(Photo
by
Bonnie
Cash-Pool/Getty
Images)
Law
professor
Jonathan
Turley
thinks
it’s
silly
to
suggest
that
Donald
Trump
would
embrace
authoritarianism
in
a
hypothetical
second
term.
Turley
arrived
at
this
conclusion
despite
warnings
from
Trump’s
former
cabinet
secretaries,
the
Supreme
Court’s
newfound
absolute
executive
immunity
stance,
the
assurances
of
Trump’s
second-term
hopefuls,
and
TRUMP’S
OWN
WORDS.
Turley
reminds
his
audience
that
he
actually
knows
better
than
all
those
particularly
damning
vectors
of
evidence
because
those
people
get
in
the
way
of
Jonathan
Turley’s
gravy
train:
appearing
on
TV
to
tell
Trump-skeptical
Republicans
not
to
worry.
So
instead,
he’s
just
going
to
ignore
all
that
testimony
and
pretend
it’s
just
something
AOC
and
the
hosts
of
The
View
talk
about.
Besides,
even
if
Trump
were
interested
in
autocracy,
some
serious
moderate
would
probably
stop
him
somewhere
along
the
line,
right?
All
that
is
required
is
for
over
two
centuries
of
constitutional
order
to
fail
suddenly,
and
for
virtually
every
constitutional
actor
in
our
system
to
suddenly
embrace
tyranny.Those
pushing
this
hysteria
often
curiously
cite
the
January
6
riot
as
proof
that
the
end
is
near.
Yet
that
horrible
day
was
the
vindication,
not
the
expiration,
of
our
constitutional
system.
The
system
worked.
The
riot
was
put
down.
Congress,
including
Republicans,
reassembled
and
certified
Biden
as
the
next
president.In
the
courts,
many
Trump-appointed
judges
ruled
against
challenges
to
the
election.Our
system
was
put
through
a
Cat
5
stress
test
and
did
not
even
sway
for
a
moment.
The
Supreme
Court
just
explicitly
rejected
the
idea
that
it’s
illegal
for
a
president
could
assassinate
a
political
rival
as
long
as
it’s
justified
as
an
“official”
security
act.
The
election
was
so
laughably
NOT
close
that
even
most
Republican
judges
didn’t
want
to
stick
their
neck
out
over
it.
And
January
6
was
not
a
Cat
5
stress
test
the
way
2024
could
be
with
election
officials
who’ve
made
denialism
part
of
their
pitch.
If
a
bunch
of
flag-draped
tourists
managed
to
steal
a
few
lecterns
without
tanking
democracy,
why
would
election-denying
state
officials
even
try,
right?
And
how
was
it
a
stress
test
if
it
was
all
an
Antifa
hoax?
How
do
these
people
keep
their
conspiracies
straight?
Former
Rep.
Liz
Cheney
(R-Wyo.)
has
declared
with
authority
that
either
you
vote
for
Harris,
or
this
“may
well
be
the
last
real
vote
you
ever
get
to
cast.”
As
for
his
reminder
that
when
he
says
“Congress,
including
Republicans,
reassembled
and
certified
Biden
as
the
next
president,”
those
plucky
side
characters
all
got
purged
the
next
time
they
faced
voters.
They’ve
been
sent
home
from
their
big
city
jobs
and
are
probably
opening
a
book
store
in
their
home
town
and
reconnecting
with
their
small
town
crushes
just
in
time
for
Hallmark
holiday
season.
Just
kidding,
they’re
oil
lobbyists.
Others,
like
running
mate
JD
Vance,
have
spent
the
intervening
years
coming
around
to
the
position
that
Trump
didn’t
lose
that
they
would’ve
never
taken
at
the
time.
Which
is
before
we
even
consider
this
sophomoric
argument
in
its
proper
context:
even
if
you
think
the
Trump
judiciary
and
congressional
Republicans
would
hold
up
in
the
face
of
an
authoritarian
power
grab,
WHY
WOULD
YOU
EVEN
WANT
TO
TEST
THAT?
It’s
almost
impossible
to
imagine
a
serious
account
of
this
subject
without
even
acknowledging
any
of
this.
And,
in
fact,
Turley’s
article
is
deeply
unserious.
But
he
kept
with
it
to
close
out
the
week,
glossing
over
concerns
about
election
officials
that
ran
on
denialism
claims
with
triumphal
follow
up
today,
crowing
that
no
one
should
worry
about
voter
suppression
measures
because
they’re…
popular!
Democratic
candidates,
including
Vice
President
Harris,
have
denounced
voter
identification
laws
as
“Jim
Crow
2.0”
attacks
on
voters.
A
majority
of
voters
have
long
supported
these
laws.
According
to
a
new
Gallup
poll,
that
majority
is
now
a
supermajority.
It’s
unintentionally
fitting
that
Turley
brushes
off
the
substantive
risk
that
these
laws
revive
the
legacy
of
Jim
Crow
with
“most
people
support
it.”
In
1966,
a
supermajority
of
Americans
had
an
unfavorable
view
of
Martin
Luther
King
Jr.
too
so
maybe
our
take
on
the
merits
of
civil
rights
abuses
shouldn’t
be
decided
by
opinion
polls.
Then
again,
Jonathan
Turley
had
no
idea
that
MLK
was
ever
arrested
for
protesting
segregation
so
his
grasp
of
constitutional
history
might
be
a
little
shaky.
Adding
voter
ID
hurdles,
either
at
the
polls
or
at
registration,
are
almost
always
popular
because
they
sound
superficially
reasonable.
While
voter
fraud
cases
are
extraordinarily
rare,
too
sporadic
to
actually
influence
any
significant
election,
and
almost
always
the
result
of
a
legal
misunderstanding
or
people
trying
to
vote
twice
(examples
of
illegal
voting
that
identification
laws
aren’t
even
needed
to
stop)
the
drumbeat
for
these
new
laws
to
“protect”
elections
have
sounded
for
years.
Why
do
these
calls
come
exclusively
from
the
same
side
of
the
aisle
that
wanted
to
hang
Mike
Pence
for
not
unilaterally
tossing
votes?
Well,
because
the
Republican
Party,
exclusively,
has
decided
that
voter
ID
laws
are
a
surprise
tool
that
will
help
them
later.
There’s
nothing
per
se
wrong
with
voter
identification.
The
right
to
vote
should
not
be
contingent
on
having
a
car
or
an
interest
in
air
travel
so
there
would
have
to
be
a
widespread
method
of
identification
besides
a
driver’s
license
or
passport.
And
until
the
Supreme
Court
decides
otherwise,
the
Constitution
doesn’t
countenance
a
poll
tax,
so
access
to
these
IDs
would
have
to
be
free
and
not
gatekept
beyond
artificial
obstacles
like
closing
all
the
DMVs
in
majority
Black
areas
of
the
state
(a
move
that
one
state
pulled
and
then
reversed
under
widespread
scrutiny).
But
that’s
the
rub,
isn’t
it?
The
issue,
as
someone
cosplaying
as
a
constitutional
scholar
should
know,
is
that
the
country
has
a
long
history
of
voter
suppression
behind
superficially
neutral
mechanisms.
Turley
should,
theoretically,
be
aware
of
the
legacy
of
voter
literacy
tests,
justified
as
a
means
to
ensure
an
informed
electorate
but
written
with
vague
questions
allowing
the
administrator
to
pass
or
fail
voters
based
on
race.
Surely,
Turley
(heh)
wouldn’t
rubberstamp
a
new
round
of
literacy
tests
based
on
the
general
public’s
saying
they
want
educated
voters.
Or
maybe
he
would…
I
guess
we
don’t
know
how
far
he’ll
bend
to
get
invited
on
cable
news
at
this
point.
The
complaint
around
voter
ID
laws
is
that
the
general
public
fails
to
understand
that
the
introduction
of
“popular”
voting
requirements
rarely
get
deployed
without
serious
shenanigans.
Anyone
who’s
tried
to
walk
into
a
bar
between
the
ages
of
21-25
knows
how
ID
laws
work.
Someone
is
going
to
look
at
it
and
decide
—
based
mostly
on
vibes
—
if
you
look
enough
like
the
picture
on
that
card
to
be
legal.
Some
patrons
will
draw
little
to
no
scrutiny
while
others
will
get
a
thorough
once
over.
The
problem
with
voter
ID
is
not
the
idea
of
voters
merely
having
an
ID,
it’s
the
prospect
of
a
random
poll
worker
who
fervently
believes
Venezuelan
space
lasers
controlled
the
last
election
scanning
everyone
walking
into
the
room
and
deciding
that
an
elderly
Black
guy
or
a
soccer
mom
with
the
Notorious
RBG
Stanley
cup
just
don’t
look
enough
like
their
pictures!
Bringing
us
back
to
Turley’s
comical
claim
to
being
a
“constitutional”
expert.
The
reason
we
have
a
Constitution
is
to
guard
against
popular,
ill-thought
out
ideas
by
recognizing
the
risk
they
pose
in
greasing
the
wheels
of
the
tyranny
of
the
majority.
A
constitutional
scholar
would
approach
popular
policies
with
a
skeptical
eye
—
especially
when
it
comes
to
voting
laws,
a
subject
that’s
given
rise
to
amendments,
multiple
statutory
fixes,
and
a
litany
of
court
challenges.
You
know…
all
those
times
that
the
Constitution
faced
actual
Cat
5
stress
tests.
Even
if
a
serious
law
professor
ultimately
saw
the
benefits
of
voter
ID
laws
as
a
tailored
cure
to
largely
nonexistent
false
identity
voter
fraud
outweighing
the
risks,
they
would
have
to
make
a
case
for
WHY
they
dispense
with
these
historically
supported
concerns
such
that
a
detractor
could
honestly
engage
that
claim
on
the
merits.
But
Turley
is
not
a
serious
man.
Joe
Patrice is
a
senior
editor
at
Above
the
Law
and
co-host
of
Thinking
Like
A
Lawyer.
Feel
free
to email
any
tips,
questions,
or
comments.
Follow
him
on Twitter or
Bluesky
if
you’re
interested
in
law,
politics,
and
a
healthy
dose
of
college
sports
news.
Joe
also
serves
as
a
Managing
Director
at
RPN
Executive
Search.