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Trump's repeated elevation of dictators as models of leadership should be understood as part of a re-education strategy: conditioning Americans to see authoritarianism as a superior form of government to democracy.

— Ruth Ben-Ghiat

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More quotes by Ruth Ben-Ghiat

Strong men disappear people, but they also disappear knowledge that conflicts with their ideologies and goals.

Authoritarians always tell you what they're going to do to you... [T]his is part of their politics of threat.

Instead of the obliteration that could come through climate change, you deny it and have a different kind of existential threat... affecting the white male minority, and you harness that rage.

Trump is not fit to serve as leader... of American democracy, but he is... eminently fit to serve as the leader of an authoritarian state.

They strike... the "authoritarian bargain"..: prosperity for... the elites in return for loyalty and toleration of... violence and suspension of rights.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Ruth Ben-Ghiat (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.