Did Trump permanently damage American democracy? This question has spawned a veritable cottage industry of hand wringing over the state of American democracy—understandably so. Never before have we had a president who schemed to overturn legitimate election results, who attacked the press and the civil servants who worked for him, who admired dictators, who blatantly profited from his public office and who repeatedly lied to the public for his own selfish purposes. But while Trump’s four years of rhetoric have been a shock to democratic norms, did they inflict permanent damage on our democracy? My answer is a qualified no. The guardrails of democracy held. The institutions designed to check autocracy are intact. CONTINUED
Elaine Kamarck, Brookings Institution