We came very close to losing this country to authoritarianism. The Supreme Court started the crumbling when it ruled that Presidents could not be tried for crimes committed in connection with official acts of office. Then in early 2025, the Trump administration made clear that they were going to rule the country by fiat, dismantling federal programs without Congressional approval, ripping up independent agencies, using private lawsuits to coerce organizations to follow their wishes.

Most damaging of all, Congress sat back and did nothing as tariffs were imposed without approval, a war was declared without authorization, and executive branch oversight disappeared entirely. Fortunately, the Courts did just enough to keep the President from taking it even farther, especially in the area of election integrity.

The greatest villain of all in this near-miss for American democracy was the House of Representatives, led by the despicable sycophant Mike Johnson. Under his speakership, the House trampled on Article 1 of the Constitution and surrendered all power to the whims of Donald Trump. Johnson should be expelled from Congress for the way he violated his oath of office, to protect and defend the Constitution.

Now, that threat is done. Donald Trump can still do quite a bit of damage to the United States and the world over the next two years. But his efforts to destroy the checks and balances of American representative democracy have failed. We now have a Congress that will hold him accountable.

He won’t have blank checks on military action in the final two years of his term. There won’t be more obscene signing bonuses for unqualified thugs to work for ICE and terrorize our communities. The personal grift of the Trump family will be examined. Idiots like Pete Hegseth won’t be confirmed for the Cabinet.

Trumpian stupidity will continue, and I suspect all of the leeches looking for favor from his administration will continue to do his bidding. And he might be able to shield his favorites from ultimate accountability with pardons.

But he will be gone in little over two years and MAGA itself is on life support. The Republican civil war is about to begin. That’s no guarantee that they won’t win the Presidency in 2029, we have only two parties in this country after all and the Democrats are superb at blowing their best opportunities.

Even in a worst case scenario, however, the center somehow held. Our constitution is intact. Donald Trump failed a permanent takeover, just like he failed in his January 6 insurrection. His type will never get a better opportunity to stress test the U.S. constitution.

And the next time it happens, we’ll have the memory of what it took to weather the storm and keep this country from becoming the province of a strongman.