Yes, the MAGA movement is a wrecking ball, taking down one previously sacrosanct norm and one institution after another.  Many of us have watched with horror as guardrails against autocracy—Congress, the Supreme Court, the Department of Health, universities, law firms, etc.—have failed to blunt MAGA’s momentum.  And yes, Trump himself is a kleptocrat, who loves power and money and cares nothing about the Constitution or democracy. And yes, MAGA deploys white Christian nationalism as its vision of America being great and is terrorizing anyone who is not white or Christian as a result. 

But this is not all that is required for MAGA to be a fascist movement. The most important ingredient, which I believe is missing, is this: fascists not only seek to destroy democracy; they create a new state and society based on fascist principles. And crucially, I will argue, Trump and his followers are incapable of doing this because MAGA is primarily a performance whose real purpose is to provide cover for Trump and his billionaire minions’ kleptocratic impulses and their bizarre psychological needs. 

Trump built a MAGA of toadies and yes-men and women to do his bidding. And for this reason, these people are utterly incompetent at their formal job titles, which require real governance experience and acumen. As a result, MAGA has little capacity (ICE being the major exception) to build new institutions and laws to replace the institutions and norms they are destroying. Their blatant incompetence (RFK?! Pete Hegseth?! Pam Bondi?!) doesn’t bother Trump at all. For as long as Trump can maintain his appearance as a powerful autocrat, he and his billionaire pals can trade on fear of his bullying to make a lot of money. 

Put another way, Trump is neither Hitler nor Mussolini. These real fascists were not in it for the money or to feed their narcissism; they were true ideologues with a vision of a new state and a new society. Trump is just an all-too recognizable American rip-off artist, a made-for-TV huckster performing as a fascist to get rich quick (and stay out of jail). 

In this sense, MAGA is a farce. It performs a white Christian nationalist, anti-democratic show, but it is really a get rich scheme for sociopathic billionaires.

This farce makes MAGA highly volatile. MAGA’s rapid dismantling of liberal democratic institutions guarantees that social and economic crises will certainly appear, and very soon. All it will take is for the AI-driven stock market bubble to burst or steep increases in health insurance premiums with millions losing access to health care (already happening), or a big spike in inflation coupled with job losses due to Trump’s tariffs, and the already widespread backlash against Trump and MAGA for their betrayal of American values will certainly snowball.

Unfortunately, there is one other element that gives MAGA staying power: the utterly shameful inability of the Democratic Party to oppose MAGA.  Sure, Democrats have become good at Trump-bashing and declaring their opposition to fascism. But the Democrats have not articulated a political vision of an alternative to MAGA, and without that, they are toothless and impotent. To effectively counter Trumpism, the Democrats would have to acknowledge the central fact of our time: the hyper inequality that has made the rich richer, the poor poorer and ripped the middle class apart.  But this would require the Democrats to directly repudiate the neo-liberal policies that were embraced by and enriched and empowered an entire generation of Democrats (especially the Clintons and Obama, but also Schumer).

I cannot help but think that the intransigence of the Democratic Party leadership is so severe that only a wrecking ball like MAGA has any chance of breaking their astoundingly stubborn adherence to neoliberal principles. It is a marvel to me that Zorhan Mamdani has brilliantly proven the success of a platform that calls for higher taxes on billionaires and vigorous regulatory and redistributive government programs (free busses, rent control, city-run food stores), yet even now, much of the Democratic Party leadership refuses to endorse him. Their belief that Mamdani’s platform ‘only works in New York City’ is beyond stupid. It might be that their real reason for not embracing Mamdani is his anti-Zionism (or him being Muslim). But read the room, people: most of the world, and most of the U.S., including the majority of American Jews, are now anti-Zionist, and any hesitation to embrace Muslims is simply a capitulation to MAGA’s Christian nationalism.

The only way to stop MAGA is to expose the marriage between their fascist message (white Christians must use any means necessary to retake the country) and the astonishing money grab Trump and his friends are now engineering at the expense of the whole country, indeed, the whole world. Truly, the only way to stop Trump is to expose his billionaire sycophants to be the traitors to America that they are. 

But the paralysis of the Democratic Party leadership has meant that the only way we have effectively opposed MAGA is in the streets. The outpouring of community-based opposition to ICE and the militarization of D.C., Chicago, Portland and LA is our greatest hope today. The enormous No Kings protests show the urgency tens of millions of Americans feel. 

But as important as direct action may be, the only way out of the destructive MAGA era will be through a new politics. We are still looking for the political party that will articulate a vision of the future that can unite most Americans to rebuild our country. So far, the Democrats are failing the test. But Mamdani’s success—and the enormous crowds at Bernie Sanders and AOC’s “Fight Oligarchy” rallies–has underscored the need for a new vision based on fierce opposition to growing inequality, a politics that directly demands the end of deregulated and under-taxed capitalism in the name of human decency.  As frustrating as it is, progressives must lean into the fight for the Democratic Party. It is still has the potential to rise to the challenge because it remains the political home of most working class and minority community organizations.

The fracturing of MAGA as Trump’s performance loses its hold on its followers is all but inevitable. But the birth of a new politics that challenges the hyper inequality that has gripped the capitalist world for the last forty years is not guaranteed.  History is never pre-ordained. It is up to us to make it happen!