Curious Femme

Is the United States Sliding Towards Authoritarian Rule, and What That Means for Europe

Standfirst

The United States is not a totalitarian state. However, major rights monitors and analysts argue that authoritarian practices are eroding safeguards. The question is not whether democracy still exists, but whether it still constrains power.

Definitions

To avoid rhetorical inflation, it helps to be precise.

Authoritarianism refers to governance where executive power expands while oversight weakens, civil liberties narrow, and accountability becomes inconsistent. Elections may still occur, but institutions that restrain leaders are undermined.

Totalitarianism is more extreme. It involves near-total state control over political life, civil society, and information, typically through pervasive surveillance, propaganda, and repression.

Competitive authoritarianism describes systems in which elections continue, but the state increasingly tilts the playing field, for example, through politicised enforcement, intimidation, legal harassment, or the systematic weakening of checks and balances (Levitsky and Way, 2010).

The US does not fit the definition of a totalitarian state. The evidence discussed here is best evaluated as potential authoritarian drift and competitive authoritarian risk.

Method

This article separates three categories:

1. Facts: verifiable claims supported by the cited sources.
2. Strongly evidenced patterns: supported by multiple credible sources but not always settled by courts or final investigations.
3. Interpretation: clearly labelled conclusions drawn from established comparative frameworks.

Facts

1. Major human rights organisations warn of authoritarian practices

Amnesty International states that authoritarian practices are eroding human rights in the United States one year into Trump’s return to office (Amnesty International, 2026). Human Rights Watch argues that the administration is adopting authoritarian tactics and weakening key democratic safeguards and rights protections (Human Rights Watch, 2026).

2. The US is being publicly discussed in “backsliding” terms

Mainstream analysis and expert commentary increasingly apply democratic erosion frameworks to the US, including the concept of competitive authoritarianism (The Guardian, 2026a; V-Dem Institute, 2025).

Quantitative monitors also capture this direction of travel. Bright Line Watch reports that expert ratings of US democracy are lower since Trump returned to office, and that experts rate the US closer to a mixed or illiberal democracy than a full democracy, and closer to those regimes than to peer comparators such as Great Britain and Canada (Bright Line Watch, 2025). Freedom House continues to rate the US as ‘Free’ but documents ongoing vulnerabilities and assigns an overall score of 84 out of 100 in its 2025 country report (Freedom House, 2025).

3. Europe is publicly signalling strategic uncertainty

Senior allied figures have publicly framed a shift towards coercive great-power politics and away from a stable rules-based order, with US policy shifts discussed in that context (Bloomberg, 2026; The Guardian, 2026b). Whether one agrees with their politics is not the point; the point is that allied leaders are treating the risk as material.

Strongly evidenced patterns

1. Oversight and transparency are under strain

When executive power expands, the decisive test is whether oversight mechanisms still compel compliance and consequences. Amnesty and HRW describe patterns they interpret as shrinking civic space, weakened accountability, and rule of law degradation (Amnesty International, 2026; Human Rights Watch, 2026). These claims are strengthened when paired with primary documents, such as court orders, official directives, and inspector general findings.

2. Narrative escalation and delegitimisation of dissent

A consistent feature of authoritarian drift is the reframing of dissent as sabotage or enemy action. It does not require censorship to produce a chilling effect, it requires repeated messaging that casts scrutiny as disloyal or dangerous (Amnesty International, 2026; Human Rights Watch, 2026). The democratic risk is not disagreement, it is the gradual normalisation of treating political opposition and protest as illegitimate.

3. The playing field risk

In a competitive authoritarian trajectory, elections can continue while institutional conditions degrade. This may involve procedural barriers, intimidation, selective enforcement, or an information environment shaped by assertion rather than evidence (Levitsky and Way, 2010; V-Dem Institute, 2025). The concern is not that Americans cannot vote, it is whether democratic competition remains fair enough to remove incumbents.

What this means for everyday citizens

These debates can sound abstract. They are not.

1. Chilling effects
   If protests and criticism are repeatedly framed as destabilisation or enemy activity, ordinary people become less willing to attend demonstrations, speak publicly, or challenge authority. That shifts civic life from participation to self-censorship (Amnesty International, 2026).
2. Reduced procedural certainty
   When due process norms weaken or enforcement expands, citizens experience the state as less predictable. This is felt most sharply by marginalised groups, migrants, and those whose legal position is already precarious (Human Rights Watch, 2026).
3. Fractured trust and polarisation
   If evidence is delayed, contested, or difficult to access while officials communicate through high-confidence assertions, the public loses shared access to verifiable reality. That makes accountability harder to organise, and conflict easier to escalate (V-Dem Institute, 2025).

Counterarguments, and why they are not sufficient on their own

Counterargument 1: “This is just polarisation”

Polarisation is not authoritarianism. The difference is whether power is used to weaken constraints and accountability. When credible monitors describe recurring patterns of rights erosion and executive overreach, the burden shifts to demonstrating that safeguards remain consistently effective (Amnesty International, 2026; Human Rights Watch, 2026).

Counterargument 2: “US courts and federalism prevent authoritarianism”

Courts, federalism, and civil society are genuine buffers and one reason the US is not totalitarian. The critical question is not whether institutions exist, but whether they still function reliably, quickly, and with enforceable consequences when challenged (V-Dem Institute, 2025). What would weaken this concern is consistent, timely compliance with adverse court rulings and transparent oversight outcomes that impose consequences where misconduct is found

Counterargument 3: “Security threats justify stronger enforcement”

States have legitimate security responsibilities. The democratic distinction is whether enforcement remains proportionate, transparent, and accountable, and whether emergency-style politics becomes routine. That is a common pathway into authoritarian drift (Human Rights Watch, 2026).

Implications for Europe and the transatlantic relationship

Europe’s concern is not merely moral; it is strategic.

• NATO credibility weakens when US commitments appear personalised or transactional rather than institutionally anchored.
• Strategic autonomy accelerates when European leaders treat US reliability as uncertain.
• Normative influence declines when major rights organisations describe the US as eroding rights domestically, because values-based diplomacy becomes harder to sustain (Amnesty International, 2026; Bloomberg, 2026).

Domestic democratic erosion and foreign policy volatility can reinforce each other. That is why European leaders’ Davos signalling matters.

Conclusion and call to action

The United States is not a totalitarian state. Totalitarianism implies near total state control over political life, civil society, and information. However, there is credible, convergent evidence that authoritarian practices are eroding democratic safeguards, and that allies are responding as though the stability of the US-led order is weakening (Amnesty International, 2026; Human Rights Watch, 2026; V-Dem Institute, 2025).

The most defensible conclusion is this: the United States is in a high-risk phase where accountability, transparency, and civic freedoms are being tested repeatedly. The outcomes of those tests will determine whether democratic constraint remains robust or becomes optional.

If you want to respond constructively rather than helplessly, focus on three actions:

Press UK and European leaders to treat democratic resilience and alliance reliability as security priorities, not culture-war theatre, because Europe’s strategic environment changes when US commitments appear less institutionally anchored (International IDEA, 2025; Bloomberg, 2026).

Prioritise evidence over slogans, share primary documents and credible monitors, and challenge claims that rely on assertion without corroboration (V-Dem Institute, 2025; Freedom House, 2025).

Resist scapegoating narratives, especially those that reframe dissent as sabotage or “enemy” activity, because that framing is a common mechanism through which civic space shrinks (Amnesty International, 2026).

Resources

Amnesty International (2026) ‘USA: One year into President Trump’s return to office, authoritarian practices are eroding human rights’. Available at: https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2026/01/usa-one-year-into-president-trumps-return-to-office-authoritarian-practices-are-eroding-human-rights/ (Accessed: 25 January 2026).

Human Rights Watch (2026) ‘Sliding towards authoritarianism?’. Available at: https://www.hrw.org/feature/2026/01/20/sliding-towards-authoritarianism (Accessed: 25 January 2026).

V-Dem Institute (2025) Democracy Report 2025: 25 Years of Autocratization, Democracy Trumped? Available at: https://www.v-dem.net/documents/60/V-dem-dr__2025_lowres.pdf (Accessed: 25 January 2026).

Freedom House (2025) ‘United States: Freedom in the World 2025’. Available at: https://freedomhouse.org/country/united-states/freedom-world/2025 (Accessed: 25 January 2026).

• Bright Line Watch (2025) ‘Violence, redistricting, and democratic norms in Trump’s America’. Available at: https://brightlinewatch.org/violence-redistricting-and-democratic-norms-in-trumps-america/ (Accessed: 25 January 2026).
• International IDEA (2025) The Global State of Democracy 2025: Democracy on the Move (overview page). Available at: https://www.idea.int/publications/catalogue/html/global-state-democracy-2025-democracy-move (Accessed: 25 January 2026).
• Bloomberg (2026) ‘Carney warns of rising authoritarianism after Davos appeal’. Available at: Bloomberg website (Accessed: 25 January 2026).
• The Guardian (2026) Relevant reporting cited in text. Available at: The Guardian website (Accessed: 25 January 2026).