Zooming In: What Does an Unchecked Trump Mean for Freedom?

We have entered another Trump term, and the political landscape has shifted in ways that challenge the very foundations of our liberal democracy. With unprecedented executive power and a growing ecosystem of loyalists surrounding the president, we must ask: What happens when political institutions are no longer able to constrain a populist authoritarian president’s ambitions? And how do institutions, the media, and civil society respond?

Today, The UnPopulist’s editor-in-chief Shikha Dalmia is joined by senior editor Berny Belvedere and contributor Andy Craig. They explore the risks of an unchecked executive, the breakdown of institutional safeguards, the chilling effect on dissent in both politics and culture, —and whether libertarians, who put checking abusive state authority at the heart of their political project, will stand up to Trump in his second term, which is already shaping up to be far worse than his first.

We hope you find the discussion interesting, if depressing.

© The UnPopulist, 2025

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