Is the US Now Authoritarian?

Before I had to think about such things, I always just assumed that there was a line — you’re either living in Authoritarianism, or you’re not. But there of course a range of conditions that move you either to the left or right along that line, and we have definitely moved towards the authoritarianism end, especially during (but not limited to) Trump’s second term. And we’ve been doing it with remarkable speed. I keep hearing that “we’re on the road to authoritarianism”, which I guess just also assumes that there is a magic line, or perhaps it’s just how we all tend to think — that there is a point where one thing becomes another. And that line exists at a different point for some all of us. For me, I feel as though we’ve definitely ticked enough checkboxes to land us in that authoritarian zone. There may be plenty of more room on the spectrum to lead us more fully into authoritarianism, but we’ve definitely moved quite a bit further away from the “ideal democracy” side of things.