From the Trump indictment to an "anti-authoritarian age"

A conversation with Ruth Ben-Ghiat, scholar of authoritarianism and democracy

After Donald Trump was indicted for the third time, the hot-takes industry enjoyed another brief boomlet. The takes were out in full force. But I craved something different — someone who could unspool for me what this historic moment means in the larger contest between democracy and authoritarianism in American life.

So I called Ruth Ben-Ghiat, one the c…