Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) has predicted that a second presidential term of former President Donald Trump would look "a lot like" Russian President Vladimir Putin's leadership in Russia.
Raskin's prediction comes as Trump is seeking another term as president in the 2024 election, setting up a potential rematch between him and President Joe Biden, the expected 2024 Democratic nominee. Earlier this week, Trump was asked about claims he had made that the Biden administration has weaponized the Justice Department and the FBI. He said that he "certainly" could do the same, should he become president again.
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"The role of the government, in his view, is to advance his political fortunes and destroy his political enemies," Raskin said. "So what would a second term look like? It would look a lot like Vladimir Putin in Russia. It would look a lot like Viktor Orban in Hungary, illiberal democracy, meaning democracy without rights, or liberties, or respect for the due process, the system, the rule of law.
The Maryland lawmaker added that the position of Trump and his allies is to reject any elections that they lose, which Raskin called "a hallmark of an authoritarian party." Raskin also claimed that Trump's party embraces "political violence" and that everything from the party "flows from the will of a charismatic politician," which he argued was Trump.
"So we are clearly headed into a completely different form of government than any of us would recognize, as continuous with the past right-wing authoritarian governments — in league with Putin, Xi, Orban, Bolsonaro, you name it," Raskin said.
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Trump announced his candidacy in the 2024 presidential election in November 2022 and is still leading the Republican Party's primary race, beating out the likes of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley, and business entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, among others.
A recent poll from CNN found that in a hypothetical rematch between Trump and Biden, the former president polled 49% among registered voters, while Biden polled 45%. Another poll, this one from the New York Times-Siena College, found Trump outpacing Biden in multiple battleground states, including Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, and Georgia.