Obama Lashes Out At Trump's ‘Lie and Confuse’ Strategy, Warns Plan to Turn US Into a Dictatorship

Oneindia

Former President Barack Obama has issued a stark warning about the direction of U.S. democracy, accusing Donald Trump and his allies of weakening democratic norms and echoing authoritarian tactics. Speaking at an event in Connecticut and in a separate interview, Obama compared the U.S. to nations like Hungary and Russia, where elections happen but leaders ignore the people’s voice. He urged judges, officials, and citizens to protect the Constitution and reject misinformation, warning that when truth is lost, dictatorship begins to take root.    #TrumpVsObama #TrumpInauguration #ObamaInauguration #ObamaTrump #TrumpNews #ObamaSpeech #TrumpRally #AngryObama #DonaldTrump #BarackObama #TrumpThirdTerm #TrumpFourthTerm #MelaniaTrump #MichelleObama #TrumpAdministration #PresidentTrump #PresidentObama #TrumpImpression #TrevorNoahTrump #ObamaJokes #DailyShowTrump #TrumpPresidency #TrumpTariffs #ObamaMeyers #ObamaVsTrump #TrumpLatest #TrumpCorrespondents #TrumpComparison #TrumpVsObamaCrowds #TrumpVsObamaPolicies  Also Read  Trump Intends To Resolve North Korea Conflict Amid Reports Of Rejected Letter :: https://www.oneindia.com/international/trump-intends-to-resolve-north-korea-conflict-amid-reports-of-rejected-letter-7785511.html?ref=DMDesc  US Will Soon Sign Very Big Deal With India: Trump :: https://www.oneindia.com/international/us-will-soon-sign-very-big-deal-with-india-trump-7784501.html?ref=DMDesc  ‘Great American Pilots Very Upset’: Trump Flips Again on Iran Strike Damage :: https://www.oneindia.com/international/trump-debates-us-strikes-impact-on-iran-nuclear-programme-011-7783495.html?ref=DMDesc    ~HT.410~

Transcript

00:00Something that is not consistent with American democracy.

00:04It is consistent with autocracies.

00:07Hungary under Orban, what we think of is a fair system

00:13in which everybody's voice matters and people have a seat at the table

00:17and there are checks and balances and nobody's above the law.

00:22Democracy is not self-executed.

00:24It requires people, judges and people in the Justice Department.

00:33All those institutional norms and laws

00:37that were embodied in the Constitution imperfectly

00:43and then over time were expanded so that we had a basic understanding

00:47like I can't just be picked up on the street and hauled off to another country.

00:54That's not something, that's not, that's not, that wasn't a partisan view.

01:05That wasn't a Republican or Democratic notion that that shouldn't happen.

01:09That was an American value and norm.

01:13And so what I believe continues to be that there has to be responses and pushback

01:30from civil society, from various institutions and individuals outside of government,

01:41but there also has to be people in government in both parties who say,

01:48well, no, you can't do that.

01:50And what we're seeing right now is when you do not have those constraints and guardrails, right?

02:02When you don't have people inside of government who say,

02:07no, you know, this is how the law works and we should follow it.

02:18Democracy is not self-executing.

02:20It requires people, judges and, you know, people in the Justice Department

02:29and, you know, people throughout the government who take an oath

02:34to uphold the Constitution.

02:38It requires them to take those, that oath seriously.

02:44And when that isn't happening, we start drifting into something that is not consistent

03:01with American democracy.

03:03It is consistent with autocracies.

03:06It's consistent with Hungary under Orban.

03:14It's consistent with places that hold elections but do not otherwise observe

03:22what we think of as a fair system in which everybody's voice matters

03:29and people have a seat at the table and there are checks and balances

03:32and nobody's above the law.

03:37And we're not there yet completely,

03:40but I think that we are dangerously close to normalizing behavior like that.

03:55And we need people both outside government and inside of government saying,

04:02let's not go over that cliff because it's hard to recover.

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