Cultivating obedience: Utilizing the Justice Division to assault former officers consolidates energy and deters dissent

Throughout President Donald Trump’s first three months in workplace, his administration has focused dozens of former officers who criticized him or opposed his agenda.

In April 2025, Trump directed the Division of Justice to analyze two males who served in his first administration, Miles Taylor and Chris Krebs, as a result of they spoke out towards his insurance policies and corrected his false claims in regards to the 2020 election that he misplaced.

Additional, Trump revoked the safety clearances for advisers and retired generals who publicly criticized him in the course of the 2024 election marketing campaign.

On their face, such strikes look like a coordinated marketing campaign of non-public retribution. However as political science students who research the origins of elected strongmen, we imagine Trump’s use of the Justice Division to assault former officers who stood as much as him isn’t nearly revenge. It additionally deters present officers from defying Trump.

Greater than revenge

Like all presidents, Trump wants allies who will faithfully implement his coverage agenda. For many presidents, this implies surrounding themselves with longtime mates.

For instance, Don Evans, George W. Bush’s commerce secretary and shut confidant, labored with Bush for many years earlier than changing into a fixture in his White Home.

However to hold out an influence seize, incumbent leaders additionally want allies who will keep silent or, higher but, endorse their makes an attempt to consolidate management.

In El Salvador, for instance, President Nayib Bukele’s legislative allies gave him free rein in 2023 to run for president a second time regardless of constitutional provisions banning reelection.

Recall that Trump solely left workplace in January 2021 as a result of key Republican officers defied his makes an attempt to overturn an election he misplaced.

Former Vice President Mike Pence, going through violent threats from a Trump-fueled mob, refused Trump’s request to overturn the election he misplaced. And Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger refused Trump’s entreaties to stuff the poll bins in Georgia with one other 11,000 votes for Trump.

Notably, each males first received political workplace on their very own, with out an endorsement from Trump. This implies they have been much less reliant on Trump for entry to political energy. Due to this fact, they have been extra more likely to prioritize their loyalty to the Structure over their loyalty to Trump.

Assaults implement loyalty

In authoritarian contexts, loyalty just isn’t an intrinsic high quality. Authoritarian leaders don’t essentially choose these with whom they’ve lengthy work expertise that results in mutual belief.

As an example, throughout Rafael Trujillo’s dictatorship within the Dominican Republic from 1930 to 1961, the pinnacle of intelligence, Johnny Abbes, was plucked from obscurity in Mexico and in 1958 started to guide the dictator’s repression machine.

As a substitute, the problem for authoritarian leaders is discovering individuals to do their bidding. And one of the best individuals for this job are those that by no means would have earned their place in politics with out the chief’s affect.

Unqualified appointees who can’t ascend to political energy primarily based on their deserves have little selection however to stay with the chief. These individuals seem loyal, however solely as a result of their careers are tied to the chief staying in energy.

A litany of failed politicians

This logic, the place individuals with few profession prospects exterior of the chief categorical probably the most loyalty, explains why Trump has appointed a lot of political candidates who’ve misplaced elections.

The pinnacle of the Small Enterprise Administration, Kelly Loeffler, although briefly appointed as a U.S. senator from Georgia, misplaced her first Senate election to Raphael Warnock in 2021.

Doug Collins, Trump’s secretary of Veterans Affairs, misplaced to Loeffler in a Georgia Senate main throughout the identical election cycle.

Dan Bongino, the deputy director of the FBI, misplaced a 2016 main contest for a congressional seat in a closely Republican district in Florida.

And don’t overlook Jeanine Pirro, Trump’s nominee to move a politically essential federal judicial workplace. Her political profession derailed 20 years in the past when she got here underneath federal investigation for “scheming to catch a dishonest partner within the act.” She misplaced an lawyer basic race in New York in 2006 to Andrew Cuomo.

Trump additionally picked two politicians who had failed presidential runs as Democrats – Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – to behave as director of nationwide intelligence and secretary of Well being and Human Companies.

For appointees who can’t win elections, the one shot at energy is steadfast alignment with the chief. This dynamic, in flip, supplies a robust incentive for these officers to stay loyal, even when the chief breaks the regulation or orders them to do the identical.

When leaders place loyalists in control of federal regulation enforcement, makes an attempt to conjure votes for the president out of skinny air or to seize poll bins in opposition districts usually tend to succeed.

The Trump administration’s assaults on former Republican officers who criticized him, corresponding to Taylor and Krebs, reinforces this dynamic. It sends a sign of future punishment to present Justice Division officers ought to they converse out towards Trump or refuse to hold out unlawful orders.

Assaults additionally goal opposition energy

After all, the Trump administration’s political assaults haven’t stopped with officers in his earlier administration who’ve fallen out of favor.

They’ve expanded to incorporate unbiased establishments corresponding to universities, not-for-profit media and regulation companies.

As analysis on authoritarian regimes exhibits, the purpose of attacking unbiased establishments this fashion is to sap their capability to withstand the incumbent authorities’s makes an attempt to cheat in future elections.

After Hungary’s chief, Viktor Orban, had rewritten his nation’s Structure and reined within the courts, he modified the electoral guidelines to make sure he received reelection in 2022. Alongside the best way, Orban pressured a complete college into exile after failing to subdue it.

In these methods, incumbents’ acts of retribution towards individuals and organizations that oppose their agenda reinforce loyalty amongst their allies. Additionally they undermine and weaken their opponents and finally facilitate incumbents’ efforts to consolidate energy.