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Your Fun Guide to the 2025 Coup (4/23/25)
Just joking. Not really fun at all. It is a coup! Okay, maybe a little ironic.
Context:
This is not “Trump’s” Coup, it is bigger than that. If Trump was gone, the 2025 Coup attempt would continue. Which means, valuable as he is, if he becomes too much of a liability then Trump will have to be neutralized—Martyred, Reaganized (sidelined and humored) or 25th Amendmented (replaced with Vance by his cabinet).
In June of 2017, I wrote an article for the Daily Kos called Is a Trump Coup Possible? where I concluded it was, but was unlikely. That is because my Trump Coup Scorecard showed that along with other obstacles Trump faced (such as a fundamental incoherence), even within the 2016 Trump Administration there were many high officials, especially retired military, who would not back a coup. This is no longer the case. There is a movement for a coup and it has focus (Plan 2025) and control of the Federal government.
There are three key issues that will determine if the 2025 Coup succeeds:
1) The Supreme Court. The military will look to the Supreme Court for deciding if Trump Regime orders are Constitutional or not. While Chief Justice Roberts claims he wants to keep its power, he may decide the way to do that is by bending the knee to the MAGA coup.
2) The Resistance. While many institutions and groups have already submitted to the Coup—corporations, law firms, Columbia University, corporate Democrats, Red States, some bureaucrats—many others are resisting. And there is growing resistance in the streets. The stronger the resistance in the streets and by institutions of all types, the more likely it is that the coup will fail.
3) The Economy. If the economy gets bad enough, Trump Regime support will collapse even among many of the rich. But not among the true believers in ending Democracy, such as the bazillionaires to-big-to-fail (Musk, Thiel, Bezos, Zuckerberg), the QAnon nexus, and the hard right of MAGA, which does include much of the GOP elite and at least half the Republican base.
April 23 update of Context: Right now, in my opinion, it seems Coup2025 is a bit stalled--increasing court resistance, consistent mass protests, declining economy thanks to weird policies. There is no reason to think the forces behind the coup (Project 2025 is the tip of the spear, Trump is just their best tool at this point) have given up. But we have some breathing space unless they decide their goal is receding so they create a Reichstag Fire type event or one falls in their lap.
Key Known Dates
April 1, 2025. Supreme Court seat election in Wisconsin determined the state court would not go MAGA despite Musk promising $100 to everyone who promises to vote for the MAGA candidate. Certainly illegal (but unlikely to be punished), and he probably won’t pay out to everyone, but he did the same for the 2024 Presidential election and got away with it, so why not?
April 5, 2025. Mass protests nationwide and in Washington D.C. supported by multiple national and local groups. The first real test of Resistance in the streets. Turned out 3 to 5 million.
April 20th, 2025. Trump has asked officials in his administration to make a recommendation on implementing the Insurrection Act because illegal immigration represents a national security threat. Some people are predicting he will act on April 20, and order US troops to the border, to start setting up concentration camps, and to confront the inevitable demonstrations in the cities. Fun fact, April 20th is also Hitler’s birthday and a major holiday for out fascists! Just a coincidence I am sure.
June 12, 2025. The 250th anniversary of the Army is on this date, and Trump is pushing hard to make it a major military parade in Washington, D.C., as is popular with authoritarians everywhere. It is also Trump’s birthday, only a coincidence I am sure.
November 3, 2026. Midterm elections. Democrats will probably regain control of the House of Representatives, but not the Senate. If they are held.
Benchmarks
Bad Benchmarks: Coup Progresses.
Good Benchmarks: Coup Weakened.
(Only when a Benchmark is fully met is it colored in.)
* January 20. Mexican cartels labeled “terrorists” by Trump and/or FBI.
Direct White House order.
* March 9. Trump Administration Begins Mass Warrentless Operations Under Alien & Sedition Act.
* March 9. Individuals labeled terrorists for their Free Speech arrested and/or deported.
This first happened with Mahmoud Khallil, and hundreds since.* March 15. Trump invokes Alien and Sedition Act of 1798.
Specifically, the INS starts using the “Alien Enemies” subsection to deport anyone not a citizen they wish.
The Brennan Center defines the rarely used law this way: "The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 is a wartime authority that allows the president to detain or deport the natives and citizens of an enemy nation. The law permits the president to target these immigrants without a hearing and based only on their country of birth or citizenship."
Fun fact, Trump now says he didn’t actually sign it! WTF?* Lower Courts Block Key Parts of the Coup.
* March. The Trump regime has had many of their actions enjoined or even ruled unconstitutional by lower courts.
* March 15. Trump launches air and/or sea strikes abroad.
Trump begins airstrikes on Yemen with no planned end.
* March 16. Trump Regime directly defies court order(s).
Until 3/16/25, when faced with clear court orders the Trump administration obeyed the courts, even if subverting the rulings at the same time, as with obeying the injunction against putting Trans women into the men’s sections of Federal prisons for the 3 plaintiffs, but moving many more Trans inmates not named in the suit.
But on March 16 Trump’s INS and Dept. of Justice started directly defying court injunctions. For example, in trying to deport the Columbia student activist with a Green Card and the case of the Yale Transplant surgeon deported illegally despite a judge’s order.
Still, the Trump Regime has not openly broken with the judicial system as of 4/23/25. So they lie about what they did and appeal to the Supreme Court to shut down the lower court resistance, as Trump did on March 21.
* March 20. Trump Administration decides it doesn’t need warrants to search for “dangerous” aliens under the Alien and Sedition act.
* April 5. Protests against Trump around the U.S. that total 3-5 million. The largest protests during the first Trump Administration were actually on the day after his inauguration, January 21, 2017: 500,000 at the Women’s March in D.C. and 2-4 million at other demos around the country (with another 2 million people protesting abroad). If the 2025 Coup is to be stopped, demonstrations must grow in size, not decline. As of early April there have been more demonstrations overall so far in the second Trump administration.
* April 7. The Supreme Court allows Trump’s invocation of the Alien and Sedition Act to stand. But does insist on due process (case by case) for those deported, so not an unqualified victory for Trump.
* April 19. Mass protests continue.
* April 20. Secretary of Defense Hegseth and Homeland Security Secretary Noem recommend against Presidential invocation of Insurrection Act.
* April 23. More and more courts, even the Supreme Court, rule against Trump executive actions and other coup2025 policies.
* April. National Labor and/or civil society groups prepare for a general strike if Trump acts UnConstitutionally, such as defying the Supreme Court.
* The Supreme Court validates Trump invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807. * The Supreme Court invalidates Trump’s invocation of the Insurrection Act of 1807.* Supreme Court blocks Trump’s invocation of the Alien and Sedition Act, or upholds a lower court’s block.* Trump Regime directly defies a Supreme Court order.
* US Marshals, following Trump’s orders, refuse to enforce an important court order. While courts can theoretically appoint people to enforce their orders if the normal authorities refuse, it seems unlikely. * Judge blocking illegal Trump orders is impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives.* Judge blocking illegal Trump orders is acquitted by the U.S. Senate.
* Trump launches drone strikes on Mexico. Being planned.
* Trump militarily supports Israeli attack on Iran.
* Trump sends troop abroad.* Trump Regime establishes mass detention facilities. Military bases besides Guantanamo used as concentration camps. Fort Bliss is already being prepared.
* U.S. Inflation hits 5%. (It was 4.7 in 2021, 8.0 in 2022, 4.1 in 2023 and 2.9 in 2024).* Dow drops to 30,000. It was at 45,000 when Trump’s second term started. This would be a decline of 33%.* Dow drops to 22,500, 50%, as it did in the first two months of the Depression.
* Gross Domestic Product (GDP) declines for a quarter.* Recession. GDP declines for two consecutive quarters.* Depression. GDP declines 10% in one year, or is in Recession for three years.
* Trump invokes the Insurrection Act of 1807. It seems increasingly likely. It certainly is the plan, but now two proposed dates for doing so by the coup2025 plotters have gone by without action: January 6 and April 20.
* Antifa, BLM or Pro-Palestine activist groups labeled “terrorist” by Trump White House and/or FBI. In the works.* At least one mainstream activist groups such as MoveOn, Indivisible, 350.org or the NAACP are labeled “terrorist” by the Trump Regime and criminalized.
* “Freedom”/Feudal Cities Approved The elite anti-democracy caucus of billionaires wants the right to set up their own “freedom” cities where they rule directly. More feudalism than the corporate towns of the 1800s. Yes, they are serious.
* Midterm elections (November 2026) cancelled or postponed. Coup complete.
***
Cool Vocabulary:
25th Amendmented: Section 4 of the 25th Amendment states the Vice-President can legally remove a President they find defective, with majority support from the Cabinet or another group Congress designates by law.
Accelerationism: The theory popular on both the extreme Right and Left, that claims that things need to get much worse for them to get better. In the case of the 2025 Coup, the chaos of DOGE and other actions by the Trump Administration are designed to so disrupt society that an authoritarian government, short on LAW but high on ORDER, can be implemented.
Coup: “Blow” or “strike” in French. No, not that kind of blow! There are many kinds of coups… coup de main, coup de grace…
We are worried here about coup d’états, coups aimed at state power. See also soft coup and self-coup.
Martial Law: Fun fact! There is no provision in the US Constitution or any other U.S. law for Martial Law, which is direct governance by the military. However, it has been implemented none-the-less in the U.S., for example in Hawaii during World War II. The Supreme Court later found it to be unconstitutional.
Martyred: False flag assassination.
Reaganzied: As the 40th President was treated most of his second term when his mind was gone…feted, tolerated, watered regularly.
Trump Watch Sites
--Democracy Collaborative mega tracking of Trump site. You can sign up for their newsletter.
--Well cited and updated website from the Revolving Door Project that tracks Coup 2025/Trump refusing to follow court orders.
--From the admirable Lawfare site, a tracker of all Trump Administration Litigation.
--A general tracker of information from and about the Trump Regime, by the UC San Diego Library.
--One of the many sites tracking Trump’s Executive Actions being run by law firms. They are trying to stay up-to-date.
--Ongoing protests are being tracked by the Crowd Counting Consortium.
Just joking. Not really fun at all. It is a coup! Okay, maybe a little ironic.
Context:
This is not “Trump’s” Coup, it is bigger than that. If Trump was gone, the 2025 Coup attempt would continue. Which means, valuable as he is, if he becomes too much of a liability then Trump will have to be neutralized—Martyred, Reaganized (sidelined and humored) or 25th Amendmented (replaced with Vance by his cabinet).
In June of 2017, I wrote an article for the Daily Kos called Is a Trump Coup Possible? where I concluded it was, but was unlikely. That is because my Trump Coup Scorecard showed that along with other obstacles Trump faced (such as a fundamental incoherence), even within the 2016 Trump Administration there were many high officials, especially retired military, who would not back a coup. This is no longer the case. There is a movement for a coup and it has focus (Plan 2025) and control of the Federal government.
There are three key issues that will determine if the 2025 Coup succeeds:
1) The Supreme Court. The military will look to the Supreme Court for deciding if Trump Regime orders are Constitutional or not. While Chief Justice Roberts claims he wants to keep its power, he may decide the way to do that is by bending the knee to the MAGA coup.
2) The Resistance. While many institutions and groups have already submitted to the Coup—corporations, law firms, Columbia University, corporate Democrats, Red States, some bureaucrats—many others are resisting. And there is growing resistance in the streets. The stronger the resistance in the streets and by institutions of all types, the more likely it is that the coup will fail.
3) The Economy. If the economy gets bad enough, Trump Regime support will collapse even among many of the rich. But not among the true believers in ending Democracy, such as the bazillionaires to-big-to-fail (Musk, Thiel, Bezos, Zuckerberg), the QAnon nexus, and the hard right of MAGA, which does include much of the GOP elite and at least half the Republican base.
April 23 update of Context: Right now, in my opinion, it seems Coup2025 is a bit stalled--increasing court resistance, consistent mass protests, declining economy thanks to weird policies. There is no reason to think the forces behind the coup (Project 2025 is the tip of the spear, Trump is just their best tool at this point) have given up. But we have some breathing space unless they decide their goal is receding so they create a Reichstag Fire type event or one falls in their lap.
Key Known Dates
April 1, 2025. Supreme Court seat election in Wisconsin determined the state court would not go MAGA despite Musk promising $100 to everyone who promises to vote for the MAGA candidate. Certainly illegal (but unlikely to be punished), and he probably won’t pay out to everyone, but he did the same for the 2024 Presidential election and got away with it, so why not?
April 5, 2025. Mass protests nationwide and in Washington D.C. supported by multiple national and local groups. The first real test of Resistance in the streets. Turned out 3 to 5 million.
April 20th, 2025. Trump has asked officials in his administration to make a recommendation on implementing the Insurrection Act because illegal immigration represents a national security threat. Some people are predicting he will act on April 20, and order US troops to the border, to start setting up concentration camps, and to confront the inevitable demonstrations in the cities. Fun fact, April 20th is also Hitler’s birthday and a major holiday for out fascists! Just a coincidence I am sure.
June 12, 2025. The 250th anniversary of the Army is on this date, and Trump is pushing hard to make it a major military parade in Washington, D.C., as is popular with authoritarians everywhere. It is also Trump’s birthday, only a coincidence I am sure.
November 3, 2026. Midterm elections. Democrats will probably regain control of the House of Representatives, but not the Senate. If they are held.
Benchmarks
Bad Benchmarks: Coup Progresses.
Good Benchmarks: Coup Weakened.
(Only when a Benchmark is fully met is it colored in.)
* January 20. Mexican cartels labeled “terrorists” by Trump and/or FBI.
Direct White House order.
* March 9. Trump Administration Begins Mass Warrentless Operations Under Alien & Sedition Act.
* March 9. Individuals labeled terrorists for their Free Speech arrested and/or deported.
This first happened with Mahmoud Khallil, and hundreds since.* March 15. Trump invokes Alien and Sedition Act of 1798.
Specifically, the INS starts using the “Alien Enemies” subsection to deport anyone not a citizen they wish.
The Brennan Center defines the rarely used law this way: "The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 is a wartime authority that allows the president to detain or deport the natives and citizens of an enemy nation. The law permits the president to target these immigrants without a hearing and based only on their country of birth or citizenship."
Fun fact, Trump now says he didn’t actually sign it! WTF?* Lower Courts Block Key Parts of the Coup.
* March. The Trump regime has had many of their actions enjoined or even ruled unconstitutional by lower courts.
* March 15. Trump launches air and/or sea strikes abroad.
Trump begins airstrikes on Yemen with no planned end.
* March 16. Trump Regime directly defies court order(s).
Until 3/16/25, when faced with clear court orders the Trump administration obeyed the courts, even if subverting the rulings at the same time, as with obeying the injunction against putting Trans women into the men’s sections of Federal prisons for the 3 plaintiffs, but moving many more Trans inmates not named in the suit.
But on March 16 Trump’s INS and Dept. of Justice started directly defying court injunctions. For example, in trying to deport the Columbia student activist with a Green Card and the case of the Yale Transplant surgeon deported illegally despite a judge’s order.
Still, the Trump Regime has not openly broken with the judicial system as of 4/23/25. So they lie about what they did and appeal to the Supreme Court to shut down the lower court resistance, as Trump did on March 21.
* March 20. Trump Administration decides it doesn’t need warrants to search for “dangerous” aliens under the Alien and Sedition act.
* April 5. Protests against Trump around the U.S. that total 3-5 million. The largest protests during the first Trump Administration were actually on the day after his inauguration, January 21, 2017: 500,000 at the Women’s March in D.C. and 2-4 million at other demos around the country (with another 2 million people protesting abroad). If the 2025 Coup is to be stopped, demonstrations must grow in size, not decline. As of early April there have been more demonstrations overall so far in the second Trump administration.
* April 7. The Supreme Court allows Trump’s invocation of the Alien and Sedition Act to stand. But does insist on due process (case by case) for those deported, so not an unqualified victory for Trump.
* April 19. Mass protests continue.
* April 20. Secretary of Defense Hegseth and Homeland Security Secretary Noem recommend against Presidential invocation of Insurrection Act.
* April 23. More and more courts, even the Supreme Court, rule against Trump executive actions and other coup2025 policies.
* April. National Labor and/or civil society groups prepare for a general strike if Trump acts UnConstitutionally, such as defying the Supreme Court.
* The Supreme Court validates Trump invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807. * The Supreme Court invalidates Trump’s invocation of the Insurrection Act of 1807.* Supreme Court blocks Trump’s invocation of the Alien and Sedition Act, or upholds a lower court’s block.* Trump Regime directly defies a Supreme Court order.
* US Marshals, following Trump’s orders, refuse to enforce an important court order. While courts can theoretically appoint people to enforce their orders if the normal authorities refuse, it seems unlikely. * Judge blocking illegal Trump orders is impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives.* Judge blocking illegal Trump orders is acquitted by the U.S. Senate.
* Trump launches drone strikes on Mexico. Being planned.
* Trump militarily supports Israeli attack on Iran.
* Trump sends troop abroad.* Trump Regime establishes mass detention facilities. Military bases besides Guantanamo used as concentration camps. Fort Bliss is already being prepared.
* U.S. Inflation hits 5%. (It was 4.7 in 2021, 8.0 in 2022, 4.1 in 2023 and 2.9 in 2024).* Dow drops to 30,000. It was at 45,000 when Trump’s second term started. This would be a decline of 33%.* Dow drops to 22,500, 50%, as it did in the first two months of the Depression.
* Gross Domestic Product (GDP) declines for a quarter.* Recession. GDP declines for two consecutive quarters.* Depression. GDP declines 10% in one year, or is in Recession for three years.
* Trump invokes the Insurrection Act of 1807. It seems increasingly likely. It certainly is the plan, but now two proposed dates for doing so by the coup2025 plotters have gone by without action: January 6 and April 20.
* Antifa, BLM or Pro-Palestine activist groups labeled “terrorist” by Trump White House and/or FBI. In the works.* At least one mainstream activist groups such as MoveOn, Indivisible, 350.org or the NAACP are labeled “terrorist” by the Trump Regime and criminalized.
* “Freedom”/Feudal Cities Approved The elite anti-democracy caucus of billionaires wants the right to set up their own “freedom” cities where they rule directly. More feudalism than the corporate towns of the 1800s. Yes, they are serious.
* Midterm elections (November 2026) cancelled or postponed. Coup complete.
***
Cool Vocabulary:
25th Amendmented: Section 4 of the 25th Amendment states the Vice-President can legally remove a President they find defective, with majority support from the Cabinet or another group Congress designates by law.
Accelerationism: The theory popular on both the extreme Right and Left, that claims that things need to get much worse for them to get better. In the case of the 2025 Coup, the chaos of DOGE and other actions by the Trump Administration are designed to so disrupt society that an authoritarian government, short on LAW but high on ORDER, can be implemented.
Coup: “Blow” or “strike” in French. No, not that kind of blow! There are many kinds of coups… coup de main, coup de grace…
We are worried here about coup d’états, coups aimed at state power. See also soft coup and self-coup.
Martial Law: Fun fact! There is no provision in the US Constitution or any other U.S. law for Martial Law, which is direct governance by the military. However, it has been implemented none-the-less in the U.S., for example in Hawaii during World War II. The Supreme Court later found it to be unconstitutional.
Martyred: False flag assassination.
Reaganzied: As the 40th President was treated most of his second term when his mind was gone…feted, tolerated, watered regularly.
Trump Watch Sites
--Democracy Collaborative mega tracking of Trump site. You can sign up for their newsletter.
--Well cited and updated website from the Revolving Door Project that tracks Coup 2025/Trump refusing to follow court orders.
--From the admirable Lawfare site, a tracker of all Trump Administration Litigation.
--A general tracker of information from and about the Trump Regime, by the UC San Diego Library.
--One of the many sites tracking Trump’s Executive Actions being run by law firms. They are trying to stay up-to-date.
--Ongoing protests are being tracked by the Crowd Counting Consortium.