The Mar-a-Lago raid could end the American republic

Prosecuting political opposition is how republics die and dictatorships begin.

It’s not an exaggeration to say that historians may mark this week as the fall of the American republic.

On Monday evening, news broke of the FBI’s raid on the residence of former president Donald Trump in Florida. 

Among the reasons Julius Caesar chose to march his army across the Rubicon was that if he heeded the Senate’s demands, he would be subject to prosecution. The same reason keeps Latin American dictators from ever giving up power: the knowledge that letting go means jail time or worse. It’s the reason Ford pardoned Nixon, and why Donald Trump decided not to “lock her up” and prosecute Hillary Clinton after his election in 2016.

Prosecuting political opposition is how republics die and dictatorships begin.

“No one is above the law.”

This has been the constant rejoinder to those noticing this breach of actual Constitutional norms dating back nearly 250 years, and on its face, it’s true. The presidency doesn’t entitle anyone to a lifetime of immunity from prosecution. If a former president decides to say, shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, it’s true that he should not be excused from the normal enforcement of the law. Nevertheless, this is a norm that has rightfully not been breached for a quarter of a millennium and the duration of the American experiment in self-government.