The Progressive Insistence That the Trump Administration Is a ‘Regime’

You don’t have to look too hard to find progressive voices using the term “the regime” when they mean the Trump administration. Robert Reich decries “the brazen cruelty of the Trump regime.” Noah Berlatsky contends “the regime wants to turn artists into performing monkeys.” November saw “remove the regime” protests.

Going back to the George W. Bush days, we’ve seen angry Democrats using slogans like, “regime change begins at home.”

The word regime has a couple meanings, including “a government in power,” but generally it refers to “a form of government” — in our case, a constitutionally based republic. A particular administration, which is temporary, is distinct from the continuing long-term form of government. I use the term “regime” in reference to the governments of Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, etc. as a way to indicate that these groups are in power, but are not democratically elected nor functionally restrained by laws, an independent judiciary, or a Constitution, and are thus less than fully legitimate. They’re in power, and are likely to remain in power for a long while, but that doesn’t mean that they’re a legitimate government with the consent of the governed.

You can have a lot of disagreements with the Trump administration — I certainly do — but that doesn’t mean that the current president, his cabinet, or his administration are illegitimate.

The 2024 elections were free and fair, and President Trump won by a clear and substantial margin. His cabinet officials were all confirmed by the U.S. Senate, even if some of the confirmation votes were fairly close. This presidency’s laws and executive orders are subject to judicial review, and the Supreme Court bars the Trump administration from taking certain actions, such as limiting the speaking engagements of immigration judges or deploying National Guard troops in Illinois. The current Senate and House majorities will face the voters again in November 2026.

If the Trump administration is a regime, then the same term can equally be applied to the Biden administration, Obama administration, or any other presidency. Not every administration that you oppose is an illegitimate regime.

Then again, some progressives may well mean that they want to “remove the regime,” in the sense that they want to drastically alter the existing form of the U.S. government. They want to add more Supreme Court justices to ensure a majority, eliminate the electoral college, add new states, and some even argue that the U.S. Senate should be abolished. As a headline to a New York Times book review warned, “The Constitution is sacred. Is it also dangerous? . . . One of the biggest threats to America’s politics might be the country’s founding document.” Or as a previous op-ed argued, “The Constitution is broken and should not be reclaimed.” Or as Osita Nwanevu, a contributing editor at the New Republic proposed in a New York Times podcast, “Abolish the Senate. End the Electoral College. Pack the Court. Why the left can’t win without a new Constitution.”

Now, it’s a free country, and that same Constitution that these folks are sneering at guarantees their right to believe and say whatever they like about it, including the idea that the Constitution is dangerous, broken, or should be completely rewritten.

But you can’t have those attitudes and take a government job and swear an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same.”