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https://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2020/02/17/le-mauvais-exemple-de-la-democratie-americaine_6029840_3232.html

source: Le Monde

EDITORIAL

translation: GoogleTranslate/doxa-louise

The bad example of American democracy

Pressure on the judiciary, virulent attacks on his opponents and journalists ... through his methods, Donald Trump continues to test the safeguards of the American political system, even if it means weakening it.

Rarely profession of faith will have sounded so false. In a plea for Western values ​​aimed at strengthening the transatlantic link, before the Munich security conference on Saturday 15 February, the head of  American diplomacy, Mike Pompeo, invoked the rule of law and the attachment of the United States to  democracy.

The West, a community born out of the Cold War, is in much better health than some people claim in Europe, said Pompeo. “The West is victorious. Freedom and democracy are victorious. We respect the rule of law. "

If these arguments were effective at the time when the unity of the Western 'block' was forged around the American leadership against  Soviet ideology, they are, unfortunately, less and less credible when they emanate from the team of  President Donald Trump. While European democracies are shaken by the rise of populist movements and far-right parties, the United States no longer appears as the promoters of liberal democracy, but, on the contrary, as the matrix of this "illiberal" challenge .

The famous "scintillating city on the hill" which attracted pilgrims at the end of their transatlantic odyssey, praised by President Ronald Reagan, has been replaced by "Trumpism", a very personal form of exercise of power, which constantly puts to test  the safeguards of the American political system, the famous checks and balances .

Attempts to exploit diplomatic staff

In the past week alone, Donald Trump, strengthened by his acquittal in an impeachment trial during which he challenged all the rules, defended his practice of public intervention in the judicial system; to his Minister of Justice, Attorney General William Barr, who complained that he could not work serenely in an environment where presidential Tweeters constantly disturbed the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, M. Trump has reaffirmed his "legal right" to "do what [he] wants as president . " One can hardly imagine a more flagrant contradiction of the democratic principle of the separation of powers.

The head of the American executive also questioned the very established practice of having his teams listen-in on his telephone discussions with foreign leaders, the source of his indictment in the impeachment trial. The hearings in Congress within the framework of this procedure also highlighted systematic attempts to exploit diplomatic personnel for internal political purposes which are not to the credit of Mr. Pompeo, meant to protect them.

These are just the latest examples of the Trump administration's infringements to what is known as the rule of law in a democracy, which is essentially about following the rules of the Constitution. More generally, Trumpism is marked by a permanent climate of insults and personal attacks against representatives of the opposition and by the denial of facts and truth as the basis of information; journalists, on the other hand, are denounced as "enemies of the people" .

This is not exactly what can be described as a "victory for freedom and democracy". By his methods, Mr. Trump, on the contrary, makes them more vulnerable to the regimes he claims to counter.

Le Monde