U.S. President Donald Trump looks on during a press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin following their meeting to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, in Anchorage, Alaska, U.S., August 15, 2025. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

A professor of democracy and international affairs at Johns Hopkins University says there's a simple way to beat President Donald Trump, who, under the Constitution, is "trying to seize power he's not entitled to," he writes in the New York Times.

"Trump will fail in remaking American politics if people and institutions coordinate against him, which is why his administration is targeting businesses, nonprofits and the rest of civil society, proposing corrupting bargains to those who acquiesce and punishing holdouts to terrify the rest into submission," Henry J. Farrell writes.

Comparing what Trump is doing to modern-day European authoritarians including Prime Minister Viktor Orbán of Hungary and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey, Farrell says that Trump's latest move in demanding higher education instutitions to sign a "compact" in exchange for government funding is nothing more than weaponization.

"It wanted to signal strength. Instead, it’s revealing its weakness. The administration’s need to break the academy is forcing it to make a desperately risky gamble," Farrell says.

"Even the most brutal tyrant does not have enough soldiers and police officers to compel everyone to obey at gunpoint. Authoritarian regimes need civil society."

Farrell says that the "Trump administration is betting its chips on public pressure. That is enormously risky, because it provides a big opportunity for the opposing coalition and encourages the public to get involved on the other side."

The way to defeat Trump, Farrell says, is to organize against it. "East Germany’s dictatorship collapsed when multitudes began to march and organize against it, collapsing the illusion that everyone accepted tyranny," he explains.

Pushing back, he writes, is the only way. But it must be done en masse, he says. "The public can be extraordinarily powerful when it pushes back," he explains, citing the public outrage over the suspension—and quick reversal of it—of late night host Jimmy Kimmel over comments he made about Trump's reaction to the death of MAGA influencer Charlie Kirk.

"Those who oppose authoritarianism have to play a different game, creating solidarity among an unwieldy coalition, which knows that if everyone holds together, they will surely succeed," Farrell writes.

Trump's weakness, Farrell says, is his self-aggrandizing.

"Mr. Trump’s basic untrustworthiness is another big turnoff for would-be turncoats. He never lets gratitude get in the way of self-interest. Those who submit to him just expose themselves to relentless demands for more," he says.

Solidarity, Farrell says, is the only way to defeat this regime. "The greatest weapon that the forces of regime change possess is the fear of inevitability. If everyone believes that Mr. Trump will succeed in reshaping America, he will," he says.

But the division needs to be put on pause, Farrell explains. "Polish pro-democracy forces won only when they agreed to leave aside their bitter divisions over abortion until after they had succeeded. . . .Will civil society hold firm against a regime that wants to center all power on itself?"