I am someone born in the USA and white and male, so I am less at risk of harassment and brutality than others.
My take on things is that Trump is probably a Russian asset and Russian leadership probably wants a US civil war (but I don’t have proof).
Midterms are still many months away. I am pretty sure Democrats realize that Trump wants conflict and they are trying to just wait for Midterms.
I am scared and feel like civil war could still happen. I have no children, few ties to any area, and only work remotely. I live in a very liberal area. I am mostly a poor person and have less than $25,000 saved.
I also have been arrested and held in terrible conditions in a notorious jail, experienced physical and emotional abuse there, and fear being arrested again and experiencing more abuse. Some of the things I experienced meet definitions of torture although not egregious physical torture (iron maiden type stuff). I am also gay and effeminate and worry I could receive worse treatment if involuntarily held for mental health reasons or for poverty because of homophobia by religious people.
Should I be trying to flee the USA now? If so, would Canada be safe? Is there anywhere else I could go to? I could claim asylum in a Northern European country but am concerned about the Russian War of Aggression.
I do not know if I am over-reacting. Will I still have time to flee if I wait and the situation gets worse?
I’m not a US citizen but I thought it might be worth writing some of my rationale for leaving the US incase it helps you.
As far as I could tell, anyone that could spell democratic backslide thought it would happen in the US. Many in Trump’s orbit even seemed to be targeting it. The main thing in dispute seemed to be how much it would happen. In my understanding slipping down the scale from democracy towards autocracy tends to come with a government ideology, demonising science/experts, persecution of minorities, erratic aggressive foreign policy, targeting of political enemies, removing checks on overreach/corruption/fraud, state controlled Fed, and federal officers harassing the population.
I was worried I might be overreacting and wanted to have some idea of the odds so I basically read every executive order that they sent out. It was only a few weeks until I put in my resignation & made plans to leave. I encourage everyone to read their executive orders. Personally, I don’t think it’s easy to reassess the US for another 8 years (two into the second term post Trump 2.0). This is mostly given the mass government firings, partisan heads of agencies, mass resignations over perceived corruption, partisanship of the supreme court (measured by differences of rulings compared to the lower courts), removal (some still in progress) of institutions and removal of personnel that target corruption/fraud. There are a lot of ways this could improve but I’d ague it’s pretty risky over that timeline and just really tough to access a short term swing compared to a long term one. That amount of time is a decent portion of someone’s life.
I’d also argue that the commentary about people running is a bit misplaced in this situation because this is arguably the most powerful country in the world. For me, not being a citizen, that meant I should minimise my contribution to it succeeding and that meant removing my taxes and contribution to the workforce. I think that rationale can hold for citizens but also agree that there need to be people in the country fighting more against Trump 2.0 or it’s going to get worse for most of the globe.
For me, I then thought through what entities seemed best placed to resist a potential rogue state (and definite erratic state) as large as the US. For me, that seemed to have one line item: the EU.