'Convergence' Is Here – And We're Not Prepared
American politics is converging towards a vague concept of authoritarian "unity," influenced by a small network of backers.
Every day we are warned about the dangers of impending Fascism, Nazism, authoritarianism, and autocracy — and with good reason. In the United States, our system of constitutional checks and balances has broken down quickly. Each day we awaken to dark new realities: people being disappeared illegally, defiance of court orders, citizens' rights being threatened, agencies being illegally dismantled. Trump and his allies are very obviously following the “fascist playbook” — and it's working.
Implicit in that observation is the idea, reinforced by tropes that ask “why didn't anyone do anything to stop this,” that we should take action. As if we could simply forcefully uninstall the fascist software, reinstall liberal democracy, and live happily ever after — having neutralized the threat. But reality is seldom quite that simple. Doing something is hard, and requires people to disrupt their lives to rise to the occasion.
But what if our turn onto the authoritarian path is irreversible? What if the way back (and other ways out) are captured, blocked, or seeded with landmines? Or have authoritarians so muddled our capacity for sense-making that we are simply incapable of finding the way out? There is a strong argument that this is now the case, and that we are now faced with a convergence of our political poles — where both sides are dissatisfied with the status quo and demanding new solutions, new approaches, and new blood. Perhaps there is no way back — only forward, through the dark forest.
Convergence Has Already Started
It's happened gradually, but we are already seeing signs of convergence across the current political landscape. Tulsi Gabbard, for many years considered a far-left Democratic operative, is now Director of National Intelligence under Trump. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., whose last name is synonymous with the Democratic Party, is now the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Elon Musk claimed he was aligned with Democrats for years, before publicly changing his allegiances. Even Donald Trump himself used to publicly identify as a Democrat before he transformed into the quintessential right-wing populist he is today.
Don't gloss over how extraordinary this is. In February 2016, Gabbard was Vice Chair of the Democratic National Committee when she resigned from that position in order to endorse Bernie Sanders. Gabbard was subsequently backed by Russia's information warfare efforts in 2019. Now she is a key part of the Trump administration's plans to exact revenge against his political enemies.
Banking heir Timothy Mellon was the largest donor common to both Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and Trump in 2024, a fact which some in the Democratic Party thought might be of concern to voters. But few noticed or seemed concerned, and now Kennedy's MAHA (Make America Healthy Again) is considered a key wing within Trump's coalition.
Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-NY) are attracting large crowds across the country with their “fighting oligarchy” rallies. But few remember the close relationship between Gabbard and Sanders, who worked together for years, and through the Sanders Institute.
Likewise, Ocasio Cortez's origin story is largely forgotten, having been thrust into her role by the Justice Democrats network, launched by people close to the Sanders campaign — Saikat Chakrabarti and Zack Exley, along with Kyle Kulinski and Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks.
Chakrabarti was a founding engineer at Stripe, the Silicon Valley payments company backed by Peter Thiel. Chakrabarti served as Chief of Staff to Ocasio Cortez until 2019, and has been associated with the views of Subhas Chandra Bose, leader of the Nazi Indian Legion, who promoted the convergence of National Socialism and communism. Chakrabarti is now mounting a bid to unseat former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).
Exley (co-founder of both Justice Democrats and Brand New Congress) is a longtime associate of Roy Singham, founder of Thoughtworks, a software consultancy. In August 2023, the New York Times reported that Singham, who relocated to China after selling that company for $785 million, is part of an extensive Chinese influence network.
Singham's wife is Jodie Evans, co-founder of anti-war activist network Code Pink. Singham's father, Archie, was a leader of the “non-aligned movement,” a group of countries who chose (after the split between Josef Stalin and Marshall Tito) to align with neither the U.S. nor the U.S.S.R. during the Cold War, but were effectively under Moscow's influence.
These associations deserve exploration, given that Justice Democrats asserted in 2017 that they wished to effect a “hostile takeover of the Democratic Party.”
The upshot of all of this is that the people animating both the fascist right and its most effective opposition are influenced by many of the same forces, and they are converging. Whether they realize this or not, this is the reality, and we should pay close attention to the alliances and funding sources behind all proposed political solutions to our problems.
No way back
There are several possible electoral pathways. One option which very many desire is that we have functional elections and choose leaders who can reverse the damage done. But other scenarios are perhaps more likely.
If the opposition center of gravity shifts towards the Sanders-Ocasio Cortez camp (as is happening now), it is possible that the party will produce candidates and platforms that play well to the base and will win primary contests, but fall short in general elections. Likewise, current DNC Vice Chair David Hogg has promised to mount primary challenges against Democrats he considers too timid. While his proposal is made in good faith and grounded in principle, it's difficult to know how it may play out in practice.
Another possibility is that Democrats try to adopt new, more forward-looking ideas like the insipid “Abundance” platform being flogged by commentator Ezra Klein and co-author Derek Thompson. The book, which is long on fluff, light on facts, and elides counterarguments is little more than DOGE ideology in sheep's clothing, making common sense demands to streamline bureaucracy, trust in technology, and build housing. Some of which is fair enough, but much of the book recycles old ideas from proponents of the technological singularity like Peter Diamandis (Abundance: The Future is Better than you Think, 2012.)
The darkest and perhaps most likely possibility is that we will have, as they do in Russia, performative “elections” with predetermined outcomes, programmed via warping of the information space, control of the candidates on offer, and electoral manipulation.
These pathways all tend towards convergence. We should consider that the democratic opposition may either lose (whether in reality, or via engineering), or “win,” and then through common influence become allied in a “unity” agenda.
We Must Work Towards the Future We Want
Restoring the rule of law as we had known it in the United States and preserving the Constitution may not be possible if we see the convergence crew as merely an infection that must be fought so that our health can be restored. We have, simultaneously, a deadly infection and immune system failure, and it may not be survivable.
Given that reality and the fact that Trump and his allies are also acting to terminate the Constitution, we should start thinking about what comes after the United States. Do we need a new Constitution, or should we change this one? What do we want that to look like? How do we defend it against authoritarian capture? Do we need to consider stronger alliances with other democracies, or global forms of governance? Are institutions like the United Nations and NATO still fit for purpose, or do we need updated structures?
The autocrats have a simple plan: tear everything down and give them control. Let them use technology and artificial intelligence to optimize our lives, realizing efficiencies through the consolidation of power. They decide who's a terrorist and who goes to globally centralized prisons and concentration camps. Indeed, are we not already here?
While it is possible that we may, through some combination of luck and leadership, throw off the convergence infection for a short time, we are unlikely to vanquish it permanently. The only solution is to outflank it with a new vision for global democracy. This is so far outside the Overton window as to be unthinkable crazy talk — for now. But will that still be true in a month, a year, a decade?
Convergence is an established idea in political theory. It is at the core of the Soviet ideas of Reflexive Control (see this paper) and Perestroika, as well as the fascist “red-brown alliance” ideologies of Oswald Spengler (Decline of the West), Francis Parker Yockey (Imperium), and Aleksandr Dugin. We saw previews of it during Occupy. We have had years to prepare, and didn't.
Convergence starts slow, and then gains speed as the poles begin to meet. Things are moving so rapidly now, it's likely we will face a series of destabilizing events such that won't know what has happened until after it's occurred.
Consider this a warning, and a call to action: we must start thinking about what comes after the United States in its current configuration — indeed, we must start to design America 2.0, and be ready to counter authoritarians with a truly better vision of a democratic global future. ■
