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During the post-Soviet 1990s, a popular political-satire show called Kukly ran on the Russian independent network NTV. Then-President Boris Yeltsin, for example, was regularly depicted as a feeble drunk. For about a decade, the show featured puppets that lampooned prominent political and cultural figures—until one episode, in which Vladimir Putin showed up as a grotesque, wicked dwarf. Soon after, Putin’s administration pressured NTV executives to drop the character, and ultimately the show was permanently canceled.
For people who know about it, Kukly represents a turning point in media freedom for Russia. For our two guests this week, Anne Applebaum, an Atlantic staff writer, and Garry Kasparov, the host of Autocracy in America, Kukly was the first thing they thought of when they heard about the indefinite suspension of Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show.
The way the Trump administration pressured ABC to pull Kimmel’s show is not exactly analogous to what happened in Russia. But to Applebaum and Kasparov, a world chess champion and one of Putin’s most prominent critics, the details are ancillary. Applebaum and Kasparov see many of President Donald Trump’s attempts to consolidate executive power as classic moves in an autocrat’s playbook. And, as Kasparov says, silencing political satire is often one of the first.
In this episode of Radio Atlantic, Applebaum and Kasparov discuss how Trump could mute the courts, which are now the most powerful resistance he faces. They debate the best way to fight back against authoritarian forces, for both Democrats and average citizens, and agree on the urgency of this moment: “2026 is the battlefield,” Kasparov says, “the most fateful election in American history.”
The following is a transcript of the episode:
Hanna Rosin: I’m Hanna Rosin. This is Radio Atlantic. Today we have a special live show as part of The Atlantic Festival in New York. Welcome, everyone.
[Audience applause]
Rosin: We have with us staff writer Anne Applebaum, who writes about the rise of autocracy, and Garry Kasparov, chess world champion who runs the Renew Democracy Initiative. They are both hosts of Season 1 and 2 of Autocracy in America, which is an amazing show, but also a show which I’m hoping there won’t be, like, too many more seasons of. Like, what will we be talking about in Season 32 of Autocracy in America? I shudder to think what the topics will be.
So, Anne, welcome to the show.
Anne Applebaum: Thank you.
Rosin: Garry, welcome to the show.
Garry Kasparov: Thank you. Just one correction. There will be no—impossible. You cannot have too many shows, Autocracy in America, for one simple reason: Either we stop it, or there’ll be no shows, because they won.
[Audience laughter]
Rosin: Oh, I see. They’re gonna cut your show off. So it’s not gonna be like Live from the gulag: A secret episode of Autocracy in America. Too soon. Okay, too soon for that joke.
The two of you have been talking about threats to democracy for a long time. You started talking about them outside the United States. Now we’re, unfortunately, talking about them inside the United States. Every week we seem to see a ratcheting up, but this week felt like new territory. So, Anne, when you saw the news about ABC and Jimmy Kimmel, what is the first thing that came to your mind? What did you think of?
Applebaum: The first thing that came to my head, and I have no doubt it was the first thing that came to Garry’s head as well, was the memory of Vladimir Putin pushing the satirical program Kukly, which means “puppets,” off the air in Russia. Dictators don’t like satire. They don’t like being made fun of. Putin in particular didn’t like this puppet that was made to look like him. And he—we even know how he did it. He sent a letter to the television station that had this satirical program and made them take it off.
I mean, this, in the United States, it went a little bit more circular. I mean, it was a threat from the FCC, you know, that was made on a podcast. And then it was interpreted by the corporate owners of a television station, and it led them to fire Jimmy Kimmel. But what’s important, I think, about this in both cases is that this is the way modern censorship works.
So we all probably have an—you probably have in your head an idea from, if you read [it], 1984 or, you know, a novel about dictatorship. You imagine censorship is: There’s a guy in a room, and he gets all the newspapers in advance, and he crosses out stuff with a pencil, and that’s censorship. Actually, nowadays, if you look at Russia, if you look at Hungary, if you look at Turkey, censorship is the government putting pressure often on private companies to adjust their programming. And that is what we are now seeing here.
Rosin: Garry, I don’t know that for the rest of us, the first thing that came into our heads was Kukly. So maybe you can explain what Kukly is. Like, do you have a memory of it? I just wanna raise it in people’s imagination. Like, what is it?
Kasparov: Yeah, thank you very much for reminding me about the gold era in Russia.
Rosin: Yeah.
Kasparov: It was a very short one. So the so-called tumultuous ’90s, but we had—it was feeble democracy—but it was freedom of speech. Actually, Kukly was on air for six years. And they have been, I mean, pushing, really, the limits. I mean, they attack Yeltsin; they mocked him. And Yeltsin, some of Yeltsin’s close advisers—actually, Yeltsin’s attorney general, 1995, tried to shut down Kukly, but he lost his job.
Rosin: Interesting.
Kasparov: And naturally, Putin hated it.
Rosin: And was it like what we are familiar with? Like Jon Stewart, Jimmy Kimmel?
Kasparov: They were puppets. But trust me—in many instances, they went much further than Kimmel or Stewart. So it was really tough. I think maybe that Yeltsin liked it.
Rosin: Like he found it funny.
Kasparov: But again, the fact is that nobody tried to touch them after 1995. You know, the attorney general failed. So it was No. 1 target for Putin. He actually did two things after being quote-unquote “elected” the president of Russian federation.
One is: He restored Soviet anthem, just to send a signal.
Applebaum: With new words, with new lyrics.
Kasparov: No, no. But think: This music, everybody heard it. It’s still imperial.
Rosin: What’s the music? Do you remember?
Applebaum: Yeah of course. You want us to sing? (Imitates Soviet anthem.)
Rosin: (Laughs.) That wasn’t that good.
[Audience laughter]
Kasparov: And then he went after Kukly, after the show. And as a matter of fact, he used similar tactics because it was not just a letter; it was all about business quarrel, because this company that had Kukly owed money, and this sounds familiar, right? So it’s all—that’s what immediately came to my mind, because I said, Wow, it’s all business. Ah, that’s how they always start.
And Putin kept repeating it. Even, you know, just when Bush 43 asked him, he said, No, no, no. It was business. Yes. Well, look—you know, there was a company. And this is, it was fair. They says they owe money to Gazprom.
Rosin: You’ve used the phrase the “Putinization of America.”
Kasparov: Yep. I saw the signs. I saw the signs. I did say. Yeah, it’s, people always say: No, America is not Russia. Absolutely. But, you know, even back in 2016, I wrote that Americans would very soon discover that so many things that they believe are carved in stone, it’s actually based on traditions. It’s not codified. It’s—
Rosin: But so, I wanna talk about this because they are different countries. Like, Putin’s a KGB official; that’s what he has in his history. Trump is a reality-TV star. We do have different histories and cultures. Our Constitution is different. It is built for tests. They’re not exactly the same. So sometimes I go along with you two, and sometimes I think they’re different.
Kasparov: But it’s, again, it’s the Constitution. It’s, I suppose, letter and spirit. I think so much in America is built on the spirit. Nobody ever did it before. For instance, you know, every candidate, you know, released his or her taxes. Trump said, Eh, no.
And so many things happening now are within his powers. I said it just after his second coming, so that’s the big danger. It would not be what he could do illegally but what he can do within his legal powers, because there’s so many loopholes. There’s the gray area. Yes, the Constitution is offering us the means to resist, but it doesn’t specifically preclude him of doing things. And also, Donald Trump—give him credit—is a genius of normalizing things that we thought would never happen in this country.
I mean, what is Watergate? It happens every day now. In 50 years, you know, something that led to the resignation of the president, it’s absolutely ignored. And every day, Trump is pushing a little bit, you know, this step-by-step in this direction. And the Constitution does not defend itself. In my next article, I’m saying: It’s just a piece of paper. It’s not ironclad. It doesn’t defend itself. It offers you an opportunity to build your fortifications, but unless you are engaged, well, it says he can go around.
Applebaum: The other point to make is that: Of course America and Russia are different, but the pattern of how an elected leader takes over a political system, takes over a democratic system, and changes its nature is something that we’ve seen before in countries that are also radically different.
So I lived through a version of this in Poland, then it lasted for eight years, and then there was an election, and it changed, and so on. We watched it in Turkey, we watched it in Hungary, we watched it in Russia. There’s a version of it, actually, in India. You know, so Americans like to think that they’re exceptional and special, and we have a long history and so on, but when we look at what Trump—and I think it’s more the people around him—are doing, we see them following these exact patterns, and we’re not seeing the institutions resist.
Mostly, we’re not seeing Congress resist, because the way our Constitution is written, the checks and balances are the other two branches of government, and one of them has done a bit, the judiciary. That story hasn’t played itself out yet. But what’s really missing is Congress.
And that speaks to a level, a deeper problem, which is that there’s clearly a—I don’t know what the right terminology is, whether it’s decay or decline or deterioration. So the thing that Thomas Jefferson once talked about as democratic virtue or democratic spirit, we see is now missing in at least one or a part of one of our political parties. We don’t see Republicans who are willing to say, This is against the Constitution. Congress has the right to determine tariffs and taxes, not the president. Congress has the right to decide what happens to government agencies and what they’re meant to be doing and who’s supposed to work for them. Congress decides what happens in the civil service. And they have decided to let these things go and let the president do it.
So it’s not that Americans are Russians, or America’s like Russia, or American history resembles Russian history. It’s just that the same kinds of tactics that we saw in places like Russia and elsewhere are playing out here, and we’re not seeing the resistance that you would expect.
Rosin: Can I try one more argument for American exceptionalism? Not the J. D. Vance version of American exceptionalism; more the Thomas Jefferson version. I recently reread the Declaration of Independence. I think you did something like this too.
Applebaum: Yep.
Rosin: The difference is: America’s founding did happen on a very specific date, at a very specific time, with a very specific idea. I encourage you all to go read the Declaration of Independence—it’s a boring thing to say, but just do it—because you are reading about Trump. Like, everything they are saying about the king’s power—
Applebaum: I had exactly that reflection.
Rosin: —down to tariffs, so that actually gave me a lot of hope, because I thought we knew that this was coming. Garry, you’re already nodding your head. Why not?
Kasparov: I also read it a few times recently, but I came to the opposite conclusion. Yes, you are right. It’s all about Trump. But the problem is: We are seeing the growing number of people—mostly on one side—that are willing to defend this practice.
They are no longer afraid of that. So if you want to understand how this administration work, just think about the hearings in the Senate. FBI director was insulting sitting senators. He doesn’t care. These people appointed him. I mean, by Constitution, by all the laws, he has to revere them. No, he was insulting them.
It’s a one-man show, for one man. And the same with all others. So it’s, yeah, it’s fantastic you have all these laws, but just for a moment, just, you know, look in the mirror and just think hard. If the moment comes—Day X—Kash Patel, Pam Bondi, and others, will they follow the Constitution or Donald Trump’s orders?
And when you answer this question, you’ll understand that everything is a piece of paper. There are many ways around.
Rosin: Okay, one more, one more. The courts: In what you guys have seen, in wherever you wanna talk about (Poland, Russia, wherever) the courts actually have—not perfectly, and not in every case—shown up a lot.
Applebaum: It depends on how, whether the courts themselves have been taken over. Because usually the first thing that happens—and in this country, it’s been happening, actually, over the last two decades—but the first thing that happens is that the would-be autocrats, the people who wanna undermine the system, take over the courts.
This is exactly what happened in Poland. It’s a complicated, long story, but the elected government changed the constitutional tribunal, which is their equivalent of the Supreme Court. And they managed to do it by changing the retirement-age law.
Rosin: Like what Israel has tried to do.
Applebaum: Exactly. And actually, I think the Israelis were copying the Poles. Israelis said that to me. So they changed a whole series of small rules without passing a constitutional law, in order to change the nature of the court. And the purpose of that was so that when they began to do things that were unconstitutional, they would get away with it. And they didn’t quite get far enough, and they thought they had enough controls over the system so that they would never lose an election again, but they were wrong.
However, it has to be said, as a little footnote: Unpicking that—so getting the courts back to where they were before, and figuring out what to do with hundreds of illegally appointed judges, and so on that took place during that period—is a nightmare.
I mean, so putting back the cracked egg after it’s been smashed is also very difficult.
Kasparov: But judges can make a decision. They cannot enforce it. That’s why you have three branches And the first one, Article I, is Congress. So, yeah, this is, you remember—I think it’s in 1833, ’34—it’s this President Jackson. You know, he had to deal with the Supreme Court ruling against some of the colonies that were trying to steal lands in Georgia. And he said, Okay, fine. You know, I cannot stop them. You know, I won’t go to send troops. Let them enforce it.
Applebaum: Apparently that’s apocryphal.
Kasparov: Apocryphal?
Applebaum: He didn’t really say that, but that’s more or less what happened.
Kasparov: More or less what happened.
Applebaum: He said specifically—Jackson said, Let the judge enforce it.
Kasparov: Let the judge, yes.
Rosin: But, Garry, have you seen any signs of that in the courts? You’re taking away all hope that I have.
Kasparov: No, but again, it’s the courts—
Rosin: Go ahead. I’m just asking.
Kasparov: Courts, you know, most of them are just doing their job. But again, it’s the—I mean, let’s talk about, for instance, the National Guard in the big cities, the blue cities. So now it’s all pending. And the court decision was, yeah, it’s probably saying it probably was not exactly legal.
But now let’s say Donald Trump sends the troops—you wouldn’t call it contempt of the court, but ignoring it—just to Chicago or Memphis, any big blue city. It doesn’t matter what the court decided. The key is: The test, the general that will have to make a decision, will be forced to choose between Donald Trump’s order and Constitution.
Rosin: But let’s just be clear: He actually hasn’t. Sending the troops to Memphis isn’t illegal.
Kasparov: Not yet. Not yet. Again, it happens fast. But, you know, he’s in the office for just eight or nine, less than nine months. And they’re moving really fast. They move really fast.
And again, the problem is that, you know, it’s because of his hold on MAGA base. Through the MAGA base he controls GOP, and through GOP he controls the House. House is silent, and with House basically absent, he can do virtually anything he wants.
Applebaum: There is one court case that he hasn’t enforced. This is actually the TikTok case, but this is an ongoing story. But I think it’s true that for the moment, they’ve been skirting around trying to defy the Supreme Court openly. But I agree with Garry that we could get there.
Rosin: We could get there.
Applebaum: We could get there.
Kasparov: Again, the big test is next year, the midterm. Let you remember: Donald Trump doesn’t lose elections. He said it. Donald Trump doesn’t accept bad numbers. They don’t exist. He lives in the world of his own reality.
On January 6, 2021, he tried to overturn the elections. He had to rely on the mob and few elected officials. Now he will do the same. And, for me, it’s not “if”; it’s “when.”
But he will have FBI, DOJ, ICE, same mob, and more elected officials on his side.
Rosin: To do what exactly? Like, what are you saying?
Kasparov: Oh, there are many ways of influencing elections. If you think that the numbers will secure the victory for Democrats, that you can rely heavily on health care or tariffs, that’s not enough. Oh, FBI—FBI will be a player. Unless, you know, unless Democrats can actually change the situation on the floor of the House, FBI and DOJ will be a player.
How many law firms acquiesced? How many big companies acquiesced? So at one point, you’ll discover that, you know, there’s probably not enough money available just to run the campaign, because they will be attacked. They’ll find how to do it.
Applebaum: So to be clear, the way you—again, it’s like modern censorship is different from the old-fashioned way, and manipulating elections is also different from what it was. And so, you know, you don’t just take the big pile of votes and steal them and move them in another room.
What you do is, you try to create the conditions for the election to be in your favor. So you get rid of a level playing field, and you make it unlevel so that it works in your favor.
Rosin: Like gerrymandering or what?
Applebaum: So gerrymandering is actually a big part of the story. I mean, you saw what just happened in Texas. The Trump administration is pushing other Republican states to do the same. This is why it’s very important that Newsom responded the way he did. Ugly as it is that he wants to gerrymander California, it’s very important that he drew attention to this as a phenomenon.
I mean, gerrymandering goes—this is a long conversation. Gerrymandering goes back a long time. A lot of people have done it. This is the first time I’m aware of that the federal government, that the president, has got involved in telling a state to gerrymander so as to assist his White House.
And the decision of the Texas governor to do it now is out of turn. These borders aren’t normally rewritten at this point in the cycle. It’s usually every 10 years, to do with when the census is taken. And so this is already one thing that’s unprecedented.
The second thing that’s unprecedented is: The federal government has been demanding voter rolls from states, allegedly looking for fraud, or allegedly they’re trying to create some kind of national voter registry. It’s not clear what.
And we had versions of this, actually, in the 2024 election. There was some evidence of this, some kind of games beginning be to played too. So they’re beginning to look at how they can legally push people off the voter rolls.
I mean, it’s hard to steal midterms, because the rules are different in every state and so on, but what they’re trying to do is set conditions that will make it much harder for the Democrats to win.
And that doesn’t mean—by the way, again, to go back to another example: You know, in Poland in 2023, this is exactly what happened. They tried to create conditions whereby the ruling party—it was called the Law and Justice Party—were sure that they would win because they’d created the rules that would make them win.
And actually, there was a huge turnout. The voters voted in very, very high numbers, and they lost anyway, which they were very surprised by. And when they lost—it was funny—they didn’t have a Plan B. Like, they were so sure they were gonna win that they didn’t plan to steal the numbers or fake the numbers. And then when they lost, they didn’t know what to do. And there was a period when they were kind of disoriented.
But what you’re gonna see over the next year is all kinds of small things. And it will be different in different states. And what they will do is try to shape a situation whereby they win.
And we could get down. I mean, we saw in 2020: We know that the president called up the secretary of state of Georgia and said—what was it?—I’m missing [11,000] votes. Could you just get me [11,000] votes? I mean, we could have that again in a state, and we could have it in a state where the secretary of state agrees.
[Music]
Rosin: We’re gonna take a short break, and we’ll be back in a minute with more from Anne Applebaum and Garry Kasparov.
[Break]
Rosin: Okay. I’m gonna ask you a question that I don’t wanna ask you, and then I’m gonna close my eyes as you answer: 2026?
Kasparov: Most fateful election in American history.
Rosin: Most what?
Kasparov: Most fateful election in American history. If Democrats do not retake the House, 2028 will be a formality. That’s it. You know, then I’m afraid the show, Autocracy in America, the show will be shut down.
Applebaum: Hanna and I will run it in the underground.
Rosin: Yes. We’ll run it in the underground.
Applebaum: In this room.
[Audience laughter]
Rosin: What? Okay, 2028 then?
Applebaum: 2028 is too far.
Kasparov: 2026. This is the battlefield. You have to make sure that the Congress, that Article I of the Constitution, will take a stand against Donald Trump.
And by the way, I believe the Democrats should actually start work on it now. There are five Republicans—there are five members of the House that separate, you know, Donald Trump from pushing his agenda. Three of the GOP members, they are retiring. So make them an offer they cannot reject. All you need, you need five votes. And it’s, again: Be active. Try. Offer them speakership.
You know, people are people. Create campaigns. You know, just create conditions where a lot of them will feel uncomfortable, and maybe some of them will be lured by the great opportunities. But try. Fight. No one is fighting now; that’s the problem.
And by the way, never accept any deals with Republicans. Shutdown, it’s bad. But remember: This government is not working for us; it’s against us. No deals. Donald Trump doesn’t believe that Democrats exist. He said it, not me. Ah, don’t deal with them. He is already de facto running a one-party system. Don’t make deals with him. Just fight at every opportunity you have.
Applebaum: There’s another thing that we’re seeing here that I’ve also seen in another countries, is that when—
Rosin: I feel like that should have been an applause. I don’t know why I feel like, you know, “fight.”
[Audience applause]
Rosin: (Laughs.) Sorry, go ahead. Sorry, Anne.
Applebaum: I was gonna say, another thing that we’re seeing here that we also see in other countries is: When you have a political party come to power that seeks to change the rules—and another country I didn’t mention, actually, is Venezuela, where this very much was true, that seeks to change the rules. It doesn’t have to be a right wing; it can also be left wing. So they seek to change the rules. One of the things that happens is that the political opposition immediately fragments, and they immediately don’t know what to do. And this is like, you can look at every—you can look at Hungary, you can look at Poland, you can look at Venezuela.
Rosin: So is that what’s happening now with the Democrats?
Applebaum: I think it’s what’s happening, because the old rules and the old ways by which people made political careers and by which they did messaging and did campaigning aren’t working anymore. And nobody really knows why. And the new rules aren’t clear yet.
And actually, I think that what we’re seeing Democrats doing—I have a little bit more patience with them than Garry does—is you see a lot of different people trying different things.
Rosin: Like Mamdani.
Applebaum: Like Mamdani, for example. He’s trying, you know, to reach young people in a new way.
Rosin: Who else, just so that we can start looking around?
Applebaum: Chris Murphy, who’s a senator from Connecticut who’s made it his business to be constantly on social media and to be talking all the time and to, you know, go around the country, and speaking.
[Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] got a whole bunch of people with Bernie Sanders, held rallies in different cities, including in red states around the country.
Gavin Newsom, he’s doing something completely different. You know, he decided to use Twitter, which is the most important forum for the sort of far right, for the MAGA conversation. And he decided to flip it back on them and make fun of them, and use satire and humor to attract attention and to breakthrough in the algorithms. And it’s completely different from what Mamdani is doing. But it’s another way of seeking to gain attention and build a constituency.
Governor [J. B.] Pritzker in Illinois is another one. And he’s very different from Gavin Newsom. He’s doing these very heartfelt, very authentic speeches about Chicago, about Illinois, about the history of his family, relating them to the present. And he’s breaking through in that way.
One of those styles will win. I mean, one of them will become the thing that’s most popular, eventually.
Rosin: So why is Garry not with us here?
[Audience laughter]
Kasparov: Because there are many more red states than blue states. Something that works in New York does not work—actually, it’s counterproductive—with many other states.
Applebaum: So, but, Garry, this is why you need multiple people. You know, the idea that we need one leader right now—
Kasparov: My problem is not, you know, having the big tent. Actually, I’m saying it’s very important for us to understand: We are fighting just for the very—for the soul of American democracy. And this is: We have to protect the framework. And within the framework, I’m more than happy to debate with people that disagree with me, but this framework is in grave danger now. That’s what Donald Trump is trying to destroy.
But to beat Donald Trump, we have to make sure that within this big tent, the leadership of the coalition will be accepted by people in the middle. Because at the end of the day, you still need just to build a coalition to win it. And it’s, our coalition is not strong enough. We need people that are just, you know, in the middle. And unfortunately, in 2024, many of them shifted to the other side. And one of the reasons, you know, the culture war, for instance, they said it.
So we have to make sure we’ll build a coalition that will concentrate on the key elements of the campaign. And these key elements are just, you know, have to be associated with people that have no, call it, political liabilities. I’m very happy to work with this grand coalition, but again, as the faces, as the people on the front—the front liners should be those who will be accepted by the majority.
Applebaum: But they also have to be people who will motivate their base. And they also have to be people who are creative and who are not simply saying, Let’s go back and have everything be the way it was. You know, there have to be people who have a different kind of inspiring vision.
Kasparov: There are so many tools available for American citizens to put pressure on members of the House, on senators, on administration, on local governors.
You can go to demonstrate on the streets. You know, it’s not Russia, God forbid. It’s the many ways for Americans to demonstrate that they disagree with the current policies. But to do that: Temperament. You know, you have to be engaged, and you have to understand that it’s the real battle, and stop thinking about 2028. As Anne said, it’s 2026. Every month, every week between now and 2026 elections, make sure that, you know, we will be ready if, God forbid, they’ll try to do things. Anne didn’t mention this: You know, it’s the social networks.
In one of my episodes in the podcast, I talked to Gary Marcus, the expert on AI and neuroscience. We talked about techno-fascism. There’s so many subtle ways of influencing elections. Again, make sure we are ready for this battle. And I like our chances. It’s much better than Russia. Probably it’s as good as in Poland, or even better.
But Poles knew they had to fight. So please recognize: It’s a fight. And it’s not 2028; it’s now.
Applebaum: Yeah. The thing I like to say is that people often ask me, What should I do? Or what can ordinary people do? And the thing—the answer to that question is: It depends who you are.
If you’re a lawyer, then work pro bono on some of the cases that will determine which way the system goes. You know, if you are a teacher, make sure that you are teaching children about the nature of our political system. You know, you can demonstrate, you can join a political party, you can join an organization, you can contribute to organizations. And very often, by being engaged—in other words, by doing something—then it will become clear to you what to do next. It’s by being involved that you understand how to become more useful.
The other thing—and I found this very much in Poland, as well (for those of you who don’t know, I live there part of the time)—is that also by doing something, by being engaged, you feel better. I mean, so you don’t feel like you’re helpless and, you know, history is washing over you, and you can’t do anything. If you’re involved, then you’re doing something, and it will be—that’s the way to fight pessimism.
Rosin: Garry, you mentioned this, but I think it’s important to illuminate in detail. This is where you did say, We are different from Russia. There are things that you can do. So what is the experience in Russia of this moment in the playbook for an average citizen, versus the experience in the U.S.? I think it will just let some air in the room to know that we do have options.
Kasparov: Today in Russia?
Applebaum: No. Compared to, say, 2010.
Rosin: So take the moment when Putin bans, you know, Kukly. Like, the moment we started out talking with.
Applebaum: That’s the beginning.
Kasparov: It was actually in the beginning. It was year 2000.
Rosin: Right? So you take that moment. Our options, as you said, are different and better and we have more of them. And I want people to understand that.
Applebaum: What was it that Russians couldn’t do in 2000 that we can do now?
Kasparov: Oh, yeah. This is—look: Russia didn’t have the same traditions of democracy.
Applebaum: No political parties.
Rosin: Great.
Kasparov: No, no, no. It’s the—
Rosin: No, this is where the air is. This is where we can breathe.
Kasparov: Yeah, and the KGB was still too strong, so the oligarchs had no interest in defending democracy. Look, it’s nothing to compare. So listen: But, you know, the fact is that Russia in 2000 was so different from America in 2025, should not make you feel happy.
Rosin: (Laughs.)
Kasparov: Because it’s just difference. It may disappear. Because Donald Trump shows determination to destroy the checks and balances. So you have a bully there. And again, imagine: The man lies every minute. So we have to find just a unique opportunity just to caught him saying the truth.
[Audience laughter]
Kasparov: And it works. And it’s not just him being there. It’s just so many sycophants around. And you have many intelligent people there that keep repeating the same lies. Again, that tells you that, you know, the critical mass of people that were willing to cross the red line—we’re not yet there. But, you know, we have to fight.
So this is—and there’s still, you know, many opportunities here. But remember, again, the Constitution, it just doesn’t defend itself. It’s just, you have tools, phenomenal tools, you know, that’s created by Founding Fathers, but I don’t think Americans ever just, you know, face this kind of threat. It’s different.
I would say it’s somehow even worse than Civil War. Now you have a sitting president trying to undermine the constitutional principles. In 1861, it was easy, okay? You have, you know, renegades, the Confederacy, the war. Now it’s enemies within.
By the way, when you look at the world now—I grew up in the world and Anne grew up in a world when we knew there was this Iron Curtain: This is the unfree world and free world. America, the beacon of hope, you know, garden of freedom.
Now when you talk about autocrats and Democrats, you know, there’s no geographical board anymore.
Applebaum: Yeah. One of the points that I make in the book I published last year was that this competition between autocratic ideas and democratic ideas—it’s not a new Cold War. It’s not this “one guy’s on one side of the wall, and the other’s on the other.” It takes place inside every country.
Kasparov: Yep.
Applebaum: It takes place in the U.S., in the U.K., in Poland, also in Russia. I mean, there’s—
Kasparov: It’s over. For the moment it’s over.
Applebaum: For the moment it’s over. But I mean, think of: You know, the most successful political movement in Russia in recent years was an anti-corruption movement, which was essentially a rule-of-law movement. And so the idea that rule of law and transparency and accountability are important is something that at least some Russians understand.
Kasparov: Some. Unfortunately.
Rosin: And why does it matter that it’s internal, versus on one side and the other side? Like, why does that change the dynamic?
Applebaum: Because it’s much easier for all of us to say, We’re all together against the foreign enemy, whatever, against the aliens, against the communists, against the people who want to—
You know, and then you create a sense of national identity and unity and so on. We don’t have that now. You know, the division is inside us, and it’s inside families. I’m sure many people here have had this experience, or inside friendships or friend circles. And that makes it much harder to negotiate and much harder to re-create a narrative of unity once again.
Rosin: Although, I have noticed—one positive thing I’ve noticed is that there are counterreactions to Trump, like in Canada. You see different countries saying, We don’t wanna go there. It’s sort of like we’ve become the enemy in a certain way.
Kasparov: I was in Canada two days ago, just had a speech there. Great audience, you know, pro-Ukraine and anti-Trump. (Laughs.) Just applauded whatever I said.
Applebaum: I was in Sweden last week, actually, and I also talked to a lot of people there. And there you have this 100 percent unity in support of Ukraine and against Russia. And part of that, part of where that’s coming from is: I would describe it almost as fear of the United States, you know, that they understand they now need to be together, because they’re—
Kasparov: But you said Sweden. But when you look at some other countries—Germany, the most popular party in the polls now: AfD (Alternative for Germany). That’s almost openly—it’s not just neo-Nazis; it’s on the Putin’s payroll.
Applebaum: Yep. It is a party that was created with Russian money and Russian influence campaigns.
Rosin: So maybe we can end by just talking about the world realignment outside our borders. We’ve just talked about the positive elements of that. The U.S. has become a kind of warning signal to some.
But then, you know, there was the recent meeting with Russia, China, and North Korea. You just visited Sudan to talk about the threat of the U.S. carrying out further. What do you guys see in the broader world that is worrisome?
Applebaum: What you see in the broader world is almost total collapse of faith and belief in the United States, and a kind of shock that is still—the waves are still coursing.
You know, as people try to understand What does it mean that the United States isn’t the leader of the democratic camp anymore, the democratic world? It’s not just Europe. It’s Europe and Asia and elsewhere. And how does that affect our trade relations with America? And how does that affect the way we think about our defense? And how does that affect the way we think about social media? which is all American—you know, mostly American.
And so you have this, it’s almost a constant topic in the domestic politics of all of our allies: How do we rethink who we are and what we do, given that the United States is not what we expect? And I don’t think you can understate the amount of shock and disruption it’s caused.
Kasparov: You mentioned the summit. It was not just Russia and North Korea. There were many other countries. You may call it, you know, this “Dictators International.” But I think what was important: It was not just a meeting; it was a meeting where Xi Jinping was crowned as the capo di tutti capi of this international, authoritarian network.
I think if you remember the picture when he was in front, and then Putin on his right hand, Kim on his left hand. And, you know, body language. I mean, Putin was subordinate. And by the way, Russia is a Chinese satellite now. I always call it, you know, it’s a Chinese gas station with nukes.
Rosin: (Laughs.)
Kasparov: And Putin follows Chinese orders. Xi Jinping needs this war in Ukraine. That’s why expecting Russia to be bankrupt is probably a bit of an exaggeration, because the war helps him. It’s just: Russia is getting weaker, and since China is the only country that has a massive territorial claim to Russia—it’s 1.5 million square kilometers, three times France. The entire territory of Vladivostok to Irkutsk used to be China prior to 1860. And China now believes it’s time to—
Applebaum: And the Chinese have now produced maps that have the Chinese name of Vladivostok.
Kasparov: Hai Shen Wai. And it’s Chinese. First time since 1960, the Chinese customs are working there.
But the one element you just remember, because dictators always, you know, pay attention to symbolism: First time I saw Xi Jinping wearing Mao’s outfit—not a Western suit. Everybody else was wearing Western suit—he’s the leader, you know, and it’s China. But again, what do you expect? You know, there’s no vacuum in geopolitics. If America moves out, somebody gets in. And guess who will be in. So it’s a real challenge.
And I wrote an article for Die Welt, a German paper. And I said there, just, we saw—maybe not yet the new world order, but definitely a bit for the new world order. And American corruption and European impotence are its cornerstones.
Rosin: Okay. So this is our last thing. I’m gonna summarize what I think is the message you’re sending to this audience, and you can correct my summary: At stake in the 2026 election is not just the future of democracy but the alignment of the entire world. That’s what the stakes are for us. I don’t wanna overwhelm people and think, Well, it’s just one bully. We can take it. But if it’s, like, one bully, a bunch of dictators here, an entire culture, forget it.
Kasparov: We are fighting not Donald Trump, but Trumpism as a phenomenon. And that’s why you have Nigel Farage in Britain, you have [Marine] Le Pen in France, you have AfD in Germany. It’s a global phenomena. And unless we can defeat it here, chances elsewhere are not looking good.
Rosin: I’m gonna say this without irony: Thank you for inspiring us to fight. Thank you.
[Audience applause]
[Music]
Rosin: This episode of Radio Atlantic was produced by Kevin Townsend. It was edited by Andrea Valdez. Thank you to all the staff at AtlanticLIVE for their help in organizing the event at this year’s Atlantic Festival. Rob Smierciak is our engineer. Claudine Ebeid is the executive producer of Atlantic audio, and Andrea Valdez is our managing editor.
Listeners, if you like what you hear on Radio Atlantic, you can support our work and the work of all Atlantic journalists when you subscribe to The Atlantic at TheAtlantic.com/Listener.
I’m Hanna Rosin. Thank you for listening.
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