Opposition to President Donald Trump is gaining fresh momentum, with Americans growing increasingly vocal and defiant in the face of what many see as an escalating authoritarian shift. In a new analysis published Wednesday, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof warns that the stakes are higher than ever, and the nation is being tested in ways not seen for generations.
“America has periodically faced great national tests,” Kristof wrote. “The Civil War and Reconstruction. The Great Depression. McCarthyism and the Red Scare. Jim Crow and the Civil Rights Movement. And now we face another great test — of our Constitution, our institutions, our citizens — as President Trump ignores courts and sabotages universities and his officers grab people off the street.”
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Kristof points to recent protests, such as the “Hands Off” demonstrations, as signs of a revived resistance movement. For months after the 2024 election, anti-Trump energy had seemed to wane, with even some Democrats conceding to elements of his agenda. But that’s changed — and not a moment too soon, Kristof argues, as Trump’s actions continue to challenge the rule of law and democratic norms.
One particularly alarming example, Kristof writes, is the forced expulsion of Kilmar Abrego Garcia into a foreign authoritarian’s megaprison — an act carried out in defiance of court orders, and one that signals even broader plans for mass deportations that could potentially impact U.S. citizens.
“Much of this echoes what I’ve seen abroad,” he continued. “In China, the government has cracked down on elite universities, crushed freethinking journalism, suppressed lawyers, and forced intellectuals to parrot the party line. One university lecturer recalled how an ancient historian, Sima Qian, had spoken up for a disgraced general and been punished with castration: ‘Most Chinese intellectuals still feel castrated, in that we don’t dare stand up for what is right,’ the lecturer told me — and I suspect some American university presidents feel that way today.”
Yet amid the darkness, Kristof sees hope. Institutions are beginning to push back, he writes — most notably Harvard University, which recently defied what he called “absurd” demands from the Trump administration, even after the president cut $2.2 billion in federal funding and threatened its tax-exempt status.
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“We needed a dollop of hope, and this week it came from Harvard University,” he said. “This government is not only authoritarian but also reckless; this is vandalism of the American project. That is why this moment is a test of our ability to step up and protect our national greatness from our national leader.”
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