In 2016, it was common for everyone watching the presidential campaign — operatives, pundits, journalists, voters — to remark that the whole thing was just crazy. Donald Trump had smashed all the spoken and unspoken rules about how a mature democracy was supposed to conduct an election, leaving much of the country shaking their heads in wonder, alternately amused and bemused, when perhaps more of us should have reacted with horror and panic.
But that was nothing. For his 2020 reelection campaign, Trump is building an engine of chaos. That engine has the president at its head but will also rely on the efforts of his allies, the media outlets that have devoted themselves to his cause, and in all likelihood more help from abroad, especially the Russian government.