Trump is going to let Israel flatten Gaza, Russia take Ukraine, and possibly China engage Taiwan but anti-war. No one is accusing him of misusing the military yet.
> what is it specifically about a second term that allows him to rig all future elections? what is different this time that wasn't true in 2016?
A majority in Congress, a loyal Republican heavy Supreme Court, and the presidency as well as the desire to stay out of jail.
The supreme court balance is the same as it was when he was president, Republicans had the majority in the House from the beginning of Trump’s presidency in January 2017 until the 2018 midterm elections, when the Democrats won control of the House, and Republicans had the majority in the Senate for the entirety of Trump’s presidency.
literally nothing is different this time that's going to let him round up people into camps and turn himself into god-emperor. if he was interested in abusing power in completely new ways he would have pardoned himself before he left office.
I think it's a safe bet that Thomas and Alito will step down in the next two years and be replaced by similarly right-wing justices, just much younger. The court will be majority hard-right for the rest of my life.
> literally nothing is different this time
This time he and his supporters are prepared. If you look at Trump in 2016, he seemed genuinely surprised he won. His transition team was ad-hoc and clumsy. His cabinet and advisory picks ended up being sub-optimal for him, as he kept appointing people who wouldn't go as far as he wanted to. Project 2025 is a thing now, and is a playbook for weakening and subverting the US federal government -- except in areas where conservatives want to keep power so they can impose it on states that don't share their ideology.
And any time states complain, SCOTUS will tell them to stuff it.