Obama’s warnings about democracy fading sound increasingly directed toward the US

[Thiệu Ngô]

Speaking with democracy activists recently from Hungary and Poland, former President Barack Obama warned about the “rising wave of authoritarianism sweeping the globe,” even in countries once believed unsusceptible to an erosion of liberties.

By Kevin Liptak

“We’re seeing politicians target civil society, undermine freedom of the press, weaponize the justice system,” Obama went on. “And no one is being spared. Even countries that thought they were immune from wholesale assaults on democracy now understand that we’re all part of one struggle.”

Obama didn’t mention his successor by name. But he’s taken an outspoken posture against President Donald Trump throughout a series of public appearances this year, amping up his criticism of Trump’s second term and expressing concern about the state of American politics.

The panelists Obama spoke with at an event last month previously participated in the Obama Foundation’s young leaders program. They were Sándor Léderer, who co-founded an anti-corruption watchdog ground in Hungary; Stefania Kapronczay, who until recently served as co-director of the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union; and Zuzanna Rudzinska-Bluszcz, who served as the Deputy Justice Minister for Poland from December 2023 to August 2025.

“I’ve become increasingly concerned about the rising wave of authoritarianism sweeping the globe,” Obama said in a video introducing the conversation, which took place in London.

The comments were a veiled, if clear, rebuke of not only the current US administration but also some of the leaders Trump has aligned himself with since taking office.

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán is a champion of what he calls “illiberal democracy,” and is often credited with inspiring Trump’s playbook for government. Orbán has become a darling to MAGA conservatives, and the president has praised him as a “very great leader” and “very strong man.”

In Poland, meanwhile, a firebrand aligned with the right-wing populist Law and Justice party narrowly won the country’s presidential election in June, a political upset that could torpedo the centrist government’s efforts to unspool the legacy of authoritarianism in the country.

Trump has tried to deploy military assets to Democratic-led cities against their leaders’ wishes, urged the Justice Department to bring indictments against his political rivals and lashed out at judges who attempt to block his actions.

Obama didn’t raise any of those examples specifically. But he pointed to promises — empty ones, in his view — offered by politicians to “go back to the way things were” that hewed closely to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” message.

At the same time, the former president offered an acknowledgment that sclerotic bureaucracies and unresponsive politicians had, in many ways, ushered in a global populist wave.

“In the United States, for example, there will need to be laws that are changed so that action can be taken more effectively, more quickly to respond to problems in a lawful way,” Obama said during his discussion. “I think what we’ve seen is that when people are frustrated, they’re willing to take any action, even if it’s unlawful, because at least there’s a sense of, something’s happening. That’s something that I think everybody has to internalize at this point.”

He acknowledged that centrist politicians had, in many instances, lost the pulse of voters and allowed some of the populist anger to take hold.

“A big challenge is that the governments themselves, whether center-right or center-left, were losing touch with people and weren’t delivering on some of the basic hopes and dreams of people, so you get frustrated with government, period,” he said. “That obviously then opens the door for right-wing populism, anti-immigrant sentiment, anger, grievances.”

He said wealth gaps and a complex modern economies had left people feeling “as if they don’t have control, and they feel as if their politicians often don’t have control over all the different forces there.” And he said social media was “very good at making people fearful of or angry about those who don’t agree with them.”

“We haven’t figured out, all right, what are the new forms of participation that can engage people and make them feel empowered so that when they act, it’s going to make a difference for them and their families,” he said.

And he suggested authoritarians operate “just by breaking things” instead of building new alternatives to the systems they decry.

“They can tear things down, remove constraints on their actions, and empower themselves in a small group,” he said. “In terms of being able to solve some of the big problems around health care or education, there, not so much, because that does require creating new structures. It’s not just a matter of getting a cut, taking a piece of whatever is being done and making sure your friends are rewarded and your enemies are punished.”