Thursday marked the one-year anniversary of the storming of the U.S. Capitol by supporters of then-President Donald Trump, in an effort to disrupt the congressional certification of the 2020 presidential election won by Joe Biden.
The events of that day seemed to epitomize the difficulty in characterizing what, if any threat Trump posed to U.S. democracy. Was it a well-planned attempted coup? A spontaneous insurrection? An angry riot? A protest joyride?
That followed four years of endless debates during Trump’s presidency over whether he was a determined but incompetent authoritarian, or simply a pathological narcissist.