"There Is Essentially No Precedent"

"Trump has long demanded—quite publicly, often on Twitter—that his most senior cabinet members use the power of their office to pursue political enemies. But his appeals this week, as he trailed badly in the polls and was desperate to turn the national conversation away from the coronavirus, were so blatant that one had to look to authoritarian nations to make comparisons." 

David E. Sanger at The New York Times writes that Donald Trump "took a step even Richard Nixon avoided in his most desperate days: openly ordering direct immediate government action against specific opponents, timed to serve his reelection campaign."