The level of American exceptionalism that's required to believe an authoritarian takeover could never happen here, even though we all saw one attempt on Jan 6th, is blatantly ignorant of world history and how authoritarian takeovers start. There first needs to be an effort which then needs to be mainstreamed into a formerly legit political party. That's already happened.
CPAC holding meetings in Hungary in 2022 and again in 2023 and hosting authoritarian dictator Orban in Dallas was nothing to see.
Of course famous last words, "It could never happen here".