PBS’s eponymous host of Amanpour & Company, Christiane Amanpour, and New York Times columnist M. Gessen joined forces on Friday to claim that despite Democrats’ midterm victories, the fact that the U.S. will have a presidential election in two years means the threat of “autocracy” is still very real.
Amanpour by suggesting the U.S. isn’t the only country facing a threat from “autocrats.” She wondered, “From the United States to Israel, a warning about the enduring appeal of autocrats. Last week's midterm elections delivered a stunning rebuke to President Trump, handing Democrats control of both houses of Congress. And in the former slave-owning state of Mississippi, Scott Colom made history becoming the state's first black U.S. senator in more than a century. But does that really signal the beginning of the end of Trumpism?”
PBS's Christiane Amanpour engages in some world class goalpost shifting as she claims the U.S. is still facing the threat of authoritarianism despite the midterms. She also has some weird analogies, "From the United States to Israel, a warning about the enduring appeal of… pic.twitter.com/XVRUohNjFG
— Alex Christy (@alexchristy17) November 14, 2026
She also claimed, “In Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu's party won the most votes despite years of war and security failures, and history shows that autocrats often thrive on the very fear and instability their policies create. And in Russia, the non-democratic Vladimir Putin has clung to power for decades, despite corruption, war, and economic hardship.”
Israelis voting for a politician Amanpour dislikes is still democracy and not at all equivalent to Putin murdering his opponents and outlawing real opposition. Israel’s wars after October 7 are also not even remotely the same as Putin’s war on Ukraine.
As it was, Amanpour turned back to the U.S. and introduced Gessen as someone who has the authority to make Trump-Putin analogies, “New York Times columnist and longtime Putin critic M. Gessen warns against misreading the midterm results and argues that defeating autocracy around the world requires more than simply opposing the autocrat. Writing, ‘What works is opposing the autocratic worldview itself. It's asserting that while life really is hard and the world really can be scary, we need not live in fear and isolation rather than conjuring an imaginary past, it’s promising and achievable future.’”
Amanpour then asked Gessen, “So, we turn to you because you are a real autocrat and authoritarian specialist. You get what it takes. You grew up in Russia. You've been around and you've really lived this stuff. So, I just first want to ask you, you've written a lot about the midterms and you said in your latest op-ed that it is a real blow to Trump and the administration and to the Republicans, but you caution it's dangerous to misread the midterm results as a complete failure of Trumpism. What do you mean by that?”
Gessen replied by trying to clarify that there is a difference between a midterm rebuke and the upcoming 2028 presidential election, “I wouldn't say that it's dangerous to misread it as a complete failure of Trumpism. It is a complete failure of Trumpism. But I think it's dangerous to assume that this means that Trumpism is over because there's a real difference. And, you know, it also has to do with just the strange way that we set up elections in this country, where there's a kind of, every four years voters get to vote for president. And every four years, two years after they voted for the president, they get to express their displeasure, right?”
Continuing with the 2028 theme, Gessen added, “There's a huge difference between how people make decisions in the midterms and how they make decisions in the presidential elections, because presidential elections are not about disapproval. It is not enough to hate the autocrat to unseat him. Presidential elections are really about what people want to see in their future. And that's where a lot of oppositions to autocrats or aspiring autocrats, both in the United States and around the world, have fallen flat on their face.”
When Democrats or the anti-Netanyahu Israeli opposition fail to win an election, it is not proof that “autocracy” is difficult to unseat. It is simply proof that sometimes PBS’s preferred candidates lose, and that is what other people might call “democracy.”
Here is a transcript for the November 13 show:
PBS Amanpour and Company
11/13/2026
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: From the United States to Israel, a warning about the enduring appeal of autocrats. Last week's midterm elections delivered a stunning rebuke to President Trump, handing Democrats control of both houses of Congress. And in the former slave-owning state of Mississippi, Scott Colom made history becoming the state's first black U.S. senator in more than a century. But does that really signal the beginning of the end of Trumpism?
In Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu's party won the most votes despite years of war and security failures, and history shows that autocrats often thrive on the very fear and instability their policies create. And in Russia, the non-democratic Vladimir Putin has clung to power for decades, despite corruption, war, and economic hardship.
New York Times columnist and longtime Putin critic M. Gessen warns against misreading the midterm results and argues that defeating autocracy around the world requires more than simply opposing the autocrat. Writing, “What works is opposing the autocratic worldview itself. It's asserting that while life really is hard and the world really can be scary, we need not live in fear and isolation rather than conjuring an imaginary past, it’s promising and achievable future.”
I spoke to M. Gessen about what it really takes to defeat autocrats.
AMANPOUR: M. Gessen, welcome back to the program.
M. GESSEN: Thank you. It's great to be here.
AMANPOUR: So, we turn to you because you are a real autocrat and authoritarian specialist. You get what it takes. You grew up in Russia. You've been around and you've really lived this stuff. So, I just first want to ask you, you've written a lot about the midterms and you said in your latest op-ed that it is a real blow to Trump and the administration and to the Republicans, but you caution it's dangerous to misread the midterm results as a complete failure of Trumpism. What do you mean by that?
GESSEN: I wouldn't say that it's dangerous to misread it as a complete failure of Trumpism. It is a complete failure of Trumpism. But I think it's dangerous to assume that this means that Trumpism is over because there's a real difference. And, you know, it also has to do with just the strange way that we set up elections in this country, where there's a kind of, every four years voters get to vote for president. And every four years, two years after they voted for the president, they get to express their displeasure, right?
The midterms are always a vote on the performance of the current president, and they're usually a vote of disapproval. So, the question is always the scale of this disapproval. And the scale of this disapproval is enormous, and I don't want to diminish that by one bit.
But there's a huge difference between how people make decisions in the midterms and how they make decisions in the presidential elections, because presidential elections are not about disapproval. It is not enough to hate the autocrat to unseat him. Presidential elections are really about what people want to see in their future. And that's where a lot of oppositions to autocrats or aspiring autocrats, both in the United States and around the world, have fallen flat on their face.
