When, as a presidential nominee, he said a particular federal judge shouldn't be hearing a case against him because the judge's parents were Mexican, Trump did more than insult a member of the judiciary. He attacked the impartiality of America's legal system.
When Trump threatened to "loosen" federal libel laws so he could sue news organizations that were critical of him and, later, to revoke the licenses of networks critical of him, he wasn't just bullying the media. He was threatening the freedom and integrity of the press.
When, as president, he equated neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members with counter-protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, by blaming "both sides" for the violence, he wasn't being neutral. He was condoning white supremacists, thereby undermining equal rights.
When he pardoned Joe Arpaio, the former sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona, for a criminal contempt conviction, he wasn't just signaling it's OK for the police to engage in brutal violations of civil rights. He was also subverting the rule of law by impairing the judiciary's power to force public officials to abide by court decisions.
When he criticized NFL players for kneeling during the national anthem, he wasn't really asking that they demonstrate their patriotism. He was disrespecting their -- and, indirectly, everyone's -- freedom of speech.
In all these ways, Trump undermined core values of our democracy.
This is the essence of Trump's failure -- not that he has chosen one set of policies over another, or has divided rather than united Americans, or even that he has behaved in childish and vindictive ways unbecoming a president.
It is that he has sacrificed the processes and institutions of American democracy to achieve his goals.
By saying and doing whatever it takes to win, he has abused the trust we place in a president to preserve and protect the nation's capacity for self-government.
Controversy over the Mueller report must not obscure this basic reality.
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