Bring on the Generals: Roughly 60 Percent of Polled Democrats Would Support a Military Coup

According to the Center, roughly six in 10 (59%) Democrats polled said they would feel “very positive” or “somewhat positive” if the US military removed Trump and seized control of the American government.

The vast majority, of course, would be happy if Trump were impeached and removed from office (87%) or ousted by his cabinet via the 25th Amendment (84%).

The survey also shows the same overwhelming support for socialism in the new Democratic Party. What is surprising is the support for public ownership of industries. That includes almost half (46%) supporting public ownership and operation of grocery stores. Almost 40 percent support public ownership and operation of restaurants. (39%).

I have previously said that I do not recognize the current Democratic Party as someone raised in a politically active and liberal Democratic family. I first became estranged from the party over the radical shift from a pro-free speech party to one that supported censorship and speech curtailment.

Despite many who claim that the Democratic Socialists represent a small fraction of the party, these polls show a consistent and growing majority in support of socialism.

The addition of support for a military coup shows the manifestation of a rage addiction in America. Democratic leaders are now calling for trashing core constitutional institutions or values. When some of us criticized moves to pack the Supreme Court, leaders like Kamala Harris and Gavin Newsom accused us of engaging in mere “nostalgia.”

It is the same “nostalgia” that leaves many of us shocked at the support for a military coup. On our 250th anniversary, we face yet again Benjamin Franklin’s warning that this is a Republic if we can keep it.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor who teaches a class on the Constitution and the Supreme Court and is the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”

93 thoughts on “Bring on the Generals: Roughly 60 Percent of Polled Democrats Would Support a Military Coup”

    1. What Has Trump Accomplished..??

      Trump has committed us to a mindless war we cannot win. That’s an ‘accomplishment’!
      And Trump is currently running down all our munitions so China can sieze Taiwan.

        1. What an absurd question.

          As Turley’s post notes – those of you on the left are delusional

          It is YOU that are lawless.
          It is YOU that are totalitarian
          it is YOU that are violent
          It is YOU that are fascist.

          Playing word games and trying to redefine the words that describe YOU accurately as labels to slap on your oponents does not change who you are.

          Read Turley’s post.

          NONE of the actions those on the left support are MORAL

          You crave power over others

          Worse still you are stupid.
          You buy ideologies that have absolutely never work
          and you are willing to impose the BY FORCE on anyone who disagrees.

          Trump is NOT imposing new and untested policies that steal your rights on you by FORCE
          He is restoring the rule of law.
          He is returning to what has worked for centuries,
          he is not infringing on your rights in anyway to do so.
          he is NOT using force against you
          he is NOT taking from you anything that was ever yours

          What he is taking from you is your lawless power over others.

          YOU are the fascists.
          YOU are the lawless.
          YOU are the Hitler worshipers

      1. Gasoline can be conserved by banning leaf blowers, lawn mowers, and gasoline-guzzling pickup trucks and muscle cars.

  1. This thought is not new. It persisted in the Biden administration, and I thought at the time that former Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was propositioned by the West Wing about whether he would consider it. At the time, many generals would have signed on. Now they’ve been purged by Hegseth.

  2. Nearly 240 years under this Constitution. Elections every two years, a general every four. Presidents come and go. Administrations come and go. The cycle repeats, and the losers wait for the next one.

    If this poll stands up to scrutiny, 59% of polled Democrats warm to a military coup. Over one president. A president pursuing the agenda he ran on and won with.

    And then what? JD Vance is next in line. Marco Rubio is behind him. The Republican bench is deep. Do the generals coup the whole party? Then the voters who elected them?

    That’s not saving the Constitution. That’s ending it.

    1. IF the poll stands up to scrutiny. It doesn’t. Because it’s based on a theoretical scenario.

      What it did show was Democrats overwhelmingly chose the constitutional approach to removing Trump.

        1. Hide the poll?! LOL!!!! I exposed what it actually said. I’m sure you didn’t bother to read it. I would not be surprised.

      1. That’s funny. 🤣 You want to validate the poll by touting one result, while at the same time saying the poll doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.

      2. X – what are you talking about ?

        Polls are nearly always about a theoretical scenario – they are about something that has not happened.

        Who WILL you vote for?
        We do not poll
        who did you vote for

        That is what elections are for.

        The relevance of the poll and what disturbs Turley and the rest of us is that
        those of you on the left seek your desired ends BY ANY MEANS NECESCARY

        Should democrats take the house there is little doubt there will be impeachments galore

        Most of the country will not care in the least
        If you wish to impeach Trump and the entire cabinet a dozen times go for it.

        You have already turned impeachment into something purely political and meaningless.
        Or possibly even a badge of courage

        I hope that Democrats do badly in November – but the best thing for the GOP in 2028 is for them to do well

        Sp Please make fools of yourselves

    2. OLLY,

      Trump is so obviously a stooge for Putin that we would welcome a committee of West Pointers to bring America back to the western orbit.

  3. We spent the year celebrating the Declaration of Independence, which is exactly using the military to overthrow a tyrannical government. Why would the same thing happening now be bad?

  4. Theoretically, if the President dissolves Congress and engages in a campaign of mass murder, it would be easily seen as valid for the military to dispose them. So where is the line? How much tyranny is allowed before it is ok for the military to step in?

    1. Sally,

      Please explain what tyranny has occurred? All court mandates are followed (even the ones not based in the law). Laws are being enforced.

      Where’s the tyranny?

  5. Some years ago on a chat board, a member remarked that he’d read the history of how Hitler came to power. He remarked that he really didn’t want to actually participate in the experience first hand (and feared he was about to). For those who like their reading light, I’d suggest Len Deighton’s book “Winter”. His father was a UK diplomat in Berlin in that era and he grew up there. Not a history, but there’s informative background.

  6. Prof Turley. Thank you for the awareness. What we have seen is Center for Strategic Politics equivalent of the Bier Hall Putsch in which the use of fear to promote revolution to the “victims”. You live in Northern Virginia – you had to see this coming.

    It has already been done. Milley and the coup balloon.

    General Mark Milley in conference with his generals and the then Secretary of Defense LLoyd Austin and probably the majority of the 44 four star pentagon leaders there in Washington and Northern Virginia with a trial balloon “This is a Reichstag moment, the gospel of the Führer,” — Gen. Mark Milley to justify a “temporary” coup that would eliminate US Democracy as illustrated in your recent book. “Milley was meeting regularly with fellow members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff representing the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines to assess the threat of a coup and draw up contingency plans. No doubt, these sessions were also aimed at taking the political temperature of the US officer corps to determine what level of support a dictatorial power grab would enjoy in different sections of the military.” – Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker. These 44 incompetent power mongers are rising.

    This blatant form of ideological propagandizing indoctrination wherein the ACCUSATION of the identified ideology and bigotry is used to obscure the actual committers accusing OF THE SAME. Examples include the use of bigoted attack the DEI political faction used against those they accused of the same bigotry. Or perhaps even better, the genocidal race and societal leadership attack against those claimed to have dominated the targeted “victims” as “master race” by those “victims” to support their own power assumption in the in 1930’s Germany as the “master race”.

    For this etal., Milley was granted full unconditional pardon by the departing President Joseph Biden and the perpetrators have had explicitly expressed future “absolution” by the “rising powers”. https://jonathanturley.org/2025/10/10/purge-politics-jeffries-pledges-legal-retaliation-when-democrats-take-power/

    The people making these votes need to be made aware that this approach of eliminating legislation and executive branches and balance of power resulted not only in the massive loss to humanity across the world, but even at home, the sons of the mothers were sent to die in brutal and useless “for the fatherland”. Their structure of industry, transportation and resources were destroyed. Their women raped and homes pillaged by the surging victory. It didn’t come out well for ANYONE.

    We better get ready for the rides to Dachau.

  7. Oh Geez. The professor is at it again. The poll did not ask, “Do you support an authoritarian military junta?” <emIt asked how people would feel if the military acted to protect the Constitution—likely implying a hypothetical scenario where Trump himself violated constitutional boundaries or refused to leave office. By omitting</b this crucial framing, Turley misrepresents an abstract desire to protect the rule of law as an endorsement of lawlessness. He’s rage baiting MAGA. As usual.

    Turley claims Democratic voters are actively “embracing a coup d’état.” This is a massive jump in logic. Saying you would feel a certain way in a pollster’s hypothetical scenario is vastly different from advocating for or organizing a military takeover. He’s exploiting MAGAs emotional ‘sensitivities’ to induce rage against Democrats. What better way to promote a book on….”rage addiction” by feeding some rage inducing poll for MAGA nuts.

    He gingerly sidestepped the fact that the same poll showed that the overwhelming majority of Democrats overwhelmingly preferred constitutional, democratic remedies: 87% favored impeachment and 84% favored the 25th Amendment. When 87% of a group explicitly supports the legal process outlined in the Constitution, it is intellectually dishonest to claim their primary political ideology is “trashing core constitutional values.

    Turley is guilty of the very phenomenon he decries. By taking a nuanced, hypothetical poll, stripping it of its context, and using inflammatory analogies—like comparing Democratic voters to perpetrators of “drive-by shootings”—he is actively manufacturing the partisan rage he claims to diagnose. To sell books and get that much appreciated blog traffic. Crazy indeed.

    1. Stupid clown agitator, start your own blog.
      YOU said that “It asked how people would feel if the military acted to protect the Constitution.”
      A COMPLETE LIE—
      but it tells us how you operate.
      Oh Geez, little X is at it again.

      1. Before you throw a tantrum and call people ‘clowns,’ you might want to actually look at the poll Center for Strategic Politics published on September 21.

        The question literally described a headline where the military took control under the ‘stated rationale of safeguarding the Constitution.’ It didn’t ask if they wanted a violent, lawless dictatorship.

        Turley hid that context because it ruins his ‘rage-bait’ narrative that people just want an authoritarian coup. Facts aren’t ‘lies’ just because they make “the good professor” look dishonest.

        1. Before YOU throw a tantrum, clown, did Turley say, “Do you support an authoritarian military junta?”
          See how that works?

          1. As usual, reading comprehension is a serious problem for you. Learn to read man. You would be doing yourself a huge favor.

    2. Amen 100%. Turley bemoans the “Age of Rage”, clutching his pearls and blaming the democrats while the throws another log on the ‘rage fire’ and warms his hands over it. It’s his whole schtick – he literally has nothing else. And I guarantee this post was influenced by the blowback from his readers a couple of days ago when he timidly intimated that Trump crossed the line by banning news outlets from the White House. He doesn’t want to lose followers so offers them up some red meat….pathetic.

    3. What george didn’t post.
      ____________________
      The survey also shows the same overwhelming support for socialism in the new Democratic Party. What is surprising is the support for public ownership of industries. That includes almost half (46%) supporting public ownership and operation of grocery stores. Almost 40 percent support public ownership and operation of restaurants. (39%).

      1. Dustoff,

        I’m glad you posted that part, because it exposes exactly how Turley’s rage-bait works.

        He wants you to read ‘public ownership of grocery stores‘ and imagine Soviet bread lines. In reality, cities across America are looking into municipal grocery pilots specifically to target food deserts and lower food costs for working-class families.

        Even more embarrassing for Turley’s narrative: the poll found that support for publicly owned grocery stores was actually highest among conservative, working-class Democrats, not the ‘radical left’. People are just tired of being overcharged for dinner. Turley took an everyday economic anxiety about inflation, slapped a scary ‘Socialist’ label on it, and packaged it to generate clicks for his blog. You fell for it.

        Turley knows his audience and he knows how easy he can rage-bait you.

  8. Dear Mr. Turley, this poll does not surprise me. The Democrats have been calling for political violence for years. Rep. Maxine Watters told her folks to start attacking conservatives during Geo. W. Bush’s administration, which they did. Sarah Sanders, hardly a conservative firebrand, was attacked at a restaurant while her young children were present. The assassination of Charlie Kirk has made the Left giddy with the possibility of taking out other conservatives. It is my hope the fall election will usher in a large conservative majority (both Republicans and conservative Democrats) and will hush these folks up once and for all.

  9. ringing up the tally…..60% of Democrats support assassination of those they disagree with, military coups when they don’t win elections, murdering the unborn, Marxism/Communism, 35 genders, believe men can have periods and have babies

  10. Oh, but the Democrats were just fine with running a man for another four years in office who was obviously displaying symptoms of dementia. When they said debate he thought they said don’t be late and nodded his head in agreement.
    Use your imagination, if you have one, what would have happened had Joe Biden been reelected.
    Gas prices under Biden $5.01 per gallon when there was no restriction to the flow of oil around the world.
    You just can’t explain stupid.

    1. “Oh, but the Democrats were just fine with running a man for another four years in office who was obviously displaying symptoms of dementia.”
      Really, what did the Republicans do with Trump?

    2. Thinkitthrough, man you really don’t think things through. Sigh.

      Yes, gas hit $5.01 per gallon for exactly one week in June 2022. But that was a direct result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine throwing global oil markets into chaos, not a permanent baseline. When Joe Biden left office in January 2025, regular gas had dropped back down to an average of $3.11 per gallon, and diesel was $3.61 per gallon

      However, since Trump’s second term began, the escalating conflict with Iran and disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz have pushed fuel costs right back up. Today, regular gas has surged to a national average of $4.48 per gallon, and diesel has hit an all-time record high of $6.51 per gallon and it’s still looking to climb even higher.

      Trump started a war that caused global gas prices to rise and has nothing to show for it.

    1. Or the 25% who would feel neither good nor bad about it. That’s a total of 58% who would be at least untroubled by the President’s assassination!

  11. “Democrats polled said they would feel “very positive” or “somewhat positive” if the US military removed Trump”, I’m surprised it’s not higher among democrats. This is the result of electing a president who wants to stem the flow of tax dollars directed to fraud and “redistribution of wealth”. These same democrats who feel “positive” about a military coup are the so called “well educated” who will cower if the violence erupts. I would be very cautious if I were a democrat regarding coup’s, they often turn on their supporters and everyone suffers.

  12. Democrats, China, Iran and the Main Stream will Lie, cheat, steal, blame someone else, deny, deny, deny, and repeat!!!
    Everything the Democrats touch turns to crap…
    Democrat Motto: We’re not happy ‘till you’re not happy…
    The Words Democrat and Hypocrite are Interchangeable…
    Democrats Believe that ALL Americans are stupid…
    Democrats and the Main Stream Media have consistently failed to meet the low standards that they set for themselves and replaced common sense with DRAMA.

  13. Yes. We know there are lots of people who would applaud the assassination of our President. And who would applaud the disenfranchisement of every Deplorable. But let’s catch our breath. Let’s remember that America’s Founding Fathers faced a more formidable foe. And with faith and courage, they prevailed. And they gifted to us the United States of America and the Bill of Rights. Let us fear not. Let us dedicate ourselves to protecting and defending our unalienable Rights endowed by our Creator. Let us pray.

    1. We? Gifted to us? faced a more formidable foe…. in your case, mental illness.
      Where do you come up with such delusions?

  14. Truly – this can’t be true! If this ever happened, it would show utter contempt for our Constitution, and we’d be in a civil war. Where is this survey?! If it is legit, then it would be time to reach out to our Senators – both sides and confront this.

    1. Trump already shows utter contempt for our Constitution. Why is what Trump is doing ok but the military restoring the Constitution not ok?

Leave a Reply