[32] On the other hand, Wendy Lower wrote that it was a "masterful synthesis",[33] John Connelly called it "morally informed scholarship of the highest calibre",[34] and Christopher Browning described it as "stunning".

[29] The journal Contemporary European History published a special forum on the book in 2012, featuring reviews by Mark Mazower, Dan Diner, Thomas Kühne, and Jörg Baberowski, as well as an introduction and response by Snyder.

[67] Marlène Laruelle commented[29] that "Contrary to [Snyder's] claims, the Kremlin does not live in an ideological world inspired by Nazi Germany, but in one in which the Yalta decades, the Gorbachev-Yeltsin years, and the collapse of the Soviet Union still constitute the main historical referents and traumas.

[74] He has spoken[75] and written about the war in the press and he publishes history and commentary in his online newsletter "Thinking About..."[76] Olena Zelenska, First Lady of Ukraine, met with Snyder to discuss the mental health and resilience of Ukrainians at the Yalta European Strategy Annual Meeting in September 2023.

[77] On February 5, 2025, Timothy Snyder said of Elon Musk’s attempt to seize control of the U.S. Treasury system: “of course it’s a coup.” Historically, he explains, centers of power were physical places and coups consisted of armed assaults on government buildings.

In this era of digital power, young men in civilian clothes with portable drives, under orders completely devoid of legal authority, have broken into computer systems[78][79] enabling them to stop government payments and obtain private data to support blackmail and further crimes.

[80] Since the 2024 United States presidential election in November, Timothy Snyder has assessed global and domestic affairs in his newsletter Thinking About[81] through a variety of lenses including a 1960s sitcom,[82] applied mathematics,[83] the debunking of historical myth,[84] neologism,[85] and a horror show of his own invention.

"[86] In Snyder's view, Trump's public record of submission to Putin and proposed appointments: Robert Kennedy, Jr., Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, Pete Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard, and Kristi Noem, "look like a decapitation strike: destroying the American government from the top, leaving the body politic to rot, and the rest of us to suffer".

He asserts that these individuals "combine narcissism, incompetence, corruption, sexual incontinence, personal vulnerability, dangerous convictions, and foreign influence as no group before them has done [and] taken together, Trump's candidates constitute an attempt to wreck the American government".

Snyder notes that the US Supreme Court cleared the way for Trump’s return through "laughable" rulings on immunity and on the US Constitution’s third section of the Fourteenth Amendment disqualifying insurrectionists from federal office.

[90] Proposing a positive alternative and response to oligarchical moves underway to break the US government, Snyder cites the example of opposition voices in Great Britain’s parliament and a Washington Post op-ed by House Representative Wiley Nickel,[91] North Carolina Democrat, urging appointment of a Congressional "shadow cabinet" loyal to the US Constitution.

Such a body would consist of leading politicians who are true experts ready to share with the press not only criticism of the misdeeds of oligarchs, but also a positive vision and specific policies that good government can and should be enacting.

''[95] Snyder encourages Americans to observe South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol's dictatorship, which lasted less than a day, to learn the danger signs of authoritarianism and make preparations, commenting: "Others have given us time to think, and have set for us good examples.

"[89] Snyder also warns against mistaken beliefs about history such as the "fall of the Berlin Wall" – it never fell – used as shorthand for the end of communism in eastern Europe, and points out the more useful fact that East Germans took the initiative to protest and to leave their country.

This is exemplified by Trump ads fantasizing that Kamala Harris allowed millions of sex-changed foreigners to take jobs from Americans, a single fiction triggering gender, economic, and sexual vulnerabilities.

Snyder predicts that Trump will seek systemic changes to remain in power until death, use deportations to divide Americans and render them violent, create a martyr cult around January 6 perpetrators, and cooperate with like-minded rulers abroad.

[103] Among publications citing Snyder were The Baltimore Banner, The Bulwark, the Columbia Journalism Review, The Globe and Mail, The Guardian, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Democracy Docket, and Salon; individuals crediting him for their understanding of media outlet decisions not to endorse Kamala Harris and the threats to democracy they signal include Ian Bassin, Andy Borowitz, Dahlia Lithwick, Robert Kagan, Bill Kristol, Jonathan V. Last, Tim Miller, Maximillian Potter, Heather Cox Richardson, Charlie Sykes, Mary Trump, and Marc Elias.

[108][109] In an essay Fantasy-Impotence-Fascism: The Trump-Vance Political Theory[110] and interview with Tim Miller of The Bulwark,[111] Snyder describes how the Springfield pet eating hoax and other fascist lies are used to turn Americans on each other and combine with actual powerlessness and highly performative masculinity on the part of leaders.

Outcomes potentially resulting from an autocratic regime, says Snyder, are an end to taxes on the very rich with increases for the middle class, bank collapse in the absence of financial regulation with bailout subsidized by average taxpayers, loss of Social Security and other benefits dependent upon a functioning federal bureaucracy, stock market crash absent uniform enforcement of laws preventing insider trading and other abuses, and job loss from the failure of businesses dependent on interactions with the federal government.

Trump's statement that if he were to lose in 2024, "Jewish people would have a lot to do with the loss",[114] in Snyder's view, also echoes Nazi propaganda themes: Jews must be singled out as a group, must pass a loyalty test, have unusual powers, make a left-center coalition illegitimate, and stab you in the back.

In response to a request from the United States House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Timothy Snyder provided written and oral testimony[115][116] for the April 17, 2024, session: "Defending America from the Chinese Communist Party's Political Warfare, Part I."

He emphasized the role Americans play in the efforts of hostile foreign powers to exploit domestic weaknesses using divisive propaganda intended to show that democracy is impotent, hypocritical, and not worth defending.

[117] He described the increasing conformity of Chinese propaganda methods and themes with those used by Russian disinformation campaigns designed to promote American inaction and interfere with elections, backing candidates most likely to support authoritarian regimes.

[118] In written testimony and during the oral hearings, Snyder and members of Congress gave examples of Marjorie Taylor Greene, JD Vance, and Donald Trump publicly promoting foreign propaganda tropes.

[120] On April 10, 2024, Snyder joined with over 35 musicians, actors, thinkers, historians, entrepreneurs, and diplomats in an appeal[121] to Congress for aid to Ukraine in defense of democracy and in the fight "for our safety and for everyone's freedom."

The open letter states that Ukrainian resistance to Russian dictatorship protects the international order, makes other wars in Europe impossible, and supports American interests, deterring China without provoking Beijing.

Snyder likened NBC's pre-2024 election hiring of former Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel to the anticipatory obedience he described in his book On Tyranny: "Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given.

[124] Trump's "big lie" tears the very fabric of factuality, said Snyder, echoing Hannah Arendt, by denying verifiable reality and forcing believers to accept an illogical premise that Democrats rigged the 2020 election only for the presidency and not for members of Congress.

"[126][127] In a May 2017 interview with Salon, he warned that the Trump administration would attempt to subvert democracy by declaring a state of emergency and take full control of the government, similar to Hitler's Reichstag fire: "it's pretty much inevitable that they will try".

[40][138] On August 18, 2024, joined by Mark Hamill, he launched the United24 Safe Terrain Initiative funding mine clearing robots to rid Ukrainian lands of explosive ordnance, reduce risks for sappers, and allow people to return to their businesses and farms.