Trump promised retribution - how far will he go?

As the US president pushes a crackdown on left-wing groups and openly targets political foes, critics ask where he's taking America

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He has vocally encouraged his attorney general to target political opponents. He has suggested the goverment should revoke TV licences to bring a biased mainstream media to heel. He has targeted law firms he sees as adversaries, pulling government security clearances and contracts.

Trump's moves have been conducted with the kind of open zeal – brazenness, his critics say – that might belie how dramatic and norm-shattering they are.

His demand a week ago that the Justice Department prosecute a handful of named political opponents, for instance, is the kind of thing that, when it was discussed in private and revealed in Oval Office recordings a half-century ago, prompted a bipartisan outcry that led to Richard Nixon's resignation as president.

Now it is just a blip in the weekly news cycle. And the pace at which Trump is expanding presidential authority in order to impose his will is, if anything, accelerating.