To the Editor:

Re “The G.O.P. Goes Full Authoritarian” (column, Dec. 11):

Paul Krugman is demonstrably right that “the G.O.P. is a n authoritarian party in waiting” and that “the G.O.P., as currently constituted, is willing to do whatever it takes to seize and hold pow er.” But not just currently.

Rollbacks of democracy have been central to Republican rule for the better part of two decades. The Republicans’ contempt for democracy was enthroned when their Supreme Court majority overrode Florida’s legal election procedures to install George W. Bush as president in 2000.

Ohio’s Republican secretary of state , Kenneth Blackwell, was already carrying out ballot restrictions in 2004. In the years since, with the spread of Republican control in the states and the Supreme Court’s rollback of federal voting rights in Shelby County v. Holder (2013) , voter purges, minority vote suppression and extreme gerrymandering have accelerated.

The G.O.P. has needed no lessons from Viktor Orban, Hungary’s dictator. The Republican Party hasn’t been waiting. It’s been speeding.