Turkey Had a Coup Attempt
On July 15, 2016, a faction of the Turkish military attempted to overthrow President Erdogan. The coup failed within hours. What followed lasted years.
Within days, Erdogan removed 2,745 judges from their positions. 15,200 educators were fired in July. 28,000 more teachers were dismissed in September. 31,000 police employees were removed. 15,000 military members. 131 media organizations were shuttered. 89 arrest warrants went out for journalists.
By the end, more than 160,000 people had been fired and 77,000 arrested. 36,000 were jailed pending trial. The purge extended far beyond anyone connected to the military attempt. Teachers who had nothing to do with the coup. Judges who had never met a conspirator. Journalists who had covered it.
Erdogan had a pretext. A violent attempt to overthrow the government. The purge was disproportionate, politically motivated, and widely condemned. But there was a crisis.
The U.S. Did Not Have a Coup
DOGE fired 260,000 federal workers in its first year. 25,000 were rehired as essential, meaning the government admitted it needed them after removing them. Federal spending rose 6% during the same period. The firings did not reduce the budget. They reduced the workforce.
160,000 fired in Turkey after a coup attempt. 260,000 fired in the U.S. without one.
The VA lost 40,000 employees. 3,000 nurses. 1,000 physicians. Neurology wait times went from 27 to 127 days. The SSA lost 7,500, hitting a 50-year staffing low while serving 70 million beneficiaries. The CFPB was gutted from 1,700 to 200. 17 inspectors general were fired in one night.
Turkey’s purge targeted the judiciary, educators, police, military, and media. The U.S. cuts hit healthcare workers, food safety inspectors, social security processors, consumer protection staff, environmental regulators, and the people who oversee all of them.
The Method Differs. The Function Is the Same.
Erdogan used emergency powers granted after a genuine national security crisis. The U.S. used executive authority and budget reconciliation. Turkey arrested and imprisoned. The U.S. fired and defunded. Turkey shuttered 131 media organizations by decree. The U.S. press freedom ranking dropped to 64th, its lowest ever, through a combination of credentialing changes, FOIA delays, and what Reporters Without Borders called a president “pouring gasoline on the fire.”
The function of a purge is not punishment. It is institutional capture. When you remove the people who enforce the rules, the rules stop being enforced. When you remove the people who investigate corruption, corruption is not investigated. When you remove the inspectors general whose job is to find waste, waste goes unfound.
Turkey understood this. Freedom House documented it. The same organization now documents the same trajectory in the United States.
Read more on the Rule of Law hub and the democracy scores brief.