Authoritarianism expert Ruth Ben-Ghiat explained the importance of mockery as a tactic in the campaign to defeat GOP nominee Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, at the ballot box in Novembers presidential election.

Democratic nominee Kamala Harris and running mate Tim Walz have fully leaned into the ridiculing of Trump, Vance and other Republicans with the single word weird in recent days.

Humor has long been one of the most effective weapons of anti-authoritarian politics, Ben-Ghiat noted in a column for MSNBC published Wednesday.

The piece is titled: Trump cant take a joke. Democrats need to use that.

Behind the facade of their omnipotence, most strongmen are brittle and insecure personalities. They dont mind being called evil, but being ridiculed is a different matter, explained Ben-Ghiat, the author of Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present, a history professor at New York University and frequent warner of what to expect from a potential second Trump administration.

Last year, Ben-Ghiat warned Trump will be finishing the job that he started if he wins back the White House.

Its not just destroying democracy internally, she predicted , envisioning Trump also removing the United States from the realm of democratic internationalism and aligning it with autocracies.

Read Ben-Ghiats full analysis here.