[Trump's] corrupt attempts to overturn election results certainly suggest that he has that tendency.
With rare exceptions (such as Coolidge and ...
ummmm ... well, such as Coolidge), every president since at least (and, of course, including) Lincoln has exhibited such a "tendency" to some degree or another. Two of the most notable were the Roosevelts, Theodore and Franklin (one being a Republican and the other a Democrat, should anyone still be laboring labor under the illusion that this is a partisan phenomenon). Treating Trump as if he is somehow special or different in this regard (either for better or worse) ultimately just boils down to personality-cult bullshit.
The source of the "tendency" is the system itself. The system evolves the personages, not the other way around. Like the modern U.S., the late Roman Republic was a basket case of dysfunctions. Several men, each in his own way, tried to "fix" it. Sulla became
dictator in the name of preserving the Roman Republic in defiance of its circumstances. He failed. Julius Caesar became
dictator in the name of adjusting the Republic to its circumstances. He failed, too (and got merked, to boot). Octavian became
imperator (turbo-
dictator) and delivered the Republic its
coup de grâce - because he understood that the Republic's gig was finally up. Republics (at least the overweeningly expansive ones) become empires - and it takes an emperor to rule an empire.
Whether someone - Trump, or anyone else - becomes "dictator" of America (formally, or
de facto) has relatively little to do with the "tendencies" of the person himself, and far more to do with the nature and "logic" of culturally-multifarious, continent(s)-spanning republics-
cum-empires.
