Former President Donald Trump faced unprecedented levels of resistance during his tenure in office, including from partisan advocacy groups, Democrats and establishment Republicans in Congress, and unelected bureaucrats and senior officials within the executive branch.

If Trump is re-elected to the White House in 2024, he will face even greater internal opposition and resistance to his leadership, potentially including a military-led coup to sideline or completely usurp his power, according to Breitbart.

In other words, for all of the talk from Trump's critics about the particularly heightened threat he poses to American-style democracy and constitutional norms, it is those same political and bureaucratic opponents who are reportedly planning to undermine and throw all of that away in an ostensible effort to prevent him from doing the same.

Report outlines plans for new level of anti-Trump resistance

NBC News reported on Sunday that former President Trump was "sparking fears among those who understand the inner workings of the Pentagon that he would convert the nonpartisan U.S. military into the muscular arm of his political agenda as he makes comments about dictatorship and devalues the checks and balances that underpin the nation’s two-century-old democracy."

Those fears included that a re-elected Trump, now surrounded by loyalists instead of career bureaucrats who would tell him "no," would order the U.S. military to go after his political opponents, quash oppositional protests, or even intervene in future elections.

Per the outlet, in light of those concerns, "a loose-knit network of public interest groups and lawmakers is quietly devising plans to try to foil any efforts to expand presidential power, which could include pressuring the military to cater to his political needs."

Those plans reportedly include taking legal and legislative action against Trump, sending threatening letters that warn of "consequences" to his appointees, and even insubordination or outright treason from military leaders who may refuse to follow not just orders from the commander-in-chief that they deem unlawful but also perfectly legitimate orders that they might view as "lawful but awful."

One of the purported leaders of this planned resistance to a Trump second term is former senior Justice Department official Mary McCord, who now works at Georgetown Law School and told NBC News, "We’re already starting to put together a team to think through the most damaging types of things that he might do so that we’re ready to bring lawsuits if we have to."

Severe pushback about reported preparations for "military coup" and treason against Trump

While NBC News reported on the Trump Resistance 2.0 plans as though they were a wholly good and necessary thing, TheBlaze reported that the revealed plans received significant pushback and were labeled by critics for what they truly were -- preparations for a military coup, subversive sedition, and outright mutiny and treason by bureaucrats and senior officials against a lawfully elected president and commander-in-chief.

Columnist Tammy Bruce said, "This is called a 'coup,' and openly discussed by the very same people who lecture you that *Trump* is the danger to democracy. Every day they panic even more exposing themselves for what they are. And they wonder why the American people have had enough."

Commentator Ian Miles Cheong observed, "The establishment will not allow Trump to become president, and even if he does somehow make it, they’ll get the military to overthrow him. They are saying the quiet part out loud."

The Federalist Editor-in-Chief Mollie Hemingway wrote in reaction to the NBC News report, "What beautifully soft framing for your article about how Democrats are plotting to have the military undermine the Constitution and civilian control."

Her colleague, The Federalist co-founder and CEO Sean Davis, wasn't so nice as he posted, "Whenever Democrats accuse Trump of doing something, it’s a guarantee that Democrats are planning to do that very thing against Trump. Which means Democrats are preparing to use the military to steal the 2024 election and prevent their opponents from lawfully taking power."

Then there was conservative communications director Greg Price, who noted of the report, "Openly admitting that they are planning a military coup if Americans re-elect Donald Trump. All to protect democracy of course."