I'm a Brit who went through Brexit. I think most people got the idea it was going to be economically stupid before the vote but the Brexit voters prioritized independence over that. Also just shaking things up because they were unhappy with how things were going for them personally.
It was hard to be sure as there were so many options - hard Brexit, soft and so on that it was unclear what the deal would be. At least with Trump you can vote him out again whereas we are kind of stuck with Brexit.
We hope. He keeps talking about ignoring the term limits set in our Constitutional Amendments. Jan 6 2021 was an ineffective coup attempt, but a coup attempt nonetheless.
Heinlein's Future History saw Nehemiah Scudder win the last American elections in 2012. We've luckily made it a few elections past that date, and the Future History was not a prophecy and was a bit kinder in that you could escape to the Moon or Mars or Venus this decade. But it's hard not to fear the same sorts of theocratic and fascist "urges" are cyclically at play in the current decade and not worry about possible consequences, such as and including the end of the US as we know it.
It was hard to be sure as there were so many options - hard Brexit, soft and so on that it was unclear what the deal would be. At least with Trump you can vote him out again whereas we are kind of stuck with Brexit.