“Administration,” according to the Merriam Webster dictionary, means “performance of executive duties: management”; also “a body of persons who administer.”

As for “coup”, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s Cline Center Coup d’Etat Project has categorized the storming of the U.S. Capitol Building on Jan. 6, 2021, as both an attempted auto-coup and as an attempted dissident coup, reflecting the distinctive activities of different actors involved in the event.

President Donald J. Trump refuses to lead an “administration.” Instead, he is continuing to lead a coup against the United States of America.

Words and their definitions matter. Lesson No. 9 from “On Tyranny — Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century” by Timothy Snyder is “Be kind to our language.” “Avoid pronouncing the phrases everyone else does. Think up your own way of speaking, even if only to convey that thing you think everyone is saying. Make an effort to separate yourself from the internet. Read books.”

This paper on Aug. 9 ran a story headlined “Trump administration to take back $62M in low-income solar grants for Maine.” A more accurate statement would be “Trump’s ongoing coup to take back $62M in low-income solar grants for Maine.”

I strongly suggest that, in the future, you use “ongoing coup” instead of “administration.”

William Thoren
South Portland