50 years? Right.

A subtle but perhaps unmentioned weapon - egregious sentences for very basic protest action somewhat forces the hand of any "next" administration - they must use the same legitimacy-eroding tools (presidential pardon as the big one) to reverse the obviously heinous punishments, making everything feel like more of the same - a mushy slush of whoever is in charge doing what they want, no actual foundational structure or rules or constraints.

Or, next admin simply lets those stand, swept under the rug, which is about equally likely, and which also moves the ball forward toward greater authoritarianism and fascism.

It's amazing and frightening, the tools at their disposal today. Even doing the most obviously dirty thing to this person / these folks - it's basically all upside.