But he fomented an insurrection (and did not lift a finger to stop it) based upon a lie. He had legal recourse to challenge the election and he exhausted it then resorted to extra legal remedies. Thus he tried to cheat. He had people breaking the law with the fake electors. He's attacked the press and any other source of fact to delegitimize the election. He's softening the ground for violence. He softened the ground for claiming fraud by calling it all rigged before the election. No previous major candidate in USA history did any of this, but this very same pattern of behavior appears in all dictatorships. The way it often works in Africa is the strong man delegitimize the election ahead of time, and if you lose, you amp it up then fight for power in the streets. So, Trump is the only major candidate to do this.
In his first go, he was prevented often by the courts and his advisors from doing more. Remembering he was going to appoint a low level lackey to head the DOJ who was willing to do his bidding and get him to write to the Georgia legislators to not certify falsely claiming evidence of fraud. Only the threatened resignation of the entire upper echelon of the DOJ stopped him. He begged his VP to throw out the votes during certification despite the VP only having ministerial powers (thus asking Pence to break the law), hoping to throw the vote into the house. Then he sat back as the crowd threatened him. Of course now he's threatening to throw everyone who followed the law which brought him indictments and convictions into gaol.
He's learned to avoid appointing the people with any standards outside of blind loyalty now. He's claiming he wants to be a dictator. His project 2025 is to replace the people in government who know what they're doing with political loyalists, which is what every dictatorship does. No democracy does this. This is why the Russians/Commies could never compete with the west, as your rise in Soviet times was based on loyalty and connections only. Prior to the Civil Service act in the USA, the USA government was all political appointees and it was thoroughly corrupt.
These patterns, clear in history, appearing in the USA for the first time, is what has Democrats and many Republicans realy concerned. And it's based on his actions and words.
Remember he has a number of criminal trials ahead, so grand juries belive he broke the law.
I get what you're saying. He didn't go full Maduro. True. But he went farther than any USA by far, and along the well worn grooves.
I guarantee if he loses again he'll scream even more about fraud and will do whatever he can to overturn the election. The stability of the usa means nothing to him.