I don’t think Democratic candidates miss the connection between racism and authoritarianism 

For the Democrats, spotlighting the struggle between democracy and authoritarianism is a way of highlighting the links between domestic and foreign policy—as Trump did to powerful effect in 2016. It’s additional justification for their ambitious domestic agendas of reducing economic inequality, investing in education and infrastructure, reforming the campaign-finance system, and restoring voting rights. If the United States wants to spread freedom abroad and compete with authoritarian rivals such as China, they reason, that must start by strengthening democracy at home. Democrats’ denunciations of Trump’s attacks on the media and the rule of law, his refusal to take Russian interference in the 2016 election seriously, and his harsh immigration policies are all slotted under the rubric of ways in which the president is imperiling U.S. democracy.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/07/democrats-have-found-their-battle-cry/593881/

Elizabeth Warren for one

"President Trump's actions and instincts align with those of authoritarian regimes around the globe," Warren said. "He embraces dictators of all stripes. He cozies up to white nationalists. He undermines the free press and incites violence against journalists."

https://www.newsweek.com/warren-trump-embraces-dictators-threatens-democracy-1237872

Interesting on Ibram Kendi​'s radically outside-the-box view on racism:

The Fight to Redefine Racism

In “How to Be an Antiracist,” Ibram X. Kendi argues that we should think of “racist” not as a pejorative but as a simple, widely encompassing term of description.

By Kelefa Sanneh @ NewYorker.com, August 12, 2019

Sennah also throws in his own opinion here, which is also interesting:

[....] In modern American political discourse, racism connotes hatred, and just about everyone claims to oppose it. But many on the contemporary left have pursued a more active opposition, galvanized by the rise of Donald Trump, who has been eager to denounce black politicians but reluctant to denounce white racists. In many liberal circles, a movement has gathered force: a crusade against racism and other isms. It is a fierce movement, and sometimes a frivolous one, aiming the power of its outrage at excessive prison sentences, tasteless Halloween costumes, and many offenses in between. This movement seems to have been particularly transformative among white liberals, who are now, by some measures, more concerned about racism than African-Americans are. One survey found that white people who voted for Hillary Clinton felt warmer toward black people than toward their fellow-whites.

Most white people in America are not liberals, of course, and so the campaign against racism has often taken the form of an intra-white conflict. One of the most prominent combatants is Robin DiAngelo, a white workplace-diversity trainer [....]