Over the last several years, Americans have been consistently warned that our democracy is teetering on a knife’s edge.
Elected officials have further spread the alarm, with House Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) telling Fox News “Democracy will be ending if the Democrats lose in 2022.” Sen. Rick Scott (R-F.L.) told N.B.C. news, “The Democrats want to destroy this country, and they will try to destroy anyone who gets in their way.”
Our own research confirms that the electorate has heard the alarm. Heading into the 2022 elections, 57 percent of Americans agreed with the statement that “America is heading toward the end of democracy, where free and fair elections will no longer occur” — 53 percent of Democrats and 65 percent of Republicans.
Substantial majorities in both parties think that the other side of the aisle supports a large number anti-democratic acts in the name of victory: censoring the media, ignoring judicial orders and loyalty to their party over the Constitution.
These data describe a dark time for America.
As political scientists who specialize in studying American political polarization – particularly the degree to which Americans have visceral hatred for those on the other side of the aisle – you might think our outlook is the bleakest of all.
And yet we came away from Tuesday’s elections looking at the political landscape with optimism.
With the electoral defeat of many Republicans on both the state and national level whose views lean toward the extreme, American voters are showing the kind of faith in American norms that we are seeing in our weekly survey research data as co-directors of the Political Polarization Lab, a joint venture between Dartmouth, University of Pennsylvania and Stanford.
In reality, the vast majority of Americans on both sides of the aisle don’t support violations of democratic norms.
For example, when we asked if they support reducing polling places in areas where the other party’s voters live, only 6 percent of Republicans and 6 percent of Democrats said yes. These numbers are still troubling, but they are encouraging in the face of claims of majorities of citizens of one party supporting the end of democracy. While there may not be support for democratic backsliding, most Americans have a false perception of the other side’s willingness to abandon democracy. When asked what percent of the other party supports reducing polling places, Democrats reported that 60 percent of Republicans would agree, and Republicans reported that 55 percent of Democrats would too.
Americans in both parties were similarly off base in nearly every category we asked about, with the exception of 48 percent of Democrats believing the president should use executive orders to circumvent a Republican Congress. (Polls from the Trump administration indicate that Republicans also support executive orders at high rates when they are in power.)
Social media, increasingly our barometer for public opinion, presents a distorted view as the most extreme are often the most vocal on these platforms.
To be sure, troubling violations of democratic norms are occurring in America, led by the political elite, and often in the name of “making America great again.” But in 2022 voters indicated tepid support for those candidates, and it’s an encouraging sign.
And even though cable news hosts and others have been batting around phrases like “a new civil war,” the data show very few people support political violence, with 98 to 99 percent rejecting a variety of violent crimes as justifiable in the name of politics. Of course, even 1 percent of the country engaging in violence is a serious concern (as the events on Jan. 6 showed), but it is still a nearly unanimous rejection of political extremism.
It’s important to show how unpopular these views actually are. Americans are far more likely to support anti-democratic behavior and political violence when they think the other side is willing to engage in such behavior.
The fact that there have been markedly fewer accusations of election fraud in 2022 and few incidents of violence around the polls also aids in the feeling that the nation’s democratic norms are holding. Election deniers who lost their 2022 races have, with a few exceptions, conceded to their opponent.
It is good news that the overwhelming majority of Americans – 78 percent as of our most recent poll – don’t feel like the end of U.S. democracy is inevitable, as much as they may worry about it. With the 2022 midterms behind us, election returns back our survey data.
The 2022 elections have shown us that there is a wide gap between what elites want and what the public supports. American voters just sent a loud message that openly violating democratic norms is not a winning campaign strategy. Candidates who want to win elections should pay attention. American elected officials have put democracy on a knife’s edge, but the American public overwhelmingly supports democracy and rejects democratic subversions.
Yphtach Lelkes is an associate professor of communication at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. Sean Westwood is an associate professor of government at Dartmouth College.