The vanishing center of American democracy

Finally, an issue has arisen that unites most Americans. According to a New York Times/Sienna poll published last week, 58 percent of voters on the left, right and in between agree that our political system is broken and needs structural change. They don’t want tinkering on the margins or incremental adjustments, but a complete overhaul. 

The problem is that while a majority agree on the diagnosis, they are irreconcilably divided on the causes and cures. It’s like being on the Titanic, agreeing that the iceberg is dead ahead, and battling over what explains the iceberg or in which direction to steer to avoid it. 

We’re so polarized that we can’t agree on what we see. For example, 92 percent of Democrats in the survey believe that former President Trump’s post-election actions “went so far that he threatened American democracy”; but 76 percent of Republicans believe “he was just exercising his right to contest the election.” Eighty-nine percent of Democrats believe Trump committed crimes while contesting the election; but 80 percent of Republicans said he hadn’t. 

The survey reveals that both parties have altered certain assumptions that guided their orthodoxies. Traditional Republicans have cemented their alignment with Donald Trump’s relentless attacks on traditional institutions. Even as the January 6 commission has methodically revealed the brutalities of the violent attack, including the bloodying and beating of U.S. Capitol Police officers, 72 percent of Republicans view it only as a protest “that got out of hand.” The established conservative doctrine of law and order, respect for institutions and support for law enforcement has been turned on its head. 

Democrats, meanwhile, are veering from the traditional view that government is a solution to achieving progress and justice. The survey revealed that they largely believe that our current political system has failed them. Their party controls both houses of Congress and the White House but has been unable, they perceive, to protect abortion and voting rights or pass meaningful gun safety and climate legislation.

What may be the most concerning element of the survey is the complete shattering of confidence across the board in news organizations. We have different views because we are ingesting partisan flames cloaked as absolute truths. Only one-third of respondents in the survey were confident that major newspapers and television networks report accurately and fairly about news and politics. Only 7 percent said they get most of their news from a major national newspaper. 

Data in these surveys can be dry, sterile, one-dimensional. I was moved by reading the sentiments of several respondents. 

Army retiree Rosanthina Goforth, 55, of Wagoner, Okla., gets her news from Christian news programs. She believes that officials at every level of government need to be removed and replaced with people “who believe in the United States.” And who does she have in mind? Here’s a hint: “I know that Trump won the election,” she said. “It’s a given. He won that election. But somehow or another, you know, people got paid and votes were mismanaged.” This is in absolute and irrefutable contradiction of the facts, upheld by over 60 courts and eight judges appointed by Trump himself.

Rachel Bernardt, 62, from Silver Spring, Md., sees things differently. For her, Trump’s election “revealed the scope of American racism and the extent to which Republican officials would cater to it.” She told the Times, “If I saw a confederate flag, I’d just assume that the person was some kind of mentally ill psycho.” On Oct. 6, she saw those flags and swastikas paraded through the halls of the U.S. Capitol.

But the divisions aren’t solely partisan. Faith in government has collapsed faster and deeper among voters between the ages 18 and 29. Mitch Toher, 22, from Austin, Texas, reflected the view of nearly half of young voters in the survey when he said that voting for either Democrats or Republicans didn’t matter. “The largest divide is not necessarily left versus right, but those that are generationally old versus young. …I don’t think those types of changes are coming any time soon, or at least forthcoming at any point in my lifetime.”

Self-described independents bring the survey into greater coherence. When they are factored into the sample, the overall percentage of voters who view the Capitol riot as an attempt to overthrow the government rises to 49 percent, with 55 percent of voters believing that Trump’s actions were a threat to American democracy.   

But the middle no longer seems to matter. The energy that cemented America near the political center for most of our recent history now tears us apart. Gerrymandered districts artificially inflate the bases of both parties and eclipse the middle; social media algorithms manipulate us, locking our eyes on a feed that fuels our adrenalin and blinds us to inconvenient, sometimes nuanced realities.  

Democracy has always required forbearance, a set of mutually agreed upon norms and a shared respect for facts even when the facts run contrary to our ideologies. The Times/Sienna poll is an alarm. Returning to the Titanic metaphor: When the ship of state sinks, we all go down. 

Steve Israel represented New York in the U.S. House of Representatives over eight terms and was chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee from 2011 to 2015. He is now director of the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy Institute of Politics and Global Affairs. Follow him on Twitter @RepSteveIsrael.