The Democracy for All Project is a multiyear collaboration between the Kettering Foundation and Gallup. This annual survey is based on the responses of more than 20,000 national participants and is designed to understand how Americans experience democracy and to elevate all voices across groups and generations.

The degree to which citizens participate in civic and political activities is one of the most common indicators used to measure the vitality of a democracy. In societies where citizens regularly engage in their communities, there is often greater collective trust and greater tolerance of those who hold differing political opinions. Since its founding 250 years ago, the United States has been celebrated as a strong democracy in which citizens participate in various forms of civic life, from community service to political advocacy. In recent decades, however, research has documented how participation and engagement have waned and is plagued by inequality among different demographic groups. As the nation moves into the next 250 years, it is an important time to reflect on the ways that Americans are currently engaging in our democracy and the issues that motivate them to participate in fulfilling its promise.

The State of Civic Participation in America

In the 2026 wave of data collection, the Democracy for All Project, a multiyear collaboration between the Kettering Foundation and Gallup, provides important insights into who is participating in our democracy today and what motivates them to get involved. The data show clear evidence that online engagement in politics is increasingly a key hub of socialization and democratic practice. Forty percent of the adult Americans surveyed reported having posted their opinions about politics online in the past year and about a third (32%) reported that they had participated in online social platforms—such as Facebook groups, Nextdoor groups, or similar forums—to discuss issues facing their communities.

Participation in face-to-face activities was more varied. Almost a third (32%) of respondents said they had volunteered for or participated in organizations designed to improve their communities in the past year, and an additional 38% said they wanted to participate in such organizations but had not done so. Overall, these data suggest that America continues to be a nation of civically engaged “joiners,” even though “joining” for many has become an online activity.

The survey also asked American adults if they had participated in a protest, rally, or demonstration in the past year. Although there are various ways that citizens engage to express their dissatisfaction with a regime or to encourage specific policies, one of the most common and visible tactics is through peaceful protest, which includes public demonstrations, rallies, and marches.

Sixteen percent of American adults in the Kettering-Gallup survey reported participating in protest, and an additional 28% reported wanting to participate.

These statistics are particularly notable since they indicate an increase in protest participation. For example, in April 2018, the Washington Post-Kaiser Family Foundation conducted a survey of American adults and asked who had participated in a protest, march, or demonstration since the first Trump administration had taken office in January 2016. At that time, 12% of American adults reported having participated during this period of time, which is a lower rate than we see today.

Understanding Protest Participation

The Democracy for All Project also provides important details about who is participating in protest in the current historic moment.

Education Level

According to decades of social scientific research, protesters have a consistent demographic profile: they tend to be highly educated, politically left-leaning, and young. Data collected by the Democracy for All Project finds similar patterns for American adults in 2026. Those who had protested in the past year were more highly educated. Respondents with the highest levels of educational attainment, a post-graduate degree, were the most likely to report having protested (25%) or wanting to protest (29%), and those with a high school degree or less were the least likely to have participated (12%) or to have wanted to protest (27%).

Also consistent with the expectations from previous research on protest participation, American adults in the Democracy for All Project who identified as being left-leaning were much more likely to have participated in protest in the past year. Almost a quarter of Democrats or Democrat-leaning independents reported having protested in the past year (23%). The statistic was much lower for those who identified as Republican or Republican-leaning independents (9%).

Age

This new data also supports previous findings that younger people are more likely to protest than elders. Youth are not only in the formative years of their lives, developing and experimenting with their social and political worldviews, but also have what scholars call “biographical availability.” In other words, younger people have fewer family and work obligations that would limit their ability to participate in a protest on a weekend or an evening. Moreover, a sizable share of young adults are also students on university campuses where political activism has historically flourished.

When we look at the data from the Democracy for All Project across age categories, there is an association between age and levels of participation in protest. While 19% of those aged 18–29 had protested in the past year, only 17% of those aged 30–44 and 12% of those aged 45–64 had protested. However, the rate goes back up for people in the oldest category of 65 years old and over. For this group, which includes many Americans who have retired and are more biographically available, 14% reported having protested in the past year.

Although these gaps are not remarkably large, the differences swell when we consider those people who expressed interest in protest. Specifically, an additional 38% of those aged 18–29 said they wanted to participate in protest in the past year but had not done so. These figures progressively fall among each age bracket: 32% of those aged 30–44, 23% of those age 45–64, and 20% of those aged 65 and over claimed they had wanted to protest but had not done so. This finding suggests that the greatest potential for more people to participate in protest is among young people, many of whom reported being interested in protest despite not participating.

Race and Party Identification

While the trends noted above align with existing academic knowledge about protest participants, the Democracy for All Project also presents some fascinating new findings regarding protest patterns based on party identification and how it interacts with racial identities. Overall, the data show that people of color reported participating in protest at slightly higher rates than White individuals (17% versus 15%).

When we look at how racial dynamics are related to party affiliation, there are clear differences. Among Democrats, White individuals are the most active: 25% of White Democrats reported protesting in the past year compared to 19% of Black Democrats, 19% of Asian Democrats, and 23% of Hispanic Democrats. Democrats that identified as American Indian or Alaska Native had the highest rates of protest at 30%. Among Republicans, though, Whites were the least engaged in protest. While only 8% of White Republicans reported participating in protests in the past year, the rate of protest for Black Republicans was nearly three times greater than White Republicans: 23% of Republicans that identified as Asian and Hispanic also reported protesting at much higher rates than their White counterparts (15% and 14%, respectively). Among independents who did not report leaning toward either party, protest rates were fairly similar among all races.

In sum, although party identification plays a more significant role in explaining protest participation, these findings show how the racial dynamics of protest differ substantially between the two major parties: Democrats that join protests are more likely to be White, on average, while Republicans that protest are more often people of color.

No Kings Participants and Differences Across Movements

As part of an ongoing research project studying protest participation in America, our research team at American University has been studying protesters who have mobilized to participate in the largest days of action during the second Trump Administration: the nationwide No Kings protests. Rather than collecting data from a national sample of American adults, like the Democracy for All Project did, this project collects data directly from protest participants, in many cases while they are marching in the streets or listening to speeches at a rally. By directly surveying protest participants while they are protesting, we can collect more granular data on this particular group of people to understand their beliefs, motivations, and backgrounds. Comparison to the Democracy for All Project sample reveals which groups are under-represented in the No Kings protests.

Our data collected from protesters at No Kings days of action were somewhat consistent with the data from the Democracy for All Project. Participants in these anti-Trump rallies were highly educated (87% of protesters had a bachelor’s degree or higher) and were left-leaning. At every event, over 92% of participants reported having voted for Democratic candidate Kamala Harris for president in 2024.

At the same time, the data we collected from No Kings participants were also quite different. Participants were predominantly White (84%) and middle-aged (the average age across all of our samples was 45). Since nearly all of the No Kings participants supported the Democratic Party in the 2024 election, it is not surprising to see that our findings are congruent with the racial dynamic discussed earlier: among Democrats, it is predominantly White people taking to the streets to protest.

While the Democracy for All Project data show that young people aged 18–29 were most likely to participate in protests in the past year, the data we collected from the No Kings rallies document that young people have not been participating at high rates in these protests against the Trump administration and its policies. In other words, young people are protesting, but they are largely channeling their activism into other events aside from the major mobilizations of the current pro-democracy movement.

Citizen Responsibility

The Democracy for All Project also asked respondents what they considered to be the most important citizen responsibility right now: either “speaking up against injustice” or “respecting authority.” In our analysis, the key feature separating respondents on this question was political affiliation. Overall, most respondents selected “speaking up against injustice” (70%). Among Democrats in the sample, 84% supported this statement compared to only 49% of Republicans.

Once again, we find interesting differences when we look at these data across party identification and protest experience. Those who have protested in the past year, no matter their party identification, supported speaking up more. While support for speaking up against injustice was high for Democrats overall whether they protested or not (87% versus 84%, respectively), the findings were different for Republicans. Although Republicans generally supported speaking up less, the rate was higher for those Republicans who reported participating in a protest over the past year (56% versus 49% for Republicans who did not protest).

Motivations

The Democracy for All Project also explores what would motivate Americans to get involved in a political or social cause. The data show remarkable consistency for respondents, no matter their political party affiliation. The most common response overall was “feeling that an important right or freedom is being threatened,” which was selected by 28% of Democrats, 27% of Republicans, and 20% of independents. Among independents, the most common answer selected was “finding a cause or issue where you believe your involvement can make a real difference.”

The biggest differences across motivations can be seen in responses to the category of being motivated by government officials abusing power. From a list of possible motivations, this option was selected by 22% of Democrats in contrast to 18% for both independents and Republicans. Beyond that difference, independents are more likely to be motivated by seeing a direct impact on their daily lives (17% versus 16% for Republicans and 14% for Democrats). Independents are also most likely to report that nothing would motivate them to get involved (15% versus 8% for Republicans and 6% for Democrats). Although this finding is the most notable, it is important to stress that it only pertains to a small percentage of independents overall.

Reframing Protests for Democracy

As the United States celebrates the 250th anniversary of its founding, the Democracy for All Project documents a significant number of Americans are still participating in civic and political activities. However, it also shows how much of this participation has been redirected from face-to-face interactions to online activities. Significant demographic traits continue to separate those who join one of the most active forms of participation—protest—and those who sit out. Americans who join protests, including those participating in the massive, nationwide No Kings days of action, have very high levels of educational attainment compared to the national population and largely affiliate themselves with the Democratic Party. Moreover, despite the No Kings rallies attracting mostly middle-aged and older individuals, young Americans are not checking out of political activism. In fact, the Democracy for All Project’s data reveal that the youngest Americans report joining protests at higher rates than middle-aged and older adults. These findings indicate that young people are devoting their political involvement to causes beyond the large-scale and nationally coordinated No Kings mobilizations.

In other words, the No Kings rallies, which have been organized to defend democracy and combat authoritarianism, are more resonant with middle-aged and older generations. Recently, public polling has confirmed that young Americans are more disillusioned with democracy and experience deeper economic insecurity than their elders. It is not entirely surprising then that younger Americans are not showing up to defend a system that they feel never worked for them. Instead, they are likely more interested in deeper, structural change rather than preserving existing institutions and systems. As the Democracy for All Project shows, young Americans report joining protests at high rates. The data we have collected from protest participants document how younger Americans tend to prioritize other issues, such as opposition to the war in Gaza and racial justice. One strategy for channeling more young people into the pro-democracy movement would involve connecting pro-democracy sentiment with efforts toward more robust socioeconomic and political changes in America.

In recent years, social science research has emphasized the centrality of political polarization in US politics. Inter-party hostility has increased, and Democrats and Republicans increasingly feel more negative toward one another. Data collected from the Democracy for All Project affirms that citizen priorities are significantly different for people who affiliate with the two main political parties. The data also reveal that the partisanship divide shapes patterns of civic engagement in America today. Democrats not only protest far more than Republicans but also the demographic makeup of protesters within each party differs significantly. At the same time, there are very clear similarities in motivations to act across party identification. Those who are looking to mobilize more Americans to participate in face-to-face forms of activism would benefit from connecting their efforts to feelings that important rights or freedoms are being threatened.

Dana R. Fisher is the director of the Center for Environment, Community, & Equity and a professor in the School of International Service at American University.

Arman Azedi is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Environment, Community, & Equity at American University.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

Germany’s far-right party, Alternative für Deutschland, and its 44% win in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt is a symptom of a systemic crisis of democracy that the political mainstream keeps mistaking for a local disturbance. Part I of this two-part essay examines the misdiagnoses and the three defective strategies built on them: isolating the far right, copying it, and letting it govern.

On September 6, 2026, the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party won 44 percent of the vote in Saxony-Anhalt’s state election. While this state in the former East Germany has just over two million people, the result matters well beyond the region. Germany is Europe’s largest economy. Its postwar democracy was designed with elaborate safeguards against a return of authoritarianism, so what happens there shapes the prospects of democracy across the continent and around the world. Commentators responded to the election results by searching for a single, clearly identifiable cause that the political center could then fix—immigration, a sluggish bureaucracy, or the peculiar political culture of the former East Germany.

Single-variable explanations, however, lead to single-factor strategies, which are bound to fail. The rise of the far right is a symptom of a systemic crisis of democracy, more visible in eastern Germany than elsewhere.

Blaming Institutions, Culture, and Character

One unconvincing cluster of explanations focuses on a country’s particular institutions. In the German case, conservative commentators often lament a slow and frustrating bureaucracy, which is indeed notoriously sluggish. The morning after the Saxony-Anhalt election, one of Germany’s largest news portals blamed the “sprawling bureaucratic state” for growing political dissatisfaction and prescribed trimming it as the remedy.

Such explanations share a common flaw: they look for country-specific factors, even though the phenomenon in question is general. In affected countries around the world, some local institutional peculiarity takes the blame for the far right’s breakthrough, whether that means the US Electoral College, Britain’s first-past-the-post system, or France’s two-round presidential election.

If the causes were such unique institutional quirks, the far right’s global presence would be hard to explain. By 2025, radical-right parties together formed Europe’s most popular party family, with support above the levels reached in the 1930s. In summer’s polls from 2026, France’s Rassemblement National stood at around 35%, Norway’s Progress Party at 30%, and Britain’s Reform UK at 26%. Narendra Modi has governed India since 2014, and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has governed Türkiye since 2003; the former in a federal parliamentary system, the latter in a system he converted from parliamentary to presidential along the way. Neither institutional design has stood in their way.

Simplistic cultural readings, the various decodings of the national psyche, are not much more convincing. In Germany, East-West identity carries distinct social, political, and cultural traits. East Germans (“Ossis”) supposedly inherited an inferior, illiberal political culture, and enforcing this theoretical condemnation is known as “Ossi-bashing.” The theory has several Eastern European variants, all of which explain the rise of illiberalism by a supposedly servile national character: the homo sovieticus, the serf mentality, or civilizational incompetence. However, the recent fall of illiberal governments in Poland and Hungary has turned these same countries into international laboratories of democratic resistance. So much for the dysfunctional national psyche. East German particularities may explain the intensity of the mechanism, but they cannot explain the mechanism itself.

The cultural explanation also has a more scientific-looking version, which by now is the most thoroughly refuted theory of populism yet still organizes public debate: the cultural backlash of aging, uneducated men against unstoppable progress toward cosmopolitanism. But basic facts contradict this theory. The AfD was founded in 2013 by highly educated free-market economists led by Bernd Lucke. Bernd Baumann, the parliamentary group’s chief whip, has a portrait of Friedrich Hayek on the wall in his office. The party is popular among the young; in Saxony-Anhalt, 41% of first-time voters aged 18 to 24 voted for it. It also won 59% of workers, yet the best predictor of its strongest districts is the density of craft and small industrial businesses. The party’s financiers are frustrated big entrepreneurs. In the 2025 campaign, the AfD received the largest individual donations of any party, including €1.5 million from Winfried Stöcker, founder of the diagnostics company Euroimmun. The party’s largest known donor is Henning Conle, a real-estate billionaire who lives in Zurich and London and owns a holding company in Liechtenstein.

The AfD, like much of today’s far right, began as a market-radical elite project that was later recast in exclusionary-nationalist terms. Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz, the Republican Party under Donald Trump, and Reform UK have traveled similar paths. These parties unite two discontented constituencies: domestic business owners who feel sidelined by global competition and a middle class that feels devalued. A large share of workers vote for the far right parties as the only available alternative to the governing elites, even though that alternative rarely delivers for them.

Behind all these explanations lies a common narrative: the far right is a passing disturbance in an otherwise functioning system. Chancellor Friedrich Merz, for instance, contritely “admitted” that the government does not communicate its measures well enough. If only someone could finally explain to those foolish voters how well the government is actually doing. In reality, the AfD has been growing for 13 years while trust in the political elite keeps falling. Only 17% of Germans now believe the state can carry out its basic tasks. Across Western democracies, the share of people who think democracy is not important is rising. A disturbance that lasts this long and spreads this widely is a chronic, life-threatening illness of democracy.

Three Defenses That Do Not Work

Misdiagnoses lead to dead-end strategies. Those who view the AfD as the expression of a minoritarian subculture expect a “firewall” to stop it. Those who attribute its success to its specific policies choose to copy them. Those who see a passing disturbance call for letting it govern, hoping it fails and is exposed. All three expectations are illusory.

The firewall, the commitment of all other German parties to refuse any cooperation with the AfD, strengthens what it is meant to wall off through three mechanisms. First, it splits the political space in two: five legitimate, democratic parties on one side, the AfD on the other. Second, the only common denominator among the five is defending the status quo, so the theme of change belongs to the far right. In Germany, this is a long-standing condition. As early as 1980, Chancellor Helmut Schmidt told anyone with visions to see a doctor; this has remained the philosophy of the German center ever since, a world of small technical steps and muddling through. Third, firewall coalitions are paralyzed from birth given the ideological distance between parties like the socialist Die Linke and the conservative Christian Democrats; decisive governance is impossible. Against this dithering, the plain-spoken drive of the far right impresses more and more people.

Co-opting the far right’s themes is another dead end. In January 2025, Friedrich Merz relied on AfD votes to pass a migration resolution in the Bundestag; at the federal election four weeks later, the AfD doubled its 2021 score. The Danish Social Democrats pioneered the anti-immigration center-left in 2019 by adopting the far right’s migration program, yet in spring 2026 they collapsed to their worst result since 1903. The research shows the same thing: on the terrain of exclusionary nationalism, the far right is unbeatable because voters prefer the original to the copy.

Centrist parties increasingly resign themselves to the third option: let them govern. The idea that right-wing populism succeeds in opposition and fails in government dates from the Austrian Freedom Party’s (FPÖ) entry into government in 2000, after which it fell from 27% to 10% in 2002. By 2024, it was stronger than ever, finishing first with 29%. As to letting them govern and watching them fail, I have 16 years of “demystifying the far right in power” with Orbán to offer as a test; I do not recommend trying it.

The misdiagnosis stems from how knowledge about populism and democracy is produced. Populism research applies ever-finer methods to ever-smaller variables, while the logic of clicks pushes the media toward personal dramas and moral panics. Policy institutes operating between the two tend to stay close to those in power and rarely confront them with unwelcome findings. The systemic crisis is thus broken down into its components, even though the whole is more than the sum of its parts.

All three strategies share one assumption: that the AfD is the problem to be managed. Thirteen years of growth under each strategy point to a deeper source, the exhaustion of the postwar settlement that reconciled market economies with democratic equality. In Part II of this essay, I’ll turn to that crisis and to what a democratic answer would require.

Gábor Scheiring, a 2025 CFK Global Fellow, is an assistant professor at Georgetown University in Qatar, where he researches democratic backsliding, economic inequality, and post-socialist transformations. He is a coauthor with Benedek Jávor of the forthcoming Stanford University Press book How Democracies Revive: Why Illiberalism Keeps Winning and What to Do About It and author of The Retreat of Liberal Democracy. Scheiring is also a former member of Parliament in Hungary.

Resilience & Resistance is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that features the insights of thought leaders and practitioners who are working to expand and support inclusive democracies around the globe. Direct any queries to globalteam@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

🎧 LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE

Is democracy still possible? Can the people still hold government accountable? Yes, but that requires working together. And working together requires organizing. Dorian Warren joins host Alex Lovit to talk about building people power, some of the victories that collective organizing has already achieved, and why he believes the United States is on the precipice of building a fairer and more inclusive democracy.

Dorian Warren is the co-president of Community Change, a national organization founded in 1968 to build the power of low-income people, especially people of color, to create a multiracial democracy and a fair economy where everyone can thrive.

Do you ever watch the news and wonder, “How did we get here?” Or think to yourself, “Things are bad . . . What can I do?”

The Context is here to help. Our show breaks down the ideas, history, and trends that are shaping democracy. And you don’t need to be an expert to follow along. Every other Tuesday, host Alex Lovit talks about timely topics with big-picture thinkers and hands-on practitioners, like activists, writers, historians, and community leaders.

The topics are heavy, but we try to have fun along the way. To build the future we want, we’ll need knowledge—but also camaraderie and joy.

We hope you’ll join us.

EXPLORE ALL EPISODES

Observers are bracing for the 2026 midterm elections—not only in anticipation of the outcome, but also out of concern for the integrity of the process. Risks come from many directions: federal agents at polling places, cyberattacks, rogue counties refusing to certify, attacks on mail-in voting, organized efforts to delegitimize the outcome, or any number of other possibilities. According to polling by the Kettering-Gallup Democracy for All Project, 57% of survey respondents are worried about ballots not being properly handled, and more than two-thirds fear political leaders will pressure officials to change election outcomes.

Then there are the risks that make fewer headlines. In a forthcoming report, produced with All Voting is Local, based on interviews with election officials, I describe the long tail of consequences from recent federal actions including layoffs at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the firing of several members of the Election Assistance Commission, which sets standards for voting equipment. While election officials told me they feel ready and supported going into 2026, the longer the drought in federal support continues, the more likely something is to eventually break.

Many of the short-term threats are not new and may not be catastrophic, while the long-term threats may play out over a long enough time that they will escape public notice. And both overlap with a third threat: the increasingly polarized nature of the public’s trust in elections, which is likely to make these challenges more difficult to solve.

Voter Intimidation and Deployment of Federal Agents

One of the most frequently cited risks to the midterms is the possibility that the administration will station federal agents—especially from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)—at polling places for the purposes of deterring voters. After all, ICE has not limited itself to only detaining noncitizens. Fear is a reasonable response to its presence.

The Department of Homeland Security denies that it has any such plans, but members of the administration have been somewhat cagier in responses when asked. Legal analysts say that federal law prohibits officials from stationing military or other federal agents at polling places. All 50 states have laws against voter intimidation, and several prominent advocacy organizations have filed a lawsuit to prevent DHS from stationing agents at polling places.

The law may be a thin shield under authoritarianism, but there are also practical obstacles to a nationwide surge of federal troops or agents: there are simply too many polling places. Agents would have to concentrate on a sufficient number of strategically important locations, and even that might stretch their numbers thin. What’s more, elections take longer than they used to; early voting has already begun in many states. Even if the administration targeted swing districts with above-average immigrant populations, a nationwide surge would be logistically challenging.

There is another source of personnel available to the government: the National Guard and the US military. The president could conceivably declare a national emergency, attempt to federalize the National Guard, and deploy soldiers to polling places for the purpose of intimidating voters, seizing voting equipment, or for the purposes of propaganda.

But according to the Brennan Center for Justice, the prohibition on deploying soldiers or federal agents to polling places is not lifted under a national emergency. An administration that was to try this tactic would essentially be operating under the doctrine of asking forgiveness rather than permission (though no apology is likely to arrive). Most likely, courts would quickly issue injunctions ordering the administration to stand down. If the situation is time-sensitive, they may not come swiftly enough, and courts’ reluctance to hold government officials in contempt has contributed to an air of impunity.

In short, targeted intervention in a small number of tightly contested races is more likely than a massive surge that changes which party wins control of one or both chambers of Congress. But given that early voting has already begun, time is running short for such a ploy to materialize.

Creating a Pretext for Action

This risk becomes more serious if the administration can create a pretext for action. The administration’s efforts to acquire state voter rolls and scour them for ever-elusive noncitizen voters embodies this risk. If the noncitizen voter narrative, or something like it, provides even a thin patina of credibility, that might be enough to give cover for federal action like the seizure of ballots or voting equipment; it might also encourage rogue county officials to refuse to certify election results, though courts are likely to intervene in that scenario too.

Any effort to create a pretext for election disruption will almost certainly be bolstered by activists and online influencers repeating the administration’s preferred narrative to their audiences. A large enough swell of support from Republican voters might even prompt Speaker of the House Mike Johnson to try something like refusing to seat newly elected members of Congress. Such a stunt would be incredibly destructive, but it is unlikely; it would require complex bureaucratic acrobatics (explained well by Molly Roberts in Lawfare).

The events described above call to mind the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection, events that took place in the context of the COVID-19 shutdown and the summer of protest and police violence following George Floyd’s murder. The political atmosphere today is much different: even former supporters of the president are questioning his leadership following sustained inflation and an unpopular war of choice with Iran. Before January 6, social media platforms detected a huge groundswell of conservative anger and violent rhetoric; it seems unlikely that these elections will create a similar outpouring of rage.

Unless the political climate changes, it is difficult to imagine the required number of people to risk personal legal jeopardy to imperil the election. If anything is going to derail the midterm election in the near term, it will probably be something much less dramatic—like slow or failed delivery of absentee ballots by a sabotaged US Postal Service. That could look like an acute legitimacy crisis—or like yet another form of voter suppression.

The Slow Erosion of Election Administration Capacity

The current administration is not the only source of threats to US elections. Cyberattacks from hostile state or nonstate actors also rank high on the list.

Unfortunately, the federal government has shed much of its capacity to support the cyber defense of state governments and local boards of elections. Geoff Hale, a visiting fellow for elections security at the Center for Democracy & Technology and a former public servant at CISA, warns that “the federal government [lost] the vast majority of its institutional knowledge about election security” after deep cuts at CISA, and that mechanisms for information-sharing have broken down. As a result, “a full picture of cyber threats to elections no longer exists.”

This sounds alarming, and it is. But a few things make this a long-term challenge rather than an acute one. First, the decentralized nature of US elections—which are run by local bodies spread across all 50 states—means the number of targets is incredibly diffuse. Attackers would need to penetrate a large number of separate systems to have a catastrophic impact. Second, many states have developed their own cyber-defense capabilities, allowing them to step into the gap—for now.

But waning federal support leaves open the possibility that state capacity will erode with time. Every federal dollar not spent on cybersecurity is a dollar state budgets must find or go without, and cross-state intelligence sharing becomes less robust. Resources and standards may sag over time.

Similar challenges exist for programs like the Help America Vote Act, which provides grants for election administrators to use for equipment upgrades and other costs. This program received significant increases in 2018, 2020, and 2022, but funding has since become anemic. Inconsistent support risks leaving boards of elections reliant on scarce local funds for vital upgrades.

Similarly, those upgrades must be certified by the Election Assistance Commission—where all commissioners were recently fired by the president. Its work will not stop immediately, but if new commissioners are not appointed, new standards cannot be set. The result would be the gradual but persistent stagnation of the nation’s election infrastructure.

The Polarization of Election Fears

With so much weighing on the shoulders of election administrators, it is hardly a surprise that public confidence in the system is shaky. The current administration’s rhetoric and actions have not helped, but the challenge of weak public confidence goes back to at least the 2000 election contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore.

As stated above, the Democracy for All Project’s most recent survey reveals deep anxiety about the election process. It is not alone: according to a joint poll by the Associated Press, the National Opinion Research Center, and USAFacts, only 34% of Americans trust government certification of election results, down from 40% in 2024. A Pew Research Center poll found that 55% of voters believe the midterm results will be fair and accurate, which is lower than in spring of 2020. All three polls show deep partisan effects: for example, the Kettering-Gallup results show that Democrats are more likely to be concerned with improper political pressure on election officials and voter intimidation while Republicans are more likely to be concerned about ballot handling improprieties.

Not all the news is bad: a survey by the States United Democracy Center found that a majority of Americans trust all means of casting and counting ballots, so the distrust is not related to a specific procedural issue and is unlikely to have a procedural remedy. The MIT Election Data and Science Lab found that between the controversial 2000 election and 2024, confidence that votes are “counted as intended” has been relatively stable. The major change is the widening gap between the two parties whose confidence oscillates depending on who won the last cycle (though confidence among Republicans has lower peaks and deeper valleys than among Democrats).

An interesting wrinkle is that this does not mean voter turnout is declining; MIT found “only a weak causal connection” between confidence and turnout. The public seems to find participation worthwhile even when it questions the integrity of the process; it may be that the citizenry does indeed see each election as an emergency.

While democratic participation is an unalloyed good, the sense of crisis that oscillates between Americans of different political stripes is a signal of poor health. The challenge might not be restoring trust in election administration. Instead, it might be building a democracy that Americans feel can survive one election loss for their preferred party.

Dean Jackson is a senior fellow at the University of Pittsburgh’s Communication Technology Research Lab and at Tech Policy Press. In 2022, Jackson was an investigative analyst with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the US Capitol.

From Many, We is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that highlights the insights of thought leaders dedicated to the idea of inclusive democracy. Queries may be directed to fmw@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

In recent years we have seen a worrying reversal of the advances in LGBTQ+ rights around the world. On the African continent, tough new anti-LGBTQ+ laws have recently been passed in Uganda, Senegal, and Ghana. In the US, there has been an alarming rise in anti-trans rhetoric and harmful policies, like laws restricting access to bathrooms, banning gender-affirming care for minors, and restricting updates to gender markers on official documents, such as passports and driver’s licenses. Most recently in September 2026, the Turkish government’s raids and arrests targeting the LGBTQ+ community made headlines around the world.

These developments should be of concern to everyone concerned about democracy and human rights, even if you are not a member of the LGBTQ+ community. Many of us are familiar with “First They Came,” a poem by Pastor Martin Niemöller, which talks about why we need to speak out when others’ rights are violated, as we might be next. But I want to take this thought a step further: attacks on LGBTQ+ people’s rights are not a precursor for attacks on the rights of others. They are an attack on everyone’s rights and on democracy itself.

Undermining the Rule of Law

As Human Rights Watch points out with respect to the recent crackdown in Turkey, the government’s actions are a threat to the rule of law because many of the activities the targeted organizations are charged with are perfectly legal, such as receiving funds from foreign sources.

More generally, when homosexuality or gender nonconformity is criminalized, it means every person, queer or not, has to watch their behavior to make sure they conform at all times to strict gender stereotypes or risk falling under suspicion. Take, for example the experience of journalist Lydia Polgreen, who was mistaken for a man in a women’s restroom in a hotel in the south of France. Policing and surveillance of some people’s bodies and behavior means the policing and surveillance of everyone’s body and behavior. This is the very definition of an unfree and undemocratic society.

This is not just theoretical. In some cases, such as Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act of 2023, landlords of LGBTQ+ people are at risk of prosecution, as is anyone who does not report a “homosexual act,” including friends and family members of LGBTQ+ people. As a trans man from Montenegro said at a recent meeting I attended, “I don’t like to talk about people being allies. I prefer to talk of accomplices because we are all in this struggle together.”

Attacks on the LGBTQ+ community serve another purpose for anti-democratic actors: they serve as a distraction. In the words of drag queen Jaida Essence Hall, who played a politician during a skit on RuPaul’s Drag Race: “Look over there!” the scapegoating of LGBTQ+ people and other minorities (such as migrants) serves to divert citizens’ attention from authoritarians’ undermining of institutions, erosion of rule of law, corruption, and mismanagement. Turkish activist Yildiz Tar pointed out on Instagram that while the government called its operation “My Family Is Safe,” it is in fact the government’s economic policies that are endangering families, driving them into poverty and increasing economic precarity.

Queer People Have Long Led the Fight

Let us not forget that LGBTQ+ people have been at the forefront of struggles for democracy and civil rights around the world. Trans people led the famous Stonewall riots against police brutality and discrimination in New York City. Bayard Rustin, a gay man, was an advisor to Martin Luther King Jr. and the lead organizer of the March on Washington. In South Africa, Simon Nkoli was one of the Delmas Treason Trialists, jailed for fighting against Apartheid. He is credited with helping the African National Congress realize that any struggle for human rights has to include gay rights. His legacy is one of the reasons South Africa’s constitution protects the rights of LGBTQ+ people. In the UK, the LGBTQ+ community famously came out in support for the Welsh miners’ strike in 1984—a story told in the award-winning 2014 movie Pride.

It is therefore deeply worrying that, as recent reports note, 90% of LGBTQ+ groups have lost funding since the Trump administration dismantled USAID. According to the report, only 3% of the organizations surveyed described themselves as stable. The crisis caused by the USAID cuts has been exacerbated by additional cuts in foreign aid by several other governments and the changing priorities of philanthropic foundations.

Donors who cut funding for LGBTQ+ activists and organizations often argue that the fight for democracy and the rule of law is more urgent than LGBTQ+ rights, but they should know that the two issues are not separate. The fight for LGBTQ+ rights is a fight for the rights of all.

Brett Davidson is founder and principal at Wingseed LLC, and cofounder of the Tindugol Consortium. He works to help social changemakers amplify their impact through storytelling, listening, and narrative change.

Resilience & Resistance is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that features the insights of thought leaders and practitioners who are working to expand and support inclusive democracies around the globe. Direct any queries to globalteam@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

Peyton Skipwith hated Liberia. Within the first six months of his arrival in 1834, he had lost his wife and daughter to fever—probably malaria. He was a skilled stonemason, but work was hard to find, and food and other essential goods were expensive. He was “dissatisfied in this place,” complaining, “The sun is so hot that people from America cannot stand it.” The United States of America was the only country he had ever known. But it had rejected him, exiling him on an unfamiliar continent.

This year, another man expelled from the United States to Liberia felt similar despair. He missed his wife and children, 5,000 miles away in New Orleans. “I wondered what had happened to the US that I used to know,” he said. “A country where I felt free and safe to live and go out with my children.” The US wasn’t the only country he’d known; he had fled persecution in Honduras, the country of his birth. But he’d lived and worked and built a family in America. Liberia wasn’t home.

With nearly two centuries between them, each of these men had been exiled to the same unfamiliar spot on the West African coast—in both cases, because the country that had welcomed their labor could not imagine a place for them among its citizenry. Both were victims of attempts to define American identity in racial terms. But these stories also demonstrate the immorality and impossibility of making the United States into an ethnostate.

The American Colonization Society: An “Anti-Slavery” Plan for Global Segregation

Most Americans today know our country’s shameful history of slavery and justly celebrate the abolitionist movement. But fewer know about the African colonization scheme, which had greater support and influence in the decades before the Civil War than the more radical call for immediate abolition. Nominally, the African colonization movement promised to remove all Black people from the United States, which also meant ending slavery was an eventual goal but never an immediate threat. Between 1822 and 1860, the White-led American Colonization Society deposited more than 10,000 Black Americans in Liberia. Emigration was theoretically voluntary, but choices cannot be free in the context of racial oppression. Enslaved people who were emancipated for the voyage (including Peyton Skipwith) usually had to choose between American slavery or Liberian freedom.

Liberian colonization was a disaster from the beginning. Disease was devastating. One modern demographer says Americo-Liberian colonists experienced “the highest mortality ever reliably recorded.” The US government provided significant financial support, but the Liberian colony was primarily backed by private donations from White Americans, and funding was always insufficient. Settlers from the United States perceived the region’s indigenous population as culturally and religiously undeveloped and established exploitative economic relationships that often mirrored American slavery.

Liberia’s troubled foundation haunted its later history. Its precarious economy led the desperate Liberian government to sign an unfavorable 1926 deal with American industrialist Harvey Firestone, creating a massive rubber plantation that often used forced labor. In 1989, tensions between the descendants of Americo-Liberian colonists and other ethnic groups contributed to a lengthy and vicious civil war. Children were conscripted to fight. At least eight percent of Liberia’s total population was killed.

In the 19th century, the American Colonization Society openly advocated for a racially segregated planet. As one supporter argued, “The black skin, the curled hair and the flat nose will be held in contempt and disgust by the white man, and felt as the cause of his degradation by the negro . . . and hence, the absolute necessity of their separation from us.”

Third Country Deportation and the New Ethnonationalism

Trump’s rhetoric is not quite so explicitly segregationist. But he has referred to nations where people of color make up the majority of the population as “shithole countries” and has expressed a preference for immigration from White-majority countries. He’s claimed that immigrants are “poisoning the blood” of the United States, has spread xenophobic conspiracy theories, and has dehumanized undocumented immigrants as “animals.”

His administration’s policies followed suit. The White House has substantially curtailed legal immigration, ramped up deportations, and boasted about encouraging “self-deportation.” It ended the humanitarian Temporary Protected Status program for immigrants from thirteen countries. It has frozen all asylum and refugee immigration cases, with the sole exemption of White Afrikaners from South Africa. In effect, the only people that the Trump administration treats as worthy of refuge in the United States are White people fleeing from claimed racial persecution in Africa. Many courts have found that these policies violated rights of due process, free speech, and habeus corpus.

Since 2025, the White House has deported immigrants to “third countries” when they cannot be returned to their country of origin, either because that country refuses to accept them or because American courts have ruled that they face threats of persecution there. More than thirty nations, including Liberia, have accepted at least 25,000 deportees, usually in exchange for money. (For Liberia and other impoverished countries, these agreements were a way of at least partially restoring the humanitarian assistance they’d previously received from USAID, before Trump shuttered the agency.) Third country deportation—briefly blocked by a federal judge but permitted to continue by the Supreme Court—is how the Honduran man described above found himself on the Liberian coast, an ocean away from anywhere he’d ever known.

Trump’s rhetoric, like the arguments for Liberian colonization two centuries ago, draws on a long tradition of defining American identity through race and ethnicity. Trump and his allies have cited far right ideas like “replacement theory” and “heritage Americans,” which elevate White Americans as emblematic citizens, at risk of displacement by people of color, who are portrayed as having weaker claims on American identity. Put simply, this is White nationalism.

An Inclusive Vision for Democracy

But this has never been the only vision for our country. The Liberian colonization plan failed in part because many Americans, including the vast majority of Black Americans, rejected the idea of a racially segregated planet. Civil rights activists like Frederick Douglass articulated an alternative vision of the United States as a multiracial democracy: “We address you not as aliens nor as exiles, humbly asking to be permitted to dwell among you in peace; but we address you as American citizens asserting their rights on their own native soil.”

The American Colonization Society ultimately failed for the same reason attempts to homogenize the United States through deportation will fail today: engineering national demographics through expulsion is practically impossible. After decades of organizing, fundraising, and lobbying, the colonization movement had made no impact on the country’s racial makeup before the Civil War ended slavery and the Reconstruction amendments guaranteed Black Americans’ citizenship rights. Enshrining equal citizenship in the Constitution wasn’t enough to end White supremacy and racial segregation. By the early 20th century, there was another Liberian colonization movement, this time led by Black Americans seeking to escape oppression.

Today, the United States is a diverse and diversifying nation. The next generation will have no single racial majority; less than half of American children today are non-Hispanic Whites. Even the Trump administration’s unrealized goal of deporting one million people per year can’t disrupt these demographic trends.

Liberian colonization failed, and the United States spent the next century trying to solve “the Negro problem” through oppression and segregation. America is, and always will be, diverse. The only question is whether we will be inclusive.

Alex Lovit is a senior program officer and historian at the Kettering Foundation. He is the host and executive producer of the Kettering Foundation podcast The Context.

From Many, We is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that highlights the insights of thought leaders dedicated to the idea of inclusive democracy. Queries may be directed to fmw@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

At a time when much of the conversation about AI and democracy still revolves around deepfakes and synthetic fakery, Amodei’s statement tapped an alternate vein. What if artificial intelligence could supplement democratic processes and institutions, lowering barriers to participation and making them more inclusive and representative?

It’s not an idle question; researchers and entrepreneurs are already designing tools and products with this premise in mind. Deployed thoughtfully, they just might deliver. If adopted carelessly, though, we could be on the verge of a civic-tech cash grab that harms where it promised to heal.

The Promise of AI-Facilitated Deliberation

It’s not just Amodei. Just days before his remarks, 23 scholars released a paper titled “How Will Advanced AI Systems Impact Democracy?“ Their expectations are not rose-tinted; they warn of both opportunity and the potential for serious disruption of democratic processes and institutions.

The key throughline is language, the domain in which large language models (LLMs) excel. “Language,” the authors write,

allows information about candidates and policies to be shared with to [sic] voters, lawmakers to create legislation, and citizens and representatives to collectively discuss, deliberate and decide on which course of action to pursue. In liberal democracies, elected leaders use oratory to explain and justify their decisions and actions to the larger public, interest groups use persuasive messaging to lobby for their preferred policies, and the general public engages in debate, either informally or through organized events such as town halls and citizens’ assemblies.

These forms of communication and, more crucially, deliberation are the stuff of democracy. Research from cognitive science tells us that groups make better decisions when they deliberate. Research from political science shows that the process of deliberation doesn’t just change the decisions people make, it also changes how they feel about the deliberative outcome and one another.

Given this understanding, the authors’ recommendations also make sense. They write about “bridging algorithms“ to encourage constructive dialogue rather than online conflict. They also refer to “new avenues“ through which government officials and campaigning politicians can gain insight into the public’s views and concerns.

Major voices in the tech industry are especially bullish on this latter concept. In a recent essay in the MIT Technology Review, Andrew Sorota and Josh Handler—who work on AI policy for Eric Schmidt, former CEO and chairman of Google—note that “several states and localities are already using AI-mediated platforms to conduct democratic deliberation at scale, building on research showing that AI mediators can help citizens find common ground.”

Case Studies in Collective Deliberation

Sorota and Handler are right: there are several case studies of governments using LLMs to open the gates for broader democratic input. They often do so using tools called “collective dialogue systems,” or CDSes, which can facilitate democratic deliberation in several ways. For instance, they might take in and summarize a range of viewpoints that surface interesting ideas or areas of broad agreement for decision-makers; provide specialist or technical insights during group discussions; or serve some other function.

In a December 2024 paper, more than two dozen scholars explain,

In formal decision-making contexts, CDSes are typically not stand-alone exercises, but instead operate as part of a larger process that frequently includes in-person deliberations among stakeholders and decision-makers. Sometimes these technologies are coupled with citizen assemblies, where a “jury” of participants is selected to deliberate in person. In these cases, a CDS is often used jointly with citizen assemblies to crowdsource perspectives from the broader public.

This use of AI has a proven track record. The city of St. Louis used the GoVocal CDS to collect public feedback on how it should allocate more than $250 million from a settlement with the owner of the former St. Louis Rams. GoVocal served as a platform for more than 16,000 citizens to share ideas, discuss proposals, and express preferences. It then made all of that discourse legible and available to decision-makers.

Similar tools have found success internationally. In 2015, Taiwan, which has long been at the vanguard of digital innovation for democratic governance, used a tool called Pol.is to solicit citizen input and draft recommendations for the regulation of online alcohol sales. Since then, Taiwan has experimented with integrating Pol.is into other processes. In 2023, Carl Miller, cofounder and research director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos, said that LLMs have made the process of using Pol.is for public dialogue simpler and less expensive to run.

Researchers and engineers continue to improve these systems in the era of widespread consumer access to LLMs. When OpenAI announced a $1 million grant program for democratic inputs to AI in 2023, many of the recipients iterated on approaches like Pol.is.

Astroturfing: The Peril of AI

If every cloud has a silver lining, every moon has a dark side. So it is for AI as a tool for democratic processes. In an article for the Journal of Democracy, scholar of direct democracy David Altman warns:

Generative AI will act as a powerful accelerator for direct democracy, making its practice cheaper, easier, and more frequent than ever before, but also systematically undermining the civic foundations that make direct-democracy mechanisms both legitimate and stable. . . . We are heading toward a future of more direct democracy, but of a poorer, more volatile kind that will ultimately lead to a legitimacy crisis.

That future may be even closer than Altman suspected when he published those words in January 2026. Just a month later, a Los Angeles Times investigation revealed that an “AI-powered platform” called CiviClick had orchestrated “at least 20,000” emails to an obscure California agency, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, in opposition to a proposed rule phasing out gas-powered heat for residential homes. The rule failed in a 7-5 vote, an extraordinarily unusual outcome.

CiviClick describes itself as offering “personalized grassroots advocacy software.” According to the Times, however, some of the people whose names were used in CiviClick’s emails said they were unaware the company was sending emails on their behalf. As a result, the outpouring of opposition looks less like grassroots and more like astroturf. If the Times‘s allegations—and CiviClick’s characterization of its letters as personalized—are true, then the company appears to have weaponized the personal data of thousands of people to influence public policy on behalf of private interests, all while cloaking itself in the language of democracy. The case for this argument becomes even stronger when considering that CiviClick worked on behalf of a PR consultant.

CiviClick is a well-documented example, but not a lonely one. From political polling to election campaigns, political technologists are exploring how to remove people from more and more processes. When politics ceases to connect people to movements and instead replaces them with numbers and LLMs, it stops being democratic and becomes something else.

Lessons for the Future

We can take at least three broad lessons from the observations above:

• First, the potential impact of AI on politics covers a broad range of positive and negative consequences. This was also true for the printing press, telegraph, radio, television, and the internet. Communication is fundamental to democracy and new communications technologies interact with it in complex ways, making it difficult to predict or even measure in real time. The key to harnessing the positive effects while avoiding the negative ones lies in implementation—a process that is under human control and not inherent to the technology itself.

• Second, the beneficial use cases were overseen by public servants who were methodical and transparent in their approach. In the St. Louis case study, officials were clear in their reflections that the process of using AI for collective dialogue required a purposeful culture shift as well as technical know-how. It was not magically efficient; it required patience. Ultimately though, it can yield new insights and, handled appropriately, build public trust.

• Finally, and perhaps most controversially, democracy requires friction to function. While gatekeeper is often thought to be a pejorative term by those concerned with democracy, institutional gatekeepers, which include advocacy groups and media organizations, play important roles in preserving the quality and authenticity of democracy (though they should also seek to include more viewpoints from society’s margins). Circumventing those roles can short-circuit deliberative processes and make them easier for well-resourced, private interests to manipulate.

For some things, the process is the point, even if the process takes time and effort. Public deliberation is one of those things. AI can enhance it, but it must not replace it.

Dean Jackson is a senior fellow at the University of Pittsburgh's Communication Technology Research Lab and at Tech Policy Press. In 2022, Jackson was an investigative analyst with the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th attack on the US Capitol.

Resilience & Resistance is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that features the insights of thought leaders and practitioners who are working to expand and support inclusive democracies around the globe. Direct any queries to globalteam@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

🎧 LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE

Host Alex Lovit is joined by Destiny Brown, Robert Mackey II, and Kevin O’Donnell, all of whom have been working to educate and empower voters in the Kettering Foundation’s hometown of Dayton, Ohio. All three of them are Dayton Democracy Fellows. The fellowship supports and connects everyday people who are dreaming big dreams about what we can be together when we are brave, creative, and steadfast. Learn more about the fellowship here.

Destiny Brown is a community organizer and joined the Kettering Foundation as a program associate for Democracy and Community in June 2026. She was part of the Dayton Democracy Fellows cohort in 2024.

Robert Mackey II is an author, youth advocate, and program coordinator at Sunlight Village, a nonprofit focused on the mental health and well-being of underserved youth in Dayton. He was selected as a Dayton Democracy Fellow in 2025.

Kevin O’Donnell is a social studies teacher at Dayton Public Schools and coordinator with Bilingual Nation, a language learning co-op. He was selected as a Dayton Democracy Fellow in 2025.

Check out Robert’s new book here: https://www.steadfastlifestylesinc.org/post/welcome-to-steadfast-lifestyles

Sunlight Village is holding a fundraising gala in November. Tickets are available here: https://www.tickettailor.com/events/sunlightvillageinc1/2307275

The Youth Voter Guide that Kevin’s students created is available here: https://www.promotethevoteohio.com/

Get Tickets to our live show

October 19 at the Howard Theatre in Washington, DC. Featuring Kettering Senior Fellow Rev. Dr. :

Do you ever watch the news and wonder, “How did we get here?” Or think to yourself, “Things are bad . . . What can I do?”

The Context is here to help. Our show breaks down the ideas, history, and trends that are shaping democracy. And you don’t need to be an expert to follow along. Every other Tuesday, host Alex Lovit talks about timely topics with big-picture thinkers and hands-on practitioners, like activists, writers, historians, and community leaders.

The topics are heavy, but we try to have fun along the way. To build the future we want, we’ll need knowledge—but also camaraderie and joy.

We hope you’ll join us.

EXPLORE ALL EPISODES

In October and November 2026, Brazil and the United States will mobilize millions of voters for general elections that can determine what the future of these countries will look like. The US midterm elections and the Brazilian presidential elections have more than their high stakes in common: both have been facing unprecedented actions by the US federal administration. These aggressions are not only causing distrust in both countries’ electoral systems but also breaking down the trust in democratic institutions as a whole.

The election meddling efforts of the Trump administration have shifted from speculation to proven reality. The US has witnessed a wave of attacks on its own electoral system and against voting rights, ranging from false accusations of fraud in the 2020 elections, to attacks on mail-in ballot processing, state redistricting wars, and unorthodox attempts to gather voter data at the federal level. These attacks are decentralized and coordinated, and the undemocratic behavior has been largely documented by the press and by pro-democracy movements across the country.

Brazil, in turn, has been targeted by the US government with a combination of political, economic, and diplomatic measures that harm the country’s economy, its institutions, and the public debate. Prominent examples include tariffs on Brazilian goods ranging from 25% to 50%, despite the US holding a trade surplus with Brazil, and the use of sanctions against Brazilian authorities, including the Brazilian ambassador to the US whose diplomatic visa was revoked with no justification. These politically motivated actions end up causing turmoil in the country’s political landscape and influencing polling numbers.

But the main goal of President Trump’s agenda is not simply to favor a specific candidate or political party but rather to influence how US and Brazilian people perceive their institutions. This authoritarian tactic has a simple method: normalize anti-democratic rhetoric and action through widespread attacks on institutions and contaminate public opinion by combining disinformation with social media strategies fueled by AI-generated content. Eventually, the content of an attack doesn’t even matter, as perpetrators only need the emotions that these narratives provoke in those who rely on social media as their primary source of information.

A Global Challenge

Neither Brazil nor the United States are isolated pieces in this scenario. The 21st century has brought a global wave of autocratization, in which elected leaders use formal mechanisms to erode checks and balances and weaken the institutions that sustain democracies. The most recent V-Dem report, a respected tool that measures the state of democracy in the world, indicates that we have returned to the democratic levels of the 1970s. This means three out of four people in the world are living under authoritarian regimes. The report also finds that there is currently a record high of 44 countries undergoing autocratization, including the United States. These are not encouraging numbers and ought to serve as a warning. Living under a democracy is not a given reality; it requires continuous commitment.

This does not mean our institutions are immune to criticism or that electoral processes cannot be improved. What the public has been observing, however, is a debate driven by untruthful narratives that are shaped by authoritarian interests. There is a huge gap between the existing pseudo-debate and true democratic discussion, which is guided by evidence, transparency, and tolerance for dissent, and is free from illegitimate interference. President Trump’s coordinated strategy to undermine US and Brazilian democracies crosses a line and endangers our right to self-determination.

Democracy is not a static arrangement, but rather a dynamic construction that requires the daily commitment of each and every one of us. Rejecting all forms of election meddling and attacks against our hard-won democracies is a collective pledge that Americans and Brazilians must embrace. It is the only way to ensure the will of the people as the sole guide to the future of our nations.

Sami Sternberg is the International Affairs Coordinator of Pacto pela Democracia. He holds a master’s degree in international affairs from Columbia University.

Resilience & Resistance is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that features the insights of thought leaders and practitioners who are working to expand and support inclusive democracies around the globe. Direct any queries to globalteam@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

As we barrel toward the 2026 midterm elections, the state of democracy in the United States is on many Americans’ minds.

One of the clearest ongoing threats to democracy is Christian nationalism. This ideology says the country is for a particular people and by a particular people, whereas a pluralistic democratic society is committed to the full and equal inclusion of all voices and a shared appreciation of diversity: a country for the people and by the people.

What exactly does “democracy” mean to supporters of Christian nationalism compared to Americans who resist or reject Christian nationalism? Is there any common ground to how they might prefer our society organize itself politically and socially? Depending on the answer to those questions, the remedies to counter Christian nationalism might look very different.

The Democracy for All Project, a joint effort from the Kettering Foundation and Gallup, provides a necessary snapshot of the relationship between Christian nationalism and Americans’ views of democracy in 2026. This national survey shows how widely Christian nationalism is embraced across the US population.

Christian Nationalism in 2026: An Overview

Aligning with other recent surveys of the American public, the Kettering-Gallup 2026 Democracy for All Project survey found that around 14% of the US population strongly embrace Christian nationalism; I will refer to this group as “Ambassadors.” Just over 16% of respondents are sympathetic toward Christian nationalism; I call those respondents “Accommodators.” A third (33.7%) of Americans are considered “Resisters” of Christian nationalism, and even more, 36%, are “Rejecters” of Christian nationalism.

The Democracy for All Project survey also provides insight into which demographic groups embrace Christian nationalism. In the table below we see that 31% of White Americans are at least sympathetic to Christian nationalism (either as Ambassadors or Accommodators), while 28% of Black Americans and 32% of Hispanic Americans say the same. Only 23% of respondents who identify with another race are at least sympathetic to Christian nationalism.

A third (32.6%) of men are either Ambassadors or Accommodators of Christian nationalism, while 28% of women respond similarly. Very few nonbinary respondents (8.6%) are sympathetic to Christian nationalism. Regarding education, 25% of respondents who have a bachelor’s degree or higher are either Accommodators (11%) or Ambassadors (14%). This is less than the number that are Resisters (27%) or Rejecters (48%).

Christian nationalism is also strongly associated with political party. Over half of Republicans (55%) are either Ambassadors or Accommodators of Christian nationalism. Only 22% of Independents and 17% of Democrats are either Ambassadors or Accommodators. The widespread embrace of Christian nationalism by the Republican Party underscores the ongoing political relevance of Christian nationalism given the two-party system that dictates US politics.

Christian Nationalism and Democracy: A Disconnect

As we will see, most Americans agree that democracy is the best form of government. In the table below, the 2025 and 2026 reports of the Democracy for All Project survey show two-thirds of Americans agree with the statement “Democracy is the best form of government.” However, there is a slight decrease over the last year in the number of Americans who believe that democracy in the US is doing “moderately” or “very well.” In 2025, around 24% answered this way, but in 2026, only 19% responded the same.

In the figure below, we can see that a majority of each Christian nationalism group—Ambassadors to Rejecters—agrees democracy is the best form of government. Hidden within these numbers, however, is an important story about what democracy means for Americans who either embrace or reject the idea that the United States is and should be a Christian nation. When supporters of Christian nationalism say they prefer democracy and are working to defend it, they are envisioning a very different state of affairs compared to Americans who reject Christian nationalism and also state they prefer democracy. This is why some supporters of Christian nationalism can claim they prefer democracy and are working to defend democracy, while also advocating for limiting voting rights. Democracy, in their minds, is for true citizens who are Americans and that are largely sympathetic to Christian nationalism.

When asked whether democracy is doing “moderately well” or “very well,” there is a clear divergence. About 44% of “Ambassadors” believe democracy in the US is doing “moderately” or “very well.” A third (33%) of “Accommodators” say the same. Many fewer “Resisters” (17%) and “Rejecters” (5%) of Christian nationalism believe democracy is doing well in the United States.

This is a clear signal that Ambassadors and Accommodators likely have a different definition of democracy compared to Resisters and Rejecters. While 70% of Rejecters of Christian nationalism think democracy is the ideal form of government, only 5% of this group believes their vision of “democracy” is doing well here in the United States.

This divergence suggests several possible explanations. First, Americans who embrace or reject Christian nationalism are likely concerned with different political and social issues regarding the functioning of democracy in the United States. Second, the four Christian nationalism groups likely diverge in their attitudes toward various democratic principles like political compromise, diversity, or the role of government in meeting people’s basic needs. Finally, the four groups may differ in their views toward how the various branches of the federal government are functioning and how their power should be distributed.

First, Christian nationalism is linked to differing levels of concern regarding important social and political issues. In the figure below, Ambassadors, and to some extent Accommodators, of Christian nationalism are worried a great deal about ineligible voters participating in elections (64% and 47% respectively) and expanding government involvement (45% and 31% respectively). Many fewer Rejecters are worried about these issues.

Rejecters of Christian nationalism, however, are much more worried about people being harmed during peaceful protests (63%). Half as many Ambassadors (31%) and Accommodators (23%) signal that they are worried about this issue, however.

Interestingly, the last three issues shown in the figure above depict a horseshoe-shaped relationship with Christian nationalism, where more Ambassadors and Rejecters report being worried about each issue than are Resisters and Accommodators. Americans on the polar ends of Christian nationalism are more worried about gerrymandering, wealthy people donating to political causes, and unethical political leaders.

If we were able to interview Ambassadors and Rejecters about each of these issues, we would likely find that they are mostly worried about the “other side” gaining a political advantage through these practices. However, it is instructive that these two groups do recognize each issue as a threat to their particular vision of democracy.

Christian Nationalism and Democratic Principles

Diverging attitudes toward various democratic principles reveal a second explanation for the difference in attitudes about how well democracy is working. The next six figures provide examples.

When given a choice between whether people should meet their own basic needs or if the government should be responsible for doing so, two-thirds of Ambassadors and Accommodators say it is each person’s responsibility. Rejecters of Christian nationalism overwhelmingly believe (72%) that it is the government’s responsibility to make sure individuals’ basic needs are met.

A majority of each Christian nationalism group believes political leaders should compromise, but almost three times more Ambassadors and Accommodators believe leaders should avoid compromise and stick to their beliefs. Given that compromise is central to democracy, these findings signal a divergence in how these groups define “democracy.”

One of the central cultural markers of Christian nationalism is a desire for ethno-racial boundaries around national identity, which diverges from the foundational commitments of a pluralistic, democratic society where diversity in various forms is valued. So, while a majority of each Christian nationalism group chose the option that the US is stronger because of racial, religious, and cultural diversity, many more Ambassadors (39%) and Accommodators (32%) of Christian nationalism see these forms of diversity as a weakness. Many fewer Rejecters (7%) see diversity as a weakness.

Another feature of a healthy democracy is the peaceful exercising and transfer of power. While some studies find a strong association between Christian nationalism and political violence, the 2026 Democracy for All Project survey shows that four out of five members of each Christian nationalism group signal that it is never OK to use violence to achieve a political goal. This is a welcome sign as we move toward the upcoming midterm elections.

Ethical and law-abiding leadership is central to any healthy democracy. Yet again, majorities of each Christian nationalism group chose the option stating, “Government officials must always follow the law, without exception.” However, a quarter of Ambassadors, Accommodators, and even Resisters believe officials should sometimes be allowed exceptions to always acting lawfully. Only 12% of Rejecters say the same.

A final explanation as to why adherence to Christian nationalism is linked to beliefs about the functioning of democracy is that the groups differ in their views of what should be expected of citizens in support of democracy in the current moment. Rejecters overwhelmingly believe citizens’ most important responsibility is “speaking up against injustice” (91%). Six in ten Resisters (63%) agree. Half of all Ambassadors and Accommodators of Christian nationalism, however, believe the most important responsibility of citizens right now is “respecting authority.”

These figures provide insight into how and why the Americans who are spread across the four groups of Christian nationalism differ in whether they think “democracy” is functioning well. Rejecting or embracing Christian nationalism is clearly linked to divergent views of what a health democracy entails. Americans’ views toward Christian nationalism will likely influence how they perceive upcoming national political events like the midterm elections.

Project 2025 and Democracy Satisfaction

A final explanation as to why the four groups differ in whether they think democracy in the US is functioning well is their views on whether the federal government, and its three branches, is functioning well. The dominance of Christian nationalism within the Republican Party is one reason why we are living through a moment where Christian nationalism has unparalleled political and policy influence. Project 2025, an explicitly Christian nationalist blueprint for the second Trump administration, aims to localize power within the executive branch. In doing so, the goal is to severely weaken the checks and balances mandated by the US Constitution among the three branches of the federal government in favor of the Republican Party, which controls the presidency. Survey data from the Democracy for All Project allows us to examine the effectiveness of Christian nationalism and Project 2025. When Americans were asked to share whether they think each branch of the federal government is working “moderately” or “very well,” we again see a clear divergence of attitudes across the four Christian nationalism groups (see figure below). Ambassadors have the most positive views across all three branches of government, followed by Accommodators, while Resisters and especially Rejecters report much less positive assessments.

Comparing how Christian nationalism shapes Americans’ assessments of the three branches of government is fascinating as well. By far, Ambassadors have the most positive evaluations of the functioning of the presidency and executive branch, with 59% saying it is working “moderately” or “very well.” The judiciary and the Supreme Court (46%) follow, with Congress and the legislative branch coming in last (32%). The same pattern follows for Accommodators: the presidency, SCOTUS, and then Congress are rated positively by 45%, 39%, and 25%, respectively.

For Resisters and Rejecters of Christian nationalism, the assessments are first SCOTUS (26%; 11%), then the presidency (23%; 7%), then Congress (13%; 5%). Clearly, Americans who embrace Christian nationalism mostly believe the branches of the federal government are working well. For Americans who resist Christian nationalism, the vast majority do not believe the branches of government are functioning well.

Remember, Project 2025 aimed to localize power within the executive branch. The 2026 Democracy for All Project survey allows us to see if the millions of Americans who embrace Christian nationalism similarly embrace this goal.

In the next figure, we see clear evidence of this exact desire across the American population. Over two-thirds of Ambassadors and Accommodators of Christian nationalism believe that the president has too little power (15%; 10%) or at least the right amount of power (57%; 56%). Conversely, Rejecters of Christian nationalism overwhelmingly believe the president has too much power (87%), with over half of Resisters saying the same (53%).

Share

The views toward SCOTUS, as seen in the figure below, show most Ambassadors, Accommodators, and Resisters align in whether they think the highest court in our country has too little, too much, or the right amount of power. Over half of Rejecters (51%), however, believe SCOTUS has too much power.

It is likely that Rejecters see SCOTUS as enablers of the presidency, rather than a check on executive power, which may be why so many more Rejecters believe SCOTUS has too much power. It aligns with their view that the presidency has too much power. For Ambassadors and Accommodators who tend to be much more supportive of the policy goals and power of the current presidency, they overwhelmingly believe SCOTUS has the right amount of power, particularly when it allows the current president to move forward with his administration’s policy goals.

The views toward the power of Congress (see figure below) clearly reveals how Christian nationalism shapes Americans’ views toward the separation of powers across the three branches of the federal government. Around 40% of Ambassadors and Accommodators believe Congress has too much power while half believe Congress has the right amount of power. Very few who embrace Christian nationalism think Congress has too little power.

Rejecters of Christian nationalism, however, see things very differently. Over one-third (34%) believe Congress has too little power, over twice as much as any other Christian nationalism group. Examining this result alongside Rejecters’ views toward the power of the presidency and SCOTUS, it is clear Rejecters hope to see the legislative branch exercise much more of its constitutional power as check on the executive and judicial branches.

Taken together, these last three figures are evidence that the millions of Americans who embrace Christian nationalism are on board with the underlying political strategy of Project 2025. Ambassadors of Christian nationalism want to see an executive branch exerting more power over policy and the direction of the country, with a deferential judicial branch, and a legislative branch that is either maintaining or absolving itself of its constitutionally mandated power.

Since Christian nationalism disdains diversity and believes a subset of Americans are the truest citizens, it makes sense that adherents are skeptical of Congress, the branch of government most likely to contain diversity of all kinds—political, socio-demographic, and religious.

Furthermore, because Congress is so large it is the branch of government that is hardest to bring into complete ideological and political alignment. There will always be representatives and senators who represent districts and states where Christian nationalism is much less influential.

Therefore, as Christian nationalism is clearly focused on gaining and wielding power to move the country toward a particular vision, the presidency and SCOTUS provide much clearer paths toward achieving the ideological purity and unfettered exercise of power commonly associated with authoritarian regimes.

What does all this mean for how Americans view the future of democracy in the United States and the role of Christian nationalism in shaping that vision? Perhaps unsurprisingly, it is Americans at the polar ends of the Christian nationalism spectrum—Ambassadors and Rejecters—who see change on the horizon.

As the figure above shows, twice as many Ambassadors (19%) than any other group believe US democracy will be “much stronger” in 50 years compared to today.

Conversely, over four out of five Rejecters of Christian nationalism believe US democracy will be “somewhat weaker” (39%) or “much weaker” (45%) in 50 years, far outpacing any other group.

In sum, the 2026 Democracy for All Project reveals that the Christian nationalist vision of Project 2025, which aims to focus power within the executive branch of the federal government to privilege a particular subset of American citizens, is a vision that appeals to the millions of Americans who embrace Christian nationalism. This survey also helps us make sense of why a majority of Americans still agree that democracy is the best form of government, while having dramatically different views on whether democracy in the US is functioning well.

Christian nationalism casts a vision for a very specific preferred citizenry and leadership in this country, one that elevates a privileged few, as the truest expression of a healthy democracy. For those who embrace Christian nationalism the current administration’s achievements are a big reason they believe democracy in the US is doing well.

For those who reject Christian nationalism and are committed to an inclusive, pluralistic, democratic society, the 2026 midterm elections and the years to follow will contain opportunities to pursue their vision for democracy in the United States.

As the data in this report lay bare, Americans who embrace Christian nationalism and those who reject it have dramatically different visions of what democracy even means. This limits opportunities for finding common ground around protecting and strengthening democracy in the United States.

However, the 2026 Democracy for All Project survey provides a key insight into how to effectively counter the push toward authoritarianism wrapped up in the Christian nationalist version of democracy. Fifty-nine percent of Americans believe the executive branch and presidency have too much power. This signals that a clear majority of Americans are ready and willing to support the checks and balances of power mandated in the United States Constitution across the three branches of the federal government.

Electing and empowering Congressional representatives who are committed to wielding their constitutional power is a vital first step to responding to our nation’s slide toward a personalist authoritarian regime.

We are living through a moment where we must—yet again—determine if, as President Lincoln identified in his dedication of the Soldier’s National Cemetery in Gettysburg, our “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Andrew L. Whitehead is professor of sociology at Indiana University Indianapolis, codirector of the Association of Religion Data Archives, and a Charles F. Kettering Foundation Research Fellow. Follow him on Bluesky and Substack.

From Many, We is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that highlights the insights of thought leaders dedicated to the idea of inclusive democracy. Queries may be directed to fmw@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

🎧 LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE

For the fourth and final installment of our month-long collaboration with the This Day podcast, we go to 2010 and the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision—which enshrined corporate spending as protected speech and unleashed a new era of dark money in American politics. This Day hosts Jody Avirgan, Nicole Hemmer, and Kellie Carter Jackson are joined by Celina Stewart, CEO of the League of Women Voters, to trace how we got here: from the Tillman Act of 1907 through Watergate, the FEC, the McCain-Feingold Act, and the long effort to keep corporate money out of elections. How much of the problem predates Citizens United, and how much did that ruling change everything?

Be sure to check out the League of Women Voters at lwv.org and their voter information resource at vote411.org.

Learn more about this special series here: https://kettering.org/america-250-podcast-series-begins-in-september/

If you enjoy this episode, go over to This Day’s feed for two more episodes on each of these historical topics. The Context’s host, Alex Lovit, will be the guest in the third episode each week. Listen to all episodes here.

This Day (A History Show)

The newsletter home for This Day, a history podcast. Sign up for America250 watch, the home for news and analysis of America's big birthday. Paid subscribers also get early ad-free, full-video access to our 50 Weeks That Shaped America series!

By Jody Avirgan

Attention, Washington, DC-area listeners! Join us on Monday, October 19, 2026, for a live taping of This Day. The Context host, Alex Lovit, will join This Day hosts live on stage. The featured guest is Kettering Senior Fellow Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II.

They will be in conversation about the moment of democratic realignment we are living through right now. Are we witnessing a fundamental shift in who holds power, who gets left out, and how race and class are reshaping the coalitions that define American politics? And what can history teach us about moments like this one?

The event is open to the public, and tickets are available through the Howard Theatre.

REGISTER

Do you ever watch the news and wonder, “How did we get here?” Or think to yourself, “Things are bad . . . What can I do?”

The Context is here to help. Our show breaks down the ideas, history, and trends that are shaping democracy. And you don’t need to be an expert to follow along. Every other Tuesday, host Alex Lovit talks about timely topics with big-picture thinkers and hands-on practitioners, like activists, writers, historians, and community leaders.

The topics are heavy, but we try to have fun along the way. To build the future we want, we’ll need knowledge—but also camaraderie and joy.

We hope you’ll join us.

EXPLORE ALL EPISODES

EXPLORE MORE EPISODES

In moments of crisis, chaos, and confusion, democracy defenders are often challenged by assessing whether their efforts are having the desired effects. The US Agency for International Development (USAID) established a cutting-edge evaluation policy in 2011. Implementing rigorous monitoring, evaluation, learning, and other accountability measures from inception to completion of programs, these measures were continuously refined up until USAID’s dissolution in 2025. Compliance was also managed with close oversight from USAID’s Office of Inspector General. The dismantling of USAID was a disaster for global democracy and a boon to authoritarians throughout the world. But lessons and approaches from its work are being adapted to pro-democracy efforts in the United States and around the world, and this work is being assisted by new efforts and tools that provide access to the knowledge that USAID generated from its work.

Determining whether a strategy has been successful is particularly challenging in complex environments where cause and effect is usually not clear and theories of what will produce the desired outcomes are underdeveloped or not developed at all. I have experienced this challenge both in my work for USAID and in doing nonprofit democracy protection work in Ohio, where communicating impact to funders and other stakeholders can be difficult, especially during periods of rapid change. USAID was a global leader in pioneering assessment approaches in such environments, including a suite of complexity-aware monitoring and evaluation approaches. These approaches incorporate the uncertainty and unpredictability of the factors that make environments complex in the first place, such as shifting political attitudes and perceptions, challenging security situations, and other social and human considerations. They also require an openness to incorporating unanticipated results into assessments as well as the intellectual honesty to admit when desired effects have not been achieved and to iterate based on early failures and lessons learned.

Afghanistan: Define the Problem You Are Trying to Solve

USAID’s experience in Afghanistan highlights one of the greatest challenges of determining success in complex environments: problem definition. It is impossible to determine whether interventions are successful if the problem they are designed to solve is not well defined, or if the defined problem is not the correct one given the uncertainties and shifting variables inherent in complex situations. From the post-September 11 US intervention to USAID’s dissolution in 2025, USAID invested over $26 billion in assistance in Afghanistan. These programs ranged from sectoral interventions in health and education to humanitarian assistance to stabilization and democracy promotion efforts. Individually, many of these programs achieved success in their specific sectors or according to specific metrics that they set for themselves. Overall, however, they suffered from a strategic-level flaw that ultimately undermined the entire effort. In trying to do such a broad range of things, the USAID effort in Afghanistan missed the key problem that would defeat the effort there: the desired changes of that effort were at odds with Afghanistan’s political, social, and cultural factors that determined how Afghans resist outside influence and manage their society.

The specific effort that I worked on in Afghanistan in 2011 and 2012 illustrates this challenge. The Kandahar Provincial Reconstruction Team was initially a Canadian, and later American, joint civilian military unit whose purpose was to build capacity and assist officials from the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to effectively govern Kandahar Province. This province included Kandahar City, Afghanistan’s second largest city and the historic stronghold of the Taliban. According to this stated goal, we succeeded spectacularly. The team transferred its responsibilities to the government officials that we had supported and partnered with in our mission. However, this success, and Kandahar’s subsequent higher level of resilience than other Afghan regions, was no bulwark against the Taliban sweep across the country in 2021 amid the collapse of the US supported government. We had solved the problem we were trying to solve, but it wasn’t the right problem.

Honduras: Develop Necessary Tools and Practices

What, then, does a more effective effort look like when it has well-defined problems, evaluation and learning approaches integrated into strategy development, and interventions adapted to updated context? One example of a useful tool toward this goal came from USAID’s mission in Honduras, which implemented a dedicated platform for evaluation and adaptation across its portfolio. USAID/Honduras largely focused on addressing the major drivers of outmigration from Honduras to the United States, including the high levels of crime and violence that led to chronic insecurity in the county. Given that insecurity is a complex problem with many different but interconnected facets, it was challenging to assess progress through the lens of any individual program. The portfolio-wide platform allowed for a more comprehensive and holistic look at the work that USAID was doing and provided the capacity to do more independent assessments of program effectiveness than would have been possible from within each individual program alone. Coupled with mixed-method approaches consisting of tools like surveys, focus groups, and regular team reflection and sensemaking efforts, program managers can have a more complete suite of tools for determining success in complex environments.

Bolivia: Check Assumptions and Adapt Theories of Change

During rapid shifts in operating context, practitioners working in complexity need to check in frequently on the assumptions that underpin their theories of change. Similarly, practitioners need to be constantly open to the possibility of unintended consequences and unexpected results of their efforts, especially ones that might disprove initial ideas for how changes would achieve desired outcomes. I participated in the January 2020 USAID and State Department assessment that determined what opportunities existed to support democratic actors in Bolivia following the 2019 resignation of President Evo Morales. Our assessment team initially assumed that social groups and activist organizations that had a long history of working with Evo’s political movement would not be open to the kinds of conversations about democracy in Bolivia that we were interested in, especially if supported with US funding. However, despite these misgivings, we arranged initial meetings with some of the groups. Surprisingly, they were far more open to potential partnerships than we originally anticipated, due in part to a previously unseen feeling that their voices had been silenced and co-opted for years. Through our initial outreach and the continued efforts of open-minded and entrepreneurial members of our program team, we were able to support conversations among a much wider range of Bolivians than we had previously thought possible.

Lessons for US Democracy Defenders

The United States has entered a period of democratic backsliding and rising authoritarianism similar to those experienced in many countries where USAID has worked. US democracy defenders who are trying to adapt to a chaotic, rapidly shifting environment can learn from the approaches that USAID took to determine whether its efforts were working. To start, US practitioners can ask themselves a series of questions about whether their approaches are ready to meet the challenges of our current moment:

• Have we sufficiently defined the problem that we are trying to solve so that we will know if we are solving it? Is it the right problem given the context we are working in? How will we know when and how to shift if we need to?

• Do we have sufficient and appropriate tools, approaches, and attitudes for determining whether what we are doing is working in a complex environment? Are we well enough resourced to keep up with a dynamic context that requires intensive management and reflection?

• Do we understand the assumptions that underpin our theories of change about how we will succeed? How will we learn if those assumptions are invalid, and what leeway do we have to adapt our theories of change?

Luckily, efforts are underway, including searchable databases (such as the Development Knowledge Commons established by the USAID Knowledge Rescue Initiative) and new technological tools such as AI interfaces, to provide access to decades of knowledge that USAID generated about its programs. Despite the Trump administration’s efforts to block access to USAID’s Development Experience Clearinghouse, these new tools will allow development and democracy practitioners around the world to benefit from its lessons learned, including US democracy defenders.

Daniel Tirrell is the cofounder and coexecutive director of The Ohio Democracy Project. Previously, he worked for 14 years on political transition and violence prevention programs at USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives.

From Many, We is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that highlights the insights of thought leaders dedicated to the idea of inclusive democracy. Queries may be directed to fmw@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

As the United States marks the 250th anniversary of its founding, most Americans remain committed to democracy as an ideal, even as their assessments of how it is performing have worsened over the past year, according to Frustration Rises, Commitment Endures, the third report from the Democracy for All Project, a multiyear research initiative by the Charles F. Kettering Foundation in partnership with Gallup. The project is the most extensive annual study of how Americans experience and participate in the democratic system.

The survey of more than 23,000 US adults finds that two-thirds, 66%, continue to call democracy the best form of government, essentially unchanged from 67% a year ago, yet Americans’ views of how it is working have darkened. The share who say democracy is doing poorly in the US rose to 56% in 2026 from 51% in 2025, while the share who say it is performing well fell to 19% from 23%. Most of the year’s movement traces to Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, whose assessments have shifted toward the more critical views held by Democrats and other independents.

“The survey captures the hopes Americans have for the ideal of democracy,” says John Dedrick, executive vice president and chief operating officer at the Kettering Foundation, “but too many are frustrated with their actual experience of democracy.”

DOWNLOAD THE REPORT

Americans See a Weaker Democracy Than in the Past and Expect Further Decline

Most Americans believe US democracy is trending in the wrong direction. Sixty percent say democracy was stronger 50 years ago at the nation’s bicentennial than it is today, while 21% say it was weaker. Looking toward the tricentennial 50 years from now, more Americans expect democracy to grow weaker (45%) than stronger (31%).

Optimism about the future is unevenly distributed. Americans who are more politically engaged, more involved in their communities, and more positive about how democracy is working today are more hopeful about where it is headed. Among those who express trust in local leaders, 38% expect US democracy to strengthen over the next 50 years.

“As the country marks 250 years, Americans’ perceptions of their democracy are sobering,” says Justin Lall, Gallup principal. “A majority of Americans say democracy was stronger 50 years ago and more expect it to weaken than strengthen over the next 50 years, yet optimism hasn’t disappeared. It’s common among people who are engaged in their communities and who see democracy working where they live.”

Doubts About the Rule of Law and Executive Power

A majority of Americans, 56%, say the rule of law is weaker than it was 10 years ago, four times the percentage (14%) who say it is stronger. While 78% of Americans say government officials must always follow the law, without exception, just 28% trust that political leaders will be held accountable to the nation’s laws and Constitution, down from 32% a year ago. Most of the decline in trust in leadership accountability is driven by shifts among Republicans.

Americans’ unease about the balance of power in the US centers on the presidency: 59% say the executive branch has too much power, far more than say the same of the judicial (38%) or legislative (34%) branches. Ratings of poor performance also have risen for systems and institutions meant to uphold the rule of law, including equal treatment under the law (60% vs. 55% in 2025), the division of power among the branches of government (51% vs. 47%), and the criminal justice system (57% vs. 55%). Those living comfortably on their present income are more likely than those finding it very difficult to get by to rate the division of power among the branches of government as working well (26% vs. 10%).

A Tale of Two Democracies: Local Optimism, National Doubt

Americans rate democracy more favorably close to home. About one-third (34%) say democracy is performing well in their own city or town, nearly double the share who say the same about democracy nationally (19%). Only 21% rate their local democracy as doing poorly, compared with 56% who rate the national democracy the same. Americans are also nearly twice as likely to agree officials in their own community are sensitive to the needs of people like them (39%) as to say the same about national leaders (23%).

Local optimism appears to be rooted in community experiences rather than a belief that local government decisions matter more than national ones. Only 24% say decisions made by local leaders affect their daily lives more than those made by national leaders, but positive views of local democracy track closely with satisfaction with local services, trust in one’s neighbors, and trust in information from local leaders. Notably, Americans who view their local democracy positively also tend to be more positive about democracy nationally, suggesting that strong local institutions may help sustain broader commitment to democracy.

How Americans Would Improve Democracy

Asked in an open-ended question for the one thing that would most improve US democracy, Americans most often point to changing who holds office (17%); reforming elections (13%) to ensure fair elections; giving the public more voice (9%); increasing accountability and ending corruption (9%); and strengthening checks and balances to limit executive power (9%). When it comes to their own participation, Americans say they are most likely to get involved when they feel an important right or freedom is being threatened (27%) or believe their involvement can make a real difference (26%).

Taken together, this year’s findings describe a public that remains committed to democracy in principle but is increasingly convinced democracy is falling short in practice and is more hopeful about democracy in local communities than in the nation as a whole.

About the Democracy for All Project

The Democracy for All Project is a multiyear collaboration between Gallup and the Charles F. Kettering Foundation designed to understand how Americans experience democracy and to elevate voices across groups and generations. The September 2026 report is based on a survey of 23,683 US adults conducted April 24 through June 10, 2026, with a maximum margin of sampling error of ±1 percentage point at the 95% confidence level.

Brazil and the United States are sharing similar challenges at this point in time: important upcoming elections, democratic governments at risk, and a past that is very present. Both are countries that were built through the labor and struggles of their people, with many racialized groups still being excluded from the benefits of democracy. Racism, violence, and deep social inequality are structural issues in both countries, while recent years have also seen parallel challenges to democratic systems and rule of law.

With such similar contexts, the United States and Brazil can learn from each other. Each country has had to address recent attacks to their democracies while also building strategies to defend democracy and human rights. Sharing concerns and strengthening relationship ties are very important in today’s political climate.

In Brazil’s case, the upcoming October presidential election will determine if a democracy that is under attack from both internal and external interference can be protected. November’s midterm elections in the US carry a similar need for protection, though the threats against the electoral system are mostly from internal forces.

Two Democracies, Two Different Responses

After losing their reelections, both Donald Trump in the US and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil challenged the electoral outcomes. Even without evidence of wrongdoing, both former leaders refused to accept the election results and incited violence. In the US, this culminated in the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021. In Brazil, the violence incited the invasion of Congress, the Supreme Court, and the presidential palace on January 8, 2023. The attacks were strikingly similar too: mobs—instigated by the former leaders—stormed the heart of government, smashed windows, destroyed offices, and clashed with security forces.

But the judicial and societal responses were quite different.

In the US, Trump was not held accountable through a criminal trial and has returned to power. Since returning to office, he has issued full and unconditional pardons to all January 6 rioters, including those who used violence against law enforcement officers and desecrated the Capitol. Furthermore, many members of Congress have continued to support Trump and denied that the events on January 6 were an attempted coup.

In Brazil, on the other hand, after a two-year investigation, the Supreme Federal Court sentenced Bolsonaro to 27 years and 3 months in prison for conspiring to overturn the 2022 election. The attempted coup was investigated and adjudicated by the judiciary in accordance with constitutional guarantees of due process. Brazil’s response reflects a robust institutional backlash to the assault on democratic norms and the rule of law. Before this criminal conviction was handed down, Bolsonaro was barred from running for office for eight years due to a previous ruling for abuse of political and economic power. He is now under house arrest.

The Upcoming Election in Brazil

Protecting Brazil’s democracy in 2026 will require not only safeguarding the electoral process itself but also ensuring there is a coordinated effort to strengthen democracy. To prepare, the country’s civil society organizations have been building their alliances with human rights and democracy organizations to be able to fight for the integrity of the 2026 presidential elections and protect Brazil’s democratic institutions.

Conectas—a nonpartisan international NGO founded in Brazil to promote human rights from a global south perspective—has, along with partners, been defending electoral integrity and strengthening democratic institutions. We have joined efforts to engage in dialogue with public authorities and the international community, including US organizations, to defend the institutions that safeguard Brazil’s democratic system. We are connecting to protect the fairness, transparency, and equal conditions for all candidates in the electoral process.

These civil society organizations also recognize that the country’s future could consist of a more anti-rights Congress. For this reason, there is also a coalition of organizations discussing which human rights policies should be protected from potential setbacks.

Concerns About US Interference

US interference in the Brazilian election and in its democratic processes has become a significant concern. The Trump administration has undertaken a series of troubling actions aimed at the Brazilian judiciary, including visa restrictions on justices of the Brazilian Supreme Federal Court and other Brazilian authorities and sanctions against a sitting justice of the Supreme Federal Court. Widely regarded as unprecedented, these actions have been sharply criticized by scholars and practitioners, such as the New York City Bar Association and the Vance Center for International Justice.

The current administration has also imposed tariffs on Brazil and launched a Section 301 investigation, explicitly linking the measures to Brazil’s judicial handling of their attempted coup, decisions involving digital platforms, and the regulation of major technology companies.

In May of 2026, the US Department of State classified two Brazilian criminal organizations as foreign terrorist organizations. This is particularly concerning because it introduces the possibility of political and military intervention by the United States. It also raises concerns about how social movements, NGOs, and residents of communities affected by organized crime could become targets of persecution.

Lessons Learned, Lessons to Share

From what we have learned during the previous federal government in Brazil, the 2022 elections, and the preparation for this year’s elections, we have some recommendations for US-based pro-democracy organizations.

• Understand the seriousness of the current US context and impact to the region. One of the most important things is to understand the severity of the situation in the US. By recognizing it as an authoritarian government, the strategies to be used should consider the danger and impacts of actions to be taken. While US-based democracy organizations must focus on defending democracy, they also need to work to envision and expand democratic practices so they are more inclusive and effective for all people.

• Map vulnerabilities and be prepared for retaliation. During Bolsonaro’s government, engagement in decision-making spaces was accompanied by institutional measures to protect the organization. Conectas mapped physical, digital, legal, and well-being risks, strengthening our resilience, especially during the 2022 elections. While remaining nonpartisan, we joined a broad coalition defending democracy.

• Find opportunities for both national and international solidarity. Supporting the people and groups most affected by democratic backsliding was central to our strategy. We provided legal and other forms of protection while strengthening coordination with civil society partners and social movements, both in Brazil and beyond its borders. Building broad and unique alliances is essential to strengthening democracy. At Conectas, diversifying institutional partnerships proved highly effective. During the COVID-19 pandemic, our collaboration with Center for Research in Health Law at the University of São Paulo (Cepedisa/USP) produced the Rights in the Pandemic bulletin, which became a key reference for the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the federal government’s response. We partnered with digital rights organizations to bridge traditional human rights agendas with emerging digital challenges and to strengthen democratic resilience. We also strengthened our commitment and strategies to fight racism and other inequalities. Furthermore, we have been promoting sustained exchanges between Brazilian and US organizations to share strategies, deepen contextual understanding, and strengthen joint action in defense of democracy and human rights. This is an ongoing project we have with the Kettering Foundation and The Horizons Project, which has opened many doors for collaboration.

• Protect what has already been achieved. It is essential to safeguard historic achievements and defend democratic institutions, while recognizing their limitations and structural problems. Some of these safeguards are already being attacked. It is important to remember that US birthright citizenship and other constitutional rights were already under attack during the first Trump administration, just as they had been under Bolsonaro.

• Document and denounce violations. Collect information and data on the government’s destruction and violation of rights and policies. When possible and necessary, carry out national and international strategic litigation and advocacy efforts. Finally, try to pair these actions with communication strategies that will inform the population, pressure decision-making actors, and help get more overall support. Whenever possible, do this work in partnership with other organizations because this distributes risk and responsibilities.

• Find the appropriate institutional strategy. Because Brazil’s judiciary was one of the few remaining checks on democratic backsliding, strategic litigation became a key tool in defending Brazilian democracy and human rights during Bolsonaro’s government. International advocacy also proved essential, which suggests that US civil society could benefit from strengthening global partnerships and using international forums to expose democratic and human rights violations.

• Focus on your country but don’t disconnect from the rest of the world. While Brazil’s democracy and human rights crisis demanded most of our attention, it also reinforced the importance of maintaining international engagement. We strengthened exchanges with organizations across the global south, showing that even during domestic crises, sustaining international solidarity and shared learning is essential.

Looking Ahead

Protecting democracy in current times requires not only safeguarding electoral processes but also ensuring a coordinated effort to strengthen democratic institutions and human rights and fight racism and other inequalities in order to be able to provide a strong response when rights are challenged.

Despite all the challenges faced by Brazil, one of the most encouraging developments has been the continued public trust in its secure, transparent, and internationally recognized electoral system. The 2022 presidential elections reaffirmed the reliability of electronic voting, with the international recognition of the results reinforcing confidence in a system repeatedly validated by international observers. We hope public trust remains high as we look ahead to the upcoming elections in both Brazil and the United States.

Julia Neiva, a 2026 CFK Global Fellow, is a cofounder and the deputy director of Conectas Direitos Humanos in Brazil.

Resilience & Resistance is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that features the insights of thought leaders and practitioners who are working to expand and support inclusive democracies around the globe. Direct any queries to globalteam@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

Luttig calls on members of both parties to publicly commit to seating duly elected representatives and urges Americans and the news media to demand those commitments before Election Day.

EXPLORE MORE EPISODES

🎧 LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE

For the third installment of our month-long collaboration with the podcast, we go to 1964 and a moment when the two major parties in this country, in a sense, switched. This Day hosts Jody Avirgan, Nicole Hemmer, and Kellie Carter Jackson are joined by Eric K. Ward, executive vice president of Race Forward, to trace the story from Jim Crow through the New Deal and into the Civil Rights Act—and to understand why the Democratic coalition that produced it was always too contradictory to survive. How did Black voters move from Lincoln’s party to LBJ’s? And what did White Southerners do when their party started to leave them behind?

Be sure to check out Eric’s documentary White with Fear on PBS.

Eric K. Ward

Eric K. Ward is author of the seminal article “Skin in the Game: How Antisemitism Animates White Nationalism.” He was the 2021 honoree of the Civil Courage Prize

If you enjoy this episode, go over to This Day’s feed for two more episodes on each of these historical topics. The Context’s host, Alex Lovit, will be the guest in the third episode each week. Listen to all episodes here.

This Day (A History Show)

The newsletter home for This Day, a history podcast. Sign up for America250 watch, the home for news and analysis of America's big birthday. Paid subscribers also get early ad-free, full-video access to our 50 Weeks That Shaped America series!

By Jody Avirgan

Attention, Washington, DC-area listeners! Join us on Monday, October 19, 2026, for a live taping of This Day. The Context host, Alex Lovit, will join This Day hosts live on stage. The featured guest is Kettering Senior Fellow Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II.

They will be in conversation about the moment of democratic realignment we are living through right now. Are we witnessing a fundamental shift in who holds power, who gets left out, and how race and class are reshaping the coalitions that define American politics? And what can history teach us about moments like this one?

The event is open to the public, and tickets are available through the Howard Theatre.

REGISTER

Do you ever watch the news and wonder, “How did we get here?” Or think to yourself, “Things are bad . . . What can I do?”

The Context is here to help. Our show breaks down the ideas, history, and trends that are shaping democracy. And you don’t need to be an expert to follow along. Every other Tuesday, host Alex Lovit talks about timely topics with big-picture thinkers and hands-on practitioners, like activists, writers, historians, and community leaders.

The topics are heavy, but we try to have fun along the way. To build the future we want, we’ll need knowledge—but also camaraderie and joy.

We hope you’ll join us.

EXPLORE ALL EPISODES

After affixing his iconic signature to the Declaration of Independence in 1776, John Hancock noted that the signatories must “hang together.” In a perhaps apocryphal response, Benjamin Franklin quipped, “Yes, we must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

As we mark our nation’s 250th year, there is little doubt we are a nation divided along party lines. Partisan polarization in Congress is as stark as it has ever been. Political donors are polarized. Even the courts, purportedly the institution most insulated from politics, have become more partisan and polarized. And this hyper-polarization is hardly limited to political elites. Rank-and-file Democrats and Republicans are deeply divided. In the last few decades, partisans have grown further apart ideologically, with those on the left consistently finding their way to the Democratic tent and those on the right ending up in the GOP. This sorting has produced partisan identities that are highly correlated with other social identities (e.g., rural versus urban, secular versus religious). And there has been a remarkable sorting of American partisans by basic worldview.

This partisan divide appears to color both how Americans feel about celebrating our nation and what that nation is all about. Our national University of Massachusetts Amherst Poll has shown Americans are deeply split on some core matters. But there is also a shared undercurrent of belief and hope that we should and will continue to hang together as a nation.

A sizable majority of Republicans, 62%, view the 250th commemorations as a “proud national milestone,” while Democrats tend to describe our 250th anniversary as either something they don’t think about much, 29%, or as a chance to reflect on the nation’s unfinished work, 25%.

The recent Democracy for All Project report found hints of this unease with only 25% of Americans saying the people’s role in the democratic process is working well.

We are divided about the extent to which we are living up to our ideals. The UMass Amherst Poll shows a majority of Republicans, 80%, think we’ve already succeeded a great deal or a moderate amount in achieving our founding principles. Only 52% of Democrats agree.

We are deeply split on the religious basis of those founding principles and American ethos. In the UMass Poll, we see a gaping chasm between Democrats and Republicans on whether the United States was founded as and should now be a Christian country. Nearly 80% of Republicans believe the US was founded as a Christian nation. A majority of GOP respondents, 72%, believe the government should advocate Christian values, while 54% of Republicans believe the US should be declared a Christian nation. Democrats are not on board with these views, and more than three-quarters, 78%, believe the government should strictly enforce the separation of church and state.

Despite all this division over core values and the state of our nation upon reaching this chronological milestone, Democrats and Republicans agree that we have far more in common than things that divide us—79% and 76%—respectively. And just a tiny fraction want to see us go our separate ways. Only about 10% of both Democrats and Republicans believe the United States would be better off if we split into two nations.

So, a quarter millennium into the American experiment, as hyper-polarization grips our body politic, people want to believe we’re still the United States of America.

Alexander Theodoridis is an associate professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and codirector of the UMass Poll. His research focuses on American electoral politics, hyper-polarization, political violence, and survey methodology.

From Many, We is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that highlights the insights of thought leaders dedicated to the idea of inclusive democracy. Queries may be directed to fmw@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.

Sebelius also describes the consequences of deep staffing cuts and leadership vacancies across HHS, which affects services from food safety and medical research to Medicare, Medicaid, and childcare. The loss of experienced federal workers, she warns, could take a generation to repair. “HHS touches Americans from birth to death,” Sebelius says. Weakening those services “has a real life and death impact on Americans, and it’s going to take a long time to rebuild.”

EXPLORE MORE EPISODES

Those who live in democracies often imagine the greatest danger as a sudden collapse: tanks in the streets, a dramatic intervention, a clear rupture with the constitutional order. But more often than not, the real threats arrive slowly. Institutions weaken gradually. Laws are rewritten quietly. Civic space narrows step by step.

Latin America has lived through this process repeatedly. In recent years, Venezuela has become one of the clearest examples of how democratic institutions can be hollowed out while the language of sovereignty and legality remains formally intact. But Venezuela is far from the only example. Across the region, governments have introduced laws that restrict civil society organizations, limit access to information, or increase state control over independent institutions.

Over the past decade, pressure on civic space in the Americas has intensified. In Nicaragua, the government of Daniel Ortega has shut down thousands of civil society organizations in an effort to eliminate independent oversight and silence dissent. This campaign that led us to July 2026, when Ortega announced the outright abolition of elections, effectively closing off any remaining path for democratic accountability. Venezuela passed legislation in 2024 that severely restricts the activities of humanitarian and human rights groups, portraying them as enemies of the state.

Similar initiatives have emerged elsewhere in the region with critics calling attention to their similarities with Russia’s “Foreign Agent Law.” In Peru, new laws give authorities broad powers to control the work of organizations receiving international funding. Paraguay and El Salvador have adopted comparable frameworks, raising alarms among regional networks and human rights organizations. These measures are often presented as efforts to combat corruption, foreign interference, or organized crime. In practice, they actually weaken those who monitor state power.

When in Doubt, Ask Civil Society

Civil society organizations often become the last line of accountability. They document abuses when institutions refuse to do so. They accompany victims navigating broken legal systems. They gather evidence, defend access to information, and preserve the public memory of violations that governments would prefer to erase.

This work rarely receives the recognition it deserves. Yet in many countries, it is civil society that sustains the democratic muscle of society when formal institutions stop functioning and repression becomes normalized. This work is often carried out under extraordinary pressure. Throughout the region, journalists, researchers, and human rights defenders operate under surveillance, threats, and legal harassment. Many organizations have been forced into exile or operate with drastically reduced resources. International funding for civil society has also shrunk in recent years, leaving organizations struggling to maintain teams and programs.

Behind every organization are people whose lives have been reshaped by this work. Civil society is often treated as a sector of projects, reports, and deliverables. In reality, it is also a school. Activists, journalists, and community organizers develop forms of knowledge that cannot be taught in any university program: how to document abuses in opaque environments, how to support victims while protecting their security, how to analyze incomplete information in rapidly changing political contexts. When organizations lose funding or their staff are forced to leave the field to survive economically, that knowledge disappears with them. It cannot simply be replaced.

Despite these pressures, civil society in global majority countries continues to show remarkable creativity and resilience. One of the most important recent developments has been the growth of cross-regional collaboration. Journalists and democracy defenders from Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba—countries that once felt far from each other—increasingly exchange experiences and strategies. Media outlets that would normally compete have begun to collaborate to fight disinformation and continue to inform their audiences under restrictive conditions. A wonderful example is the Investigative Rebel Alliance, a coalition of independent media devoted to investigative journalism in Venezuela, a country where freedom of expression has been reduced beyond its minimum.

Civil society networks across Latin America share legal analysis, security practices, and advocacy strategies to confront similar patterns of repression. Even small initiatives can play an important role. The cafecitos organized by IFEX ALC, the Latin American and Caribbean alliance of members within the global IFEX network, are just one example. These organized spaces within regional networks have created opportunities for activists and journalists to meet, question their assumptions, and learn from each other’s experiences. While these connections may appear modest, they help build the relationships and trust that allow civil society to respond collectively to new challenges. Most participants leave the meetings having learned a few new tricks, but, more important, they come away feeling connected and less isolated.

These Collaborations Are Not Just Desirable, They’re Necessary

Authoritarian governments exchange tactics, technologies, and legal strategies. Surveillance practices travel across borders. Laws restricting civic space are copied and adapted from one country to another. In this context, civil society cannot afford to remain fragmented.

At the same time, civil society collaborations must also address long-standing inequalities in existing international partnerships. Too often, organizations from Western democracies occupy the role of hosts, facilitators, or agenda-setters, while actors from the global majority are expected to only provide local testimony or project implementation.

Yet the political landscapes that many societies, even those in the West, are now facing—institutional erosion, hybrid authoritarianism, shrinking civic space—are realities that civil society in the global majority has been navigating for years. Their experience is far from being peripheral knowledge; it is essential for creating successful strategies.

Building stronger partnerships therefore must have more horizontal forms of exchange. It requires acknowledging power imbalances, addressing intercultural misunderstandings, and being willing to have the difficult conversations about blind spots in international advocacy. Above all, it requires recognizing that the fight against authoritarianism is collective and cross-regional.

The boundaries that define civil society cooperation can no longer follow national borders. Democracies around the world are becoming increasingly connected through shared vulnerabilities. The stability that some societies once considered permanent is becoming less certain.

Latin America offers lessons that extend far beyond the region. Not because the region provides a blueprint for crisis but because its civil society has spent decades developing ways to navigate political instability, institutional collapse, and authoritarian pressure.

In a world where authoritarian governments share notes, civil society must do the same. Resilience must be built on the shoulders of giants. Solidarity cannot remain a distant, symbolic gesture. It must become a consistent practice of listening, learning, and building together across regions and experiences. Only then can the networks that defend democracy become strong enough to face the challenges ahead.

Laura Vidal is a Venezuelan researcher in digital rights, a freedom of expression advocate, and an intercultural communication educator. Her work also includes community and movement building and strategic communications among civil society organizations. She works as the communications manager for Digital Action and is a regional writer for IFEX.

Resilience & Resistance is a Charles F. Kettering Foundation blog series that features the insights of thought leaders and practitioners who are working to expand and support inclusive democracies around the globe. Direct any queries to globalteam@kettering.org.

The views and opinions expressed by contributors to our digital communications are made independent of their affiliation with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation and without the foundation’s warranty of accuracy, authenticity, or completeness. Such statements do not reflect the views and opinions of the foundation which hereby disclaims liability to any party for direct, indirect, implied, punitive, special, incidental, or other consequential damages that may arise in connection with statements made by a contributor during their association with the foundation or independently.