Survey: Americans Increasingly Believe Political Violence Is a Problem
In This Resource
Americans are worried about political violence.
Concern about political violence has remained steady in recent years but jumped after the June 2025 killing of Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark.
More than half of Americans (57%) believe political violence is a major problem, according to a recent States United survey. That’s the highest percentage for that question in two years. Just 29% think it’s a minor problem.
Further, as of June 2025, nearly 8 in 10 (78%) Americans believe that political violence has increased over recent years. Only 14% believe it has stayed the same. The number of Americans who believe that political violence is increasing has climbed over the past two years. When States United asked this question in June 2023, 58% of Americans believed political violence had increased.
These results came after the June 2025 shootings that targeted Minnesota lawmakers. In July 2024, President Trump was shot at in an attempted assassination in Pennsylvania. Other officials, including Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, have also been the target of politically motivated attacks in recent years.
The survey was conducted in partnership between States United and YouGov between June 17 and 20, 2025, among 1,515 adult Americans.
- More than half of Americans say political violence is a major problem. That number has gone up in recent months.
- Almost 8 in 10 of Americans believe that political violence has increased—the highest percentage for that question over a two-year period.
When asked if they believed political violence was a major problem, a minor problem, not much of a problem, or no problem at all, nearly 9 in 10 Americans chose one of the two top answers. Among those asked, 57% said political violence is a major problem, while 29% thought it was a minor problem. Very few Americans saw political violence as either not much of a problem or no problem at all.
At 57%, the percentage of Americans who believe that political violence is a major problem is at its highest level in the two years that States United has asked this question—up from 44% in June 2023. The 86% of Americans who believe that political violence is either a major or minor problem is also at the highest percentage in two years.
When asked if they thought political violence in this country has increased, decreased, or stayed about the same over the past few years, nearly 8 in 10 (78%) Americans thought it increased. Only 14% thought it stayed the same and 3% thought it decreased.
At 78%, the number of Americans who think that political violence in this country has increased is by far the highest level for that question in the past two years of States United surveys. The previous high was 69% in September 2023.
These data are taken from a States United survey based on 1,515 interviews conducted on the internet of U.S. adults. Participants were drawn from YouGov’s online panel and were interviewed from June 17 – 20, 2025. Respondents were selected to be representative of American adults. Responses were additionally weighted to match population characteristics with respect to gender, age, race/ethnicity, education of registered voters, and U.S. Census region based on voter registration lists, the U.S. Census American Community Survey, and the U.S. Census Current Population Survey, as well as 2020 presidential vote. The margin of error for this survey is approximately ± 2.7 percentage points, though it is larger for the analysis of partisan subgroups described above. Therefore, sample estimates should differ from their expected value by less than the margin of error in 95% of all samples. This figure does not reflect non-sampling errors, including potential selection bias in panel participation or measurement error.