America is bracing for political violence – and significant portion think its OK

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/11/03/poll-americans-political-violence-00632864

by alephnerd • 9 months ago

64 86 9 months ago

politico.com

postflopclarity6• 9 months ago

"bracing" ?

we already have it.

In order of approximately most significant to least significant acts of political violence just in the last 6 months:

* The assassination of Melissa Hortman (D - MN House) and attempted assassinations of John Hoffman (D - MN Senate) and each of their spouses.

* The assassination attempt (arson) on Josh Shapiro (D - PA Governor)

* The assassination of Charlie Kirk (R - not a public official)

and there were several other acts of political violence in 2024 (including the attempted assassinations of Trump and of Nancy Pelosi and her husband)

Forgeties797• 9 months ago

What drives me crazy is, in a rare moment for me, I will acknowledge that it’s been morphing into a “both sides” issue in the last 24mo or so. I just generally reject “both sides” arguments because it’s so often a cheap hand wavy way to say “I don’t care/won’t look under the hood on this” without having to say it while ignoring the fundamental truth of “two wrongs don’t make a right.”

And yet I still have people insist it’s all “left wing Marxists” or whatever their favorite term is these days. Like we can’t even agree political violence is ratcheting up broadly and it’s a problem we ALL have to deal with.

Partisanship is a hell of a drug.

Edit: several recent attempts/successful perpetrators, including Kirk’s killer, were not clearly right or left. There have been some leftwing incidents but they are certainly fewer than others. I am not saying left wing violence is as bad as right wing violence. But it’s not all right wing anymore. That’s all I’m saying.

alephnerd• 9 months ago

The fact you got downvoted is symptomatic of the larger issue you identified.

mcphage• 9 months ago

I will acknowledge that it’s been morphing into a “both sides” issue in the last 24mo or so.

Has it been? How so?

postflopclarity6• 9 months ago

it might be a "both sides" issue in terms of opinion polls like this, but empirically right-wing political violence in the US is consistently, statistically, and significantly, more lethal

nitwit005• 9 months ago

Our current government seems to want to provoke a reaction. Constantly talking about sending troops into cities, calling democrats terrorists, and all the other vitriol, certainly isn't intended to create a sense of peace and comfort.

If you constantly try to make people angry, eventually you succeed.

pstuart• 9 months ago

[flagged]

twojacobtwo• 9 months ago

Vurtually anyone saying "left wing Marxists" in the US, in reference to an organized movement, is full of shit and/or fully captured by the American propaganda waves still echoing from the the red scare era of the 1940s and 50s. These people are the type to call literally any social safety net "communist".

America has been pulled so far to the right in the last 70+ years that the average voter now seems to think 'the left' starts at authoritarian communism.

xg152• 9 months ago

I mean, look at the GenZ protests in other parts of the world that have successfully brought down several governments. The US is still "just" in the "lone wolf" phase of political violence.

gojomo3• 9 months ago

Plot these against the rate of similar attempts (or successes) over the past century if you want to convince others of anything other than your own subjective presentist perspective.

postflopclarity6• 9 months ago

the Hortman murder was the first assassination of a sitting legislator at the state or federal level in my lifetime, which feels pretty significant.

I'm looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assassinated_American_... and I stand by my "subjective perspective" as remaining pretty reasonable. let me know what specifically you wanted me to plot

charlescearl• 9 months ago

- The excess deaths experienced by unhoused persons - The excess deaths of persons that live in in the so-called Cancer Alley https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2025/the-shocking-hazards-of-lo... - The persistent excess deaths of those incarcerated in american prisons https://www.vera.org/news/the-hidden-deaths-in-american-jail... - The american mass shootings in 2025 https://massshootingtracker.site/ - The internationalized violence of ICE arrests and attacks https://www.npr.org/2025/10/23/nx-s1-5538090/ice-detention-c...

These are all instances of political violence. The political class in the united states deemed particular populations disposable, and enacted policies that lead to excess deaths and extreme violence upon those populations. Millions in the united states live under the threat of state violence and politcally accepted exposure to premature death.

The article and comments refer to the resulting counter-violence that perpetrators of the un-remarked systemic violence may become exposed to.

postflopclarity6• 9 months ago

I kind of agree with you in spirit, but I was more meaning to refer to terrorism / acts of violence against high profile public officials.

satisfice• 9 months ago

Homeless people must be so happy now that people acknowledge that they can feel at home without a house to live in. There never was a problem with homelessness, I am sure they would say. (this is sarcasm)

But doesn’t “unhoused” sound a little too much like “unhinged?” Has anyone checked whether being referred to as a “person” might be offensive to men and women and boys and girls who have more specific identities? (this is not sarcastic)

I_Am_Nous• 9 months ago

One of the big ones I remember from the last decade was the Congressional baseball shooting in 2017, where luckily nobody was killed. This isn't a sudden problem to brace for, it's a continuing problem to finally accept and address.

Charlie Kirk was not an elected public official, but he was definitely still political in a way that a lot of regular Americans are political. So even if it's less significant with regard to elected officials being targeted, it was political violence that regular people felt and could conceive of being targeted with, for similar reasons as Charlie. I believe that was what made his assassination resonate with people, much more than an elected official being assassinated does.

ggreer• 9 months ago

If we're counting in the past six months, the list should also include the Capital Jewish Museum shooting, the Boulder Molotov cocktail attack, and the shootings at ICE facilities in Alvarado & Dallas.

IAmBroom5• 9 months ago

And the ICE arrests, in general, which have greatly increased.

postflopclarity6• 9 months ago

I was going for attacks on specific high profile individuals. there were indeed these events and more others if we're counting all politically-motivated terrorism.

phantasmish• 9 months ago

A new rise of political violence was clearly coming in when Trump told his supporters, on camera, in front of a crowd, that they ought to shoot Hillary if she won—and then he not only still had an active campaign a week later, but went on to win the election.

That was a huge "oh shit" moment. The rest of this isn't exactly a consequence of specifically what he said, but is something that one could predict from that and other things he said and did in the first election and his first term. The fact that he said what he said and that was no longer regarded as abhorrent by enough people to keep him from even getting close to the Presidency, was the sign.

rickydroll2• 9 months ago

Did you notice that the photographs taken at that event showed that his right ear was bloodied, implying that it was damaged by the bullet passing by. Believable, kinda. But then the Time photo showing his Georgia O'Keeffe neck also showed his completely intact right ear.

The attempt in itself is not just political violence, but also provides grounds for justifying violence against "enemies."

EPWN3D• 9 months ago

I'd agree except that we appear to have just memory-holed the attempted assassination of Trump during his campaign. And he never talks about it either. Until you posted this, I'd completely forgotten about it.

miamibre• 9 months ago

Exactly! People who think that the vitriol is just cordoned off to social media haven't been paying attention to the very real spillover that has already claimed lives.

I think the issue is that mainstream media like movies showcases political violence as very well organized and full of manifestos when the majority of these attempts are very poorly planned and the people carrying it out clearly have mental disorders so it's very hard to pinpoint what ideology they are promoting.

I also believe that these recent attempts have showcased that the current political establishment has been doing an awful job at reconciliation and instead pouring gasoline by refusing to make a joint statements condemning the violence or making any sort of gesture that isn't blatantly bipartisan.

If you look at the political violence of the 60's and 70's in the US, there's a lot of overlap but at least the government took steps to not only keep it under control but congress actually took steps in dealing with the hot button issues. Nowadays it seems like we're just kicking the can down the road and blaming the other side for it. I mean just look at the current shutdown and tell me if this state of affairs won't result in further anger and people taking action with their own hands rather than rely on political institutions.

michael19992• 9 months ago

Don't forget Gabby Giffords and Steve Scalise.

locopati• 9 months ago

and almost all of it committed by people with right-wing views

gojomo3• 9 months ago

Lessons are repeated until learned. And again, after those lessons are forgotten.

mc322• 9 months ago

This is not good. What’s worse is none of the larger parties is willing to control their extremes who think more ideologically and are incapable of dialing down without the needed negative feedback loop from their donors and larger party figure heads pushing back.

skopje• 9 months ago

one set of political extremes has 3x the budget of the us marines and is a paramilitary that operates above the law. the other political extreme are some skinny vegan teenagers in black clothes. no no both sides.

stuffn• 9 months ago

I think you vastly underestimate what "skinny vegan teenagers in black clothes" are capable of to an almost comically ignorant level. Not only is it a complete misrepresentation of the average "antifa-er" it also mischaracterizes them (perhaps deliberately) as an incapable force.

You would probably benefit from reading about the link between prominent activists in these circles, and for example, the sandanistas and other violent socialist/communist groups. Or the link to the USSR via the DDR where antifa as we know it came to be. The black bloc is a clear and present danger to the citizenry in the same respect as the paramilitary you refer to.

zingababba3• 9 months ago

Well the extremes are quickly becoming the norm on both sides. Fuentes is making the rounds, just recently on Tucker's podcast. The talking points on the right are increasingly becoming that the left needs to be absolutely crushed. Mayors/governors arrested, etc. The idea that Trump is being nowhere near extreme enough is very much being discussed openly. Pundits are all decrying the immanence of civil war. If you go deep right you find communities are VERY actively prepping and gathering like-minded individuals together.

The left meanwhile is busy attempting to cover up massive fraud under their watch (Minnesota,) voting in self-proclaimed socialists or those who vow allegiance to other countries entirely and shutting down any conversation that does not maintain their simulacrum. If you go deep left you find communities are gleefully celebrating the murder of their opponents and are also actively buying arms (often for the first time in their lives.)

Meanwhile the middle is getting slammed by layoffs.

tastyface2• 9 months ago

Publicly shacking up with neo-nazis is equivalent to… electing democratic socialists?! Are you seriously making this equivalence?

mc322• 9 months ago

Not only the right. Remember there were two or three actual attempts on the candidate for the presidency and one of their influencers was shot dead. Plus you have outburst from Maxine, ol’ Joe miss Occasionally Cortez and others calling for people to take to the streets and to take up violence… sorry but it’s both doing this. Calling anlmost any conservative who isn’t a Neocon a neo nazi doesn’t help quell things either.

mothballed4• 9 months ago

Politics is merely the mechanism by which organized systematic violence happens. The winner of politics decides which violence is legitimate.

alwa• 9 months ago

If I remember my von Clausewitz correctly, at least some professional violence workers believe it’s the other way ‘round. Political ends by violent means and all that… violence being one of many species of persuasive technique available to people and groups with political aims.

sabarn01• 9 months ago

True in the most general sense. Generalized political violence is very different from the state using force to based upon the accent of the govern where we have a generalized concept of human rights. To me its a little like saying all art can be be made up with pixels therefore everything is a pixel.

IAmBroom5• 9 months ago

Max Weber was wrong.

Politics is the attempt to resolve public conflict, ideally with violence as a last resort (but always as a possibility).

gruez8• 9 months ago

Politics is merely the mechanism by which organized systematic violence happens

Yes, in the sense that "the government has a monopoly on violence", and the application (or at least threat) of "violence" is needed to for a government to work (eg. tax collection, enforcement of property rights, law enforcement), but that's clearly different than "political violence" mentioned in the OP (ie. extrajudicial politically motivated killings), and pretending they're the same because they both "violence" borders on bad faith argumentation.

pseudalopex3• 9 months ago

Legality is very important to you seemingly. It is less important to others.[1][2]

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45803019

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45803404

deadbabe• 9 months ago

When the law fails its people, the people have no choice but to take the law into their own hands.

What good are courts, if a perpetrator is never brought to justice?

It leaves no choice, but to resort to a very primal form of justice: kill them.

subjectsigma3• 9 months ago

Gee, I wonder why.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45801849

AnimalMuppet3• 9 months ago

Because BBC doctored a Trump video? That's why? Seriously?

Your cause-and-effect logic escapes me.

subjectsigma3• 9 months ago

It’s not that hard to see?

1. The president promotes a false narrative that the election was stolen. Media makes sure every single person in America gets coverage of this 24/7.

2. A protest happens with potential for violence.

3. President then gives a speech which wavers back and forth between calling for peace and saying inflammatory things which could escalate.

4. The media makes damn sure every single person hears the bad parts. Some media outlets go as far to edit the speech to make it seem worse than it is.

5. Everyone on one side thinks “Well, this is what the president is calling for” and everyone on the other side thinks “If they’re doing this we need to fight back ourselves”

The media has made every bad thing happening in politics worse

ivape2• 9 months ago

Why flagged?

testing223212• 9 months ago

HN has decided to stick its head in the sand on politics.

It’s all about to burn down, but they want us talking about new AI features, and ignoring the fires.

AnimalMuppet3• 9 months ago

There are an almost infinite number of places where we can discuss those fires. Some of those flagging want to not talk about the fires on HN. You are wrong to assume that that's them sticking their head in the sand.

gruez8• 9 months ago

The article revolves around a poll showing that people expect that political violence will increase, but this is likely more of a reflection of how terrible people's perceptions are, than a bellwether of actual impending political violence. People are terrible at assessing how willing the other side is willing to use violence. This study from 2021[1] shows that the overwhelming majority of americans don't support political violence, but massively overestimates how willing the other side is willing to.

[1] https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2116851119#fig01

phendrenad2• 9 months ago

Yeah, no, after Charlie Kirk was assassinated (and a few lesser-known political figures who immediately became household names post-Charlie Kirk to keep some kind of gross political peropaganda balance), I was immediately fearful that this would be the start of a new trend. But, has there been anything since? It seems like everyone is too afraid of the government cracking down on them to do anything, and that's a good thing. Now, the 1/5 of every tax dollar the US government takes in goes to servicing the national debt, another 1.5/5 goes to medicare, and another 1/5 goes to social security, and 1/5 goes to fighting ongoing wars, that leaves 500 billion dollars "spending money" to try to keep the peace.

kelseyfrog• 9 months ago

America's was delivered by two births of of political violence: the American revolution and the Civil War.

I'm interested in hearing why those are justifible acts of political violence (or not political violence) whereas today's political violence is not. Surely there were folks during those times who described them as not justifible. What makes today's arguments against political violence materially different than dissenters in prior eras?

OkayPhysicist• 9 months ago

As the expression goes "The ends sanctify the means". We generally, collectively agree that the results of the Civil War (and more universally, the Revolution) were good things, and thus the actions that advanced those ends are sacred.

Contemporary events can't be judged that way: Consequentialists (typically on the left) end up judging actions by perceived probability of success weighted outcomes, which, naturally, discount modern events since the only things with certain outcomes are those in the distant past. Deontological thinkers (more typical on the right) have to condemn contempory actions as "wrong" until they can be incorporated into a larger narrative that justifies them, which again takes time.

jleyank• 9 months ago

What might happen if the air traffic system collapses right before/during the American Thanksgiving holiday. They're working short-staffed and without pay, but I doubt the family/personal debts are suspended.

Or, maybe it's time to invite some French speakers over to discuss the whys and hows of general strikes? Gotta watch out when people feel they have little or nothing to lose.

mothballed4• 9 months ago

ATCs already tried that under Reagan. He fired all of them and they were permanently banned from ever working with the FAA again. Trump would do it in an instant.

_DeadFred_• 9 months ago

Trump already tried supplementing with military ATC. It's not the 80s, that didn't work this time (the two are too different. Everywhere is held together with it's own special duct tape). How is firing them all going to reopen anything?

rickydroll2• 9 months ago

I definitely agree. Trump is a crazy old man shaking his fist at the clouds with extreme prejudice. Unfortunately, he is backed by people whose philosophy is to shrink government to the point where it could be drowned in a bathtub.

I agree with what another poster said about bringing in some French people to teach us the importance of general strikes and shutting everything down to make our point.

Failing that, I think blue states should offer a federal tax escrow service to pay for what they've been promised but denied.

stubish• 9 months ago

A general strike is many industries striking in solidarity. Stock up on essentials, paralyze everything, and hold your nerve. Can't even sack anyone if the HR departments are missing or no power to the buildings.

Simulacra• 9 months ago

Violence against anyone is uncalled for. I don't care who it is, unless it's a direct threat to life, violence is wrong. Encouraging people to commit violence is even worse.

FrankWilhoit• 9 months ago

Thinking that a thing is okay, and understanding that there are no alternatives to it, are not at all the same thing.

michael19992• 9 months ago

This is so weird:

Most Americans expect political violence to keep growing in the United States and believe that it is likely a political candidate will be assassinated in the next few years.

Like, there have already been several assassinations! Were Gabby Giffords, Steve Scalise, or Melissa Hortman no politicians? The water is getting pretty hot.

America is bracing for political violence – and significant portion think its OK

Related Stories