Americans have grown less proud of their country’s history or the way its democracy works over the past decade, according to a new AP-NORC poll.
Americans’ pride in the U.S. on several key attributes has dropped since 2017 — including the nation’s military and its political influence around the globe — according to the survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. This poll was conducted in April, as the United States and Iran fought over the Strait of Hormuz in a prolonged war that started with the U.S. and Israel launching strikes on Iran.
New Gallup polling also finds that only 53% of U.S. adults are “extremely” or “very” proud to be an American, the lowest reading in the trend dating back to 2001.
Let’s be clear. The primary reason people have lost pride in America and democracy is Donald Trump and his administration. You can say other administrations have had their faults, certainly, but what’s happening now is far, far worse. And let’s not forget the constant drumbeat of propaganda from Fox News and other right wing outlets telling us our country is a shit hole. And again, we have our problems, but this is how propaganda works. You mix in some truth about something while wildly exaggerating or making up other things about it.
Idk Trump is without a doubt the worst (so far) and doesn’t bother to even dress it up as anything else but when I read this:
My first thought was “Ruh Roh…”
Every authoritarian overreach, breach of civil rights and liberties in the name of safety, invasion of privacy, and abuse of executive power, was made possible by the Patriot Act and the Bush administration’s response to 9/11.
The creation of ICE and homeland security (once again for our own safety).
Information control and the idea of a post truth society vs a reality based community that seems to be getting smaller and smaller by the year.
Propaganda and fear meant to box people into black and white thinking is an echo of McCarthyism but was most famously stated as “If you’re not with us, you’re against us.”
That frame of mind/tribalistic thinking was normalized in the 50s, signed into law in the early aughts, and the same day Charlie Kirk was assassinated and Trump signed NSPM-7, allowed the already overly vague and easily abused definition of terrorist/terrorism to be expanded to include political opposition and basically anybody for anything, because the king says so.
Not long after NSPM-7, the king and his administration began targeting fishing boats in Venezuela with drone strikes and breaking into homes in the United States without search warrants due to similar vague claims about threats of terrorism and safety. And even though they’ve mainly focused on immigrants so far, they’ve quietly continued to test the waters and see how far they can expand that definition by linking groups of protestors to gangs and possession and distribution of drugs to foreign drug cartels (while also literally making closed door deals with wealthy drug cartels and their families, bc they do whatever TF they want. Organized crime is still organized crime, but it’s legal for certain people).
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/trumps-orders-targeting-antifascism-aim-criminalize-opposition
https://www.newsweek.com/what-is-nspm-7-over-3000-nonprofits-sound-alarm-on-new-trump-directive-10807321
https://www.commondreams.org/news/minnesota-indictments
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/06/donald-trump-gao-report-shell-companies-money-laundering-drug-cartels/
https://www.commondreams.org/news/left-wing-extremist-groups
They really ramped things up with Renee Good and seemed to back down a bit after Alex Pretti, but they’re definitely not done. People should not be letting their guard down, because without a doubt they’re going to get more brazen just before and especially after the midterms, and as the king keeps reminding us, he wants to normalize the idea that there are no limits to his executive power. (And SCOTUS has continued to quietly ensure that’s true).
Tldr: I question if it’s really a coincidence Trump makes W.'s legacy look so much better by comparison, because W. and his administration enabled all of this. (And tbf to “both sides,” I do honestly feel that the Dems that came after W. in Congress and the White House deserve a middle finger for not making any real effort to undo any of it when they had the chance.)
Edit: Also, if you’re interested in understanding the legal path of exactly where we’re headed and why you should be very angry every time Trump or JD Vance slips in some bullshit normalizing the idea of unchecked executive authority (aside from the obvious), I recommend more people familiarize themselves with the legal theory of Common Good Constitutionalism.
https://sh.itjust.works/comment/25141335
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/10/4/common-good-constitutionalism/