Party affiliation, political ideology, views on democracy and society, and support for political violence in the United States of America: findings from a nationally representative survey

Background Recent research in the United States has found concerning levels of support for and willingness to engage in political violence and for extreme beliefs linked to violence. Associations between political party affiliation and political ideology and these levels of support have not been quantified. Methods Cross-sectional nationally representative survey conducted May 13 to June 2, 2022, of adult members of the Ipsos KnowledgePanel. Primary outcomes concerned support for and personal willingness to engage in political violence, presented as prevalences (weighted to achieve representativeness) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) and prevalence differences (adjusted for sociodemographics and geography) with p-values adjusted for the false discovery rate and reported as q-values. Results The completion rate was 55.8%; the analytic sample included 8,620 respondents. Higher percentages of Republicans (from 35.3% to 49.5%) than Democrats (from 24.7% to 26.7%) considered violence to be usually or always justified to advance at least 1 of 17 specific political objectives. Few respondents (<3%), with no statistically significant differences by party affiliation, were “very or completely willing” to threaten or intimidate, injure, or kill another person for political purposes. Strong Republicans were more likely than strong Democrats to consider it “very or extremely likely” that they would be armed in a future situation where they considered political violence to be justified: 14.6% (95% CI, 12.5%, 17.0%) and 4.7% (95% CI, 3.4%, 6.3%), respectively; adjusted prevalence difference 9.7% (95% CI, 6.9%, 12.1%; q < 0.001). Respondents rarely (<2%), and again without differences by party affiliation, thought it very or extremely likely that they would shoot someone in such a situation. Findings for political ideology resembled those for party affiliation. Conclusions Republicans and conservatives were more likely than Democrats and liberals to view political violence as justified to advance specific political objectives; this finding is a function of the specific objectives that were presented. Republicans were not more willing than Democrats to engage in political violence themselves. These findings deepen our understanding of the potential threat posed by political violence in the United States and can contribute to prevention efforts.