In this partisan moment, open debate helps us find common ground
In this partisan moment, open debate helps us find common ground
Just over half of Americans today feel very or mostly free to express their political views, according to a new study by the Knight Foundation.
Of the more than 25,000 Americans surveyed between May 4 and May 26, 72% said they felt very or mostly free to do the same 10 years ago, and 42% said they expected to feel the same 10 years from now.
The roughly half-and-half split over the state of free expression today “conceals wide variability between different groups,” a Knight Foundation fact sheet said. Among Hispanic Americans, for example, that number lowered to 41%, while 38% of Black respondents said they felt free to express their political views.
Other demographic groups, which the Knight Foundation described as being “in crisis,” also hovered around 40% – including current students, LBGTQ+ Americans and adults between the ages of 18 and 24.
Demographic groups that expressed more confidence in the state of free expression included Republicans, with around three-fourths of respondents saying they felt very or mostly free to express their political views, and White Americans, with 63% saying the same.
Among the other findings:
- Nearly one-fourth of respondents (22%) said they felt not very or not at all free to “peacefully protest about controversial issues in public spaces,” while 48% said they felt very or mostly free to do so.
- Nearly one-fourth of respondents (22%) said they felt not very or not at all free to “express political views or criticisms of government officials on social media,” while 48% said they felt very or mostly free to do so.
- Just over half (52%) of respondents said they felt very free or mostly free to “create, perform or display art, music or cultural works that some might find controversial,” while 16% said they felt not very or not at all free to do so.
The findings come amid broader public discussion about free speech under President Donald Trump’s administration. Trump vowed in his campaign to “bring back free speech” and signed an executive order calling government censorship of speech “intolerable in a free society,” but declared in October that his administration “took the freedom of speech away” as it relates to flag burning, an activity the Supreme Court has long recognized as protected speech.
His administration has also been accused of attempting to stifle anti-Trump speech. A federal judge in June ruled against the administration in its efforts to remove a protest group’s “8647” flag that they’d displayed at an ongoing demonstration in Washington, DC. Some Trump supporters have interpreted the series of numbers as a threat because “86” is a slang term that means “to throw out” or “to get rid of,” and Trump is the 47th U.S. president.
BrieAnna Frank is a First Amendment reporter at USA TODAY. Reach her at bjfrank@usatoday.com. USA TODAY’s coverage of First Amendment issues is funded through a collaboration between the Freedom Forum and Journalism Funding Partners. Funders do not provide editorial input.