WASHINGTON — Most Americans believe civil liberties like the right to vote are under threat, according to a new AP-NORC poll, while also continuing to agree that the rights expressed in the nation’s founding documents are still core to American identity.
The survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that most Americans across demographics believe the right to vote, the right to free speech and freedom of religion are integral to the country. But they were more divided on the importance of the right to bear arms, and few — about one-third or less — saw those rights as safe from threats.
The survey, which was conducted April 16-20 — before the Supreme Court’s recent ruling that winnowed a section of the Voting Rights Act — highlights an enduring consensus among Americans that personal freedoms are vital to the country’s national identity. But it also reveals deep anxieties about the nation’s trajectory on the cusp of a summer filled with celebrations of the country’s semi-quincentennial birthday.
“Our idea of rights has been very consistent in this country until the last few years,” said Louise Rochon, 85, of Connecticut. “Now, they’re all under threat. Every single last one of them.”
Americans see rights as vital, but threatened
About 9 in 10 Americans say the right to vote is “extremely” or “very” important to the United States’ identity, the poll found. About the same proportion of Americans consider freedom of speech to be highly important to the country’s identity. Meanwhile, about 8 in 10 Americans consider freedom of religion to be core to the national identity, while about 6 in 10 Americans consider the right to keep or bear arms as highly important to the nation’s identity.
But many in the country see those same principles as imperiled today. About two-thirds of Americans view the right to vote as under some threat, with about one-third saying voting rights are under “major threat” while about 3 in 10 said they faced a “minor threat.” Only about one-third of Americans said voting rights faced “no threat at all.”
Additionally, nearly half of Americans say freedom of speech is under major threat, followed by about 3 in 10 who said the same about gun rights and religious freedom.
The country is going “down the drain,” said Tracy Gonzales, an independent from San Antonio, Texas. Americans of all stripes, she said, have “thrown religion to the side at the moment” and allowed for other civil liberties to be eroded amid fierce debates over immigration and the economy.
“Given everything going on with our president, you really don’t have time to think of anything else,” said Gonzales, 37, of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdowns. “There are so many other crimes that are being committed and people that actually need help, and you’re focused on the ones that are trying to get it together.”
Vast majority of Black Americans see threat to voting rights
The poll’s results also surfaced complicated opinions about democracy and identity among Black Americans. Those are likely rooted, at least in part, in the country’s history of denying voting rights and full citizenship to people of African descent for centuries.
Black Americans are less likely than white Americans to say the right to vote is “extremely” or “very important” to American identity, with about three-quarters agreeing with the sentiment compared to about 9 in 10 white Americans.
But about 4 in 10 Black Americans say that the right to vote is facing a “major” threat in the country today, higher than any other racial group.
“You cannot feel like you are a total and full part of the American experiment unless you have the right to vote,” said Antonio Williams, a school administrator in Dallas, Texas, who is Black. “And African Americans didn’t fully get to enjoy the right to vote until about 60 years ago, and I feel like it’s under threat right now.”
Younger adults see the right to vote as less important
Independents and younger adults are less likely than Americans overall to say voting and freedom of speech are central to American identity.
“My age group has grown up a lot more with social media as part of their existence in life and the microcosms that that creates in politics,” said Julian Goodwin-Ferris, 28, a professional dancer from New Jersey.
“I think we feel more like our voice doesn’t matter as much because it feels like we’ve grown up with our rights sort of being more ignored,” said Goodwin-Ferris.
Democrats and Republicans are divided on magnitude of threat
Americans at times diverged along partisan lines in their view of the threats to rights, with Democrats seeing a greater threat to freedom of speech, while Republicans were more worried about the right to keep and bear arms.
While Democrats and Republicans are similarly likely to say freedom of speech is at least “very important” to the nation’s identity, about 6 in 10 Democrats say freedom of speech is facing a “major threat” compared to about 4 in 10 independents and roughly one-third of Republicans.
Similarly, while most Americans believe the right to bear arms is at least “very” important to the nation’s identity, about 8 in 10 Republicans agree with that sentiment, compared to only about 4 in 10 Democrats. About half of independents shared that view. And about 4 in 10 Republicans found that the right to bear firearms was under threat, an increase from October 2025 not reflected among either Democrats or independents.
“We have the Bill of Rights for a reason,” said Nuri Simmons, a warehouse worker in New York and a registered Democrat. Simmons, 31, said that threats to different rights “bleed into each other” and that while he was most concerned about threats to voting rights today, he understood that others may feel differently.
“Like when people try to bring some gun control into it, I think some people look at that as an attack on their rights. I guess that all depends on your politics,” he said.
___
The AP-NORC poll of 2,596 adults was conducted April 16-20 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 2.6 percentage points.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
