A recent global survey reveals that Americans are significantly more likely than people in other countries to view politics as the greatest threat to their personal safety, highlighting the profound impact of partisan divisions on daily life in the United States.
The Lloyd’s Register Foundation world risk poll, conducted across 140 countries, found that one in ten Americans identified politics as the primary risk to their well-being. This marks an increase from 6% in both 2021 and 2023 and stands well above the global average of just 1%. While road accidents and crime remain the most commonly cited dangers among Americans, the survey uniquely shows that more people in the U.S. named politics as their biggest risk than personal health issues.
Benedict Vigers, a senior global news writer at Gallup, which partnered on the research, described the figure as "unprecedented," emphasizing the charged nature of the political climate in the U.S. He noted that no other country surpassed this level of concern and explained that many Americans now perceive political tensions as a tangible, everyday threat to their security.
The United States has consistently ranked among the countries where politics is considered a significant personal safety risk over the three waves of polling conducted. However, 2025 marks the first year it topped the list, with Hungary following closely at 9%. Serbia, Latvia, and Lithuania also registered elevated concerns but at lower rates of around 6%. The timing of polling in Hungary preceded its recent election cycle.
Several factors may underpin Americans’ heightened fears. Over the past decade, the U.S. has experienced an increase in politically motivated violence, including three assassination attempts on former President Donald Trump, the 2025 assassination of Charlie Kirk, and a deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Moreover, incidents of localized harassment, death threats targeting election officials, and tactics such as doxing and swatting have targeted those involved in the political process.
The survey found that these concerns are widespread across different demographic and political groups, with no statistically significant variation by age, gender, education, or political affiliation. Many respondents attributed the sense of danger to the oppositional political camp, while others cited broader dysfunction and division within U.S. politics.
One 54-year-old Republican respondent described the heightened risk as stemming from "the state of polarisation of the American people," while a 69-year-old Democratic woman expressed anxiety about future safety linked to the political situation. Vigers noted that almost all respondents who identified politics as their main safety concern referred to political polarization as a central theme.
This phenomenon appears distinctively American, underscoring how deep political fragmentation has evolved into an everyday personal risk, according to the report’s findings.