Do most Americans say violence against leaders is OK?

['Tom Kertscher', 'Wisconsin Watch', 'More Tom Kertscher', 'State Fact Brief Reporter', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Avatar', 'Where Img'] Wisconsin Watch 2025-09-17 16:45:05

Reading Time: < 1 minuteWisconsin Watch partners with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. Polls do not show that most U.S. adults think violence against leaders is acceptable. YouGov poll, conducted Sept. 10: 11% said violence can sometimes be justified to achieve political goals; the figure was 24% among very liberal respondents. University of California, Davis, May-June 2024: 26% said violence was usually or always justified to advance at least one political objective. The most-Americans claim was made by Republican Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, discussing conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s assassination.