Given the state of our national politics, it’s no wonder a disturbing number of voters don’t trust our election process. 

According to a recent survey conducted for the Democracy Defense Project, more than 30 percent of Nevadans don’t trust votes to be “accurately cast and counted in the 2024 election.” Given the relentless and repeated claims of a stolen 2020 election, Republicans are unsurprisingly more concerned than Democrats. 

In a separate question, 88 percent of Republicans said they are somewhat or very concerned “irregularities could imperil the legitimate election and certification of the next President,” compared to only 47 percent of Democrats. 

When asked about whether they believe the opposing party would engage in “improper ballot activities” that jeopardize the integrity of the election, both parties overwhelmingly believe the other side would be up to shenanigans. Among Democrats, 85 percent were either somewhat or very concerned that former President Donald Trump and the GOP would engage in such improper ballot activities, while 86 percent of Republicans suspected the same of Democrats. 

A majority of independents reported being either somewhat or very concerned about both parties in this regard — which probably says something about why they’re unaffiliated voters in the first place.  

In other words, we’re really not a trusting electorate right now. And it’s easy to see why. Even before the unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud took hold in 2020, there have been plenty of instances of politicians refusing to accept their election losses as legitimate. 

As recently as 2019, Hillary Clinton was making public claims that Russian hackers had gained access to “the county election systems of every county in Florida” in the 2016 election — a claim that Florida officials quickly refuted. And while the year 2000 feels like a lifetime ago, Democratic complaints that George W. Bush wasn’t a “legitimate” president were widespread after a contentious, close and complex election outcome. 

But at least those two losing candidates actually conceded, rather than scheme to overturn the results. Trump took the practice of sore losing to a whole new level in 2020 with his conspiracy theories, relentless (and baseless) litigation efforts and ludicrous schemes to subvert the process. He then roused a rabble to storm the Capitol building and admonished his former vice president for refusing to go along with his plan to overturn the election.

Yes, the former president is in a class of his own when it comes to “election denialism.” However, claims of stolen elections, rigged systems and illegitimate election results are likely as old as the election process itself — and even the far less offensive examples of such behavior help to sow the seeds of distrust among certain factions of the electorate. 

And in today’s world, there’s an abundance of partisan rhetoric swirling around the political ecosystem designed to erode our trust in “the system” — a system that isn’t limited merely to the electoral process, but extends to virtually all institutions, organizations, corporations and even fellow voters. 

Some of the resulting distrust in the nation’s institutions — such as Congress — is probably warranted considering our federal government hasn’t exactly been an exemplary model of productivity and competence. It’s been 27 years since lawmakers have passed a budget on time, for example, and that was only the fourth time it did so since 1977. 

Such dysfunction certainly merits a healthy skepticism of government. However, the declining level of trust among Americans extends well beyond government institutions. With cultural changes, political division peaking and ongoing partisan feuds, Americans have also had a deteriorating view of each other. 

As Pew Research has documented before, there’s not only a growing political divide in America, but a growing contempt between rank-and-file members of the two parties. Members of both major parties, for example, overwhelmingly believe their ideological rivals are closed minded, immoral, unintelligent and represent a genuine threat to democracy. Similarly, both major parties genuinely believe their foes on the opposite side of the aisle would abuse the power of government to punish and persecute members of the political minority. 

In other words, it doesn’t take much for voters to look at the illiberal and undemocratic nature of our modern political rhetoric and conclude a great many of their fellow Americans are zealous about subverting constitutional and democratic norms for partisan gain. 

Is it at all surprising such general distrust would bleed over into how we feel about the electoral process more broadly?

The only real silver lining to be found in the survey for the Democracy Defense Project is that while 31 percent were not confident in election security nationwide, a whopping 84 percent of respondents were “somewhat” or “very confident” in Nevada’s election system. Given that the Silver State has been mired in the middle of “stop-the-steal” rhetoric and conspiracy theories for the last four years, that’s an impressive number. 

Rest assured, there are still plenty of political opportunists and grifters ready to chip away at that confidence for their own partisan gain — but at least on the local level, Nevadans have remained fairly resilient against such efforts. 

Michael Schaus is a communications and branding expert based in Las Vegas, Nevada, and founder of Schaus Creative LLC — an agency dedicated to helping organizations, businesses and activists tell their story and motivate change. He has more than a decade of experience in public affairs commentary, having worked as a news director, columnist, political humorist, and most recently as the director of communications for a public policy think tank. Follow him at SchausCreative.com or on Twitter at @schausmichael.