A View from the Valley
By Georgia Earley
In 2024 U.S. Capitol Police reported 9,400 investigations into threats against members of Congress. In 2017 there were 3,939. From 2013 through 2016, the average per year was 38.
From 2016 through July 2025, there were 25 terrorist attacks and plots against government targets in the U.S. motivated by partisan political beliefs according to the Strategic and International Studies established in 1994. In the two decades preceding 2016 they reported 2.
According to the United States Democracy Center, a nonpartisan organization to advance free, fair, and secure elections, when people were asked about their support for violence if their preferred presidential candidate were to lose the 2024 election fair and square, 20% of respondents said that violence could be at least “a little” justified. However, when asked about their support for violence if their preferred candidate were to lose because of “unfair actions” taken by their political opponents, support for violence was 37%.
If those figures are even close and if over 125 million citizens would support violence for any reason, our Democratic Republic is sitting on a powder keg. Considering the growing number of threats and physical attacks including the tragic deaths of Senator Melissa Hortman and her husband last June, and then only three months later of Charlie Kirk, if this doesn’t wake us up to the escalating political volatility in our country, what will? Maybe it’s time to ask how we got here and what we can do to prevent that keg from blowing up our Democratic Republic entirely.
In 2017 the National Academy of Sciences reported that dehumanization allows perpetrators to set aside moral concerns increasing the likelihood of violence carried out as a means to an end. Dehumanization is done by calling people or a group of people names that create an image that strips them of basic human traits and evokes hostility, disdain, loathing, physical disgust, and/or bodily fear in people. Essentially dehumanization is a mental loophole that lets us commit harm.
In a recent documentary on PBS, a survivor of the Holocaust was asked why she thought the Holocaust happened. She answered, “we all have a dark side and all it takes is permission to unleash it”.
Johns Hopkins political scientist, Lilliana Mason, explains in a June 23, 2025 article, how political violence is eroding American democracy and changing who participates in politics. She points out that “if the people who lead us are using violent or dehumanizing rhetoric, then it’s a signal to their supporters that violent rhetoric is acceptable, and that violent action might be acceptable”.
In the U.S. we’ve witnessed how antagonistic and threatening rhetoric of those in power have made many in congress, our media, and other institutions reluctant to speak freely about issues in fear of retaliation. And as we’ve seen in other countries, when institutional checks and balances fail, democracies fail.
So, for safety’s sake, leaders need to focus on issues and quit blaming and demonizing. And to preserve the unity of our nation and our freedoms, we need to identify and be un-swayed by divisive rumors and fear mongering, and instead fact-check what we hear before investing our emotions.
When listening to the various responses from Charlie Kirk’s wife, of our lawmakers, and of others, I was struck at how powerful words can be.
The appeals of Utah’s Governor Cox for more consensus driven dialogue, and to “stop hating our fellow Americans” were met with derision by some, but not all. Many I’ve talked with would like to see more leaders ascribe to their “better angels”.
So it came as no surprise that in referring to her husband’s killer, when Erika Kirk uttered the words “I forgive him” the crowd before her cheered. And when she said, “hate is not the answer”, her words that day gave thousands who shared her grief, PERMISSION to NOT hate.
And when she went on to say that forgiveness is what Jesus taught and what Charlie believed, it was a reminder of the values that Jesus stood for. He taught love, forgiveness, help those in need, don’t judge others, serve others, and do to others as we would want them to do to us. These words reflect values that heal, guide and unite.
Maybe some of our leaders need to be reminded of them.