U.S. Democracy Hits 50-Year Low, Threatening Global Stability

Half a century of democratic progress in the United States has quietly unraveled to a point that researchers across the political spectrum can no longer dispute. A new multi-institutional report, released in September 2026, documents the deterioration of courts, elections, press freedom, and minority protections — not as isolated failures, but as a coherent pattern of institutional strain. The significance reaches beyond American shores: a nation long positioned as democracy's exemplar now finds its moral authority to champion democratic norms abroad undermined by the condition of its own foun