Nearly 8 in 10 Americans say politicians should avoid heated or aggressive speech

Most Americans (78%) say elected officials should avoid using heated or aggressive language because it could encourage some people to take violent action.

A far smaller share (20%) says that officials should be able to use heated language without worrying about how some people may act, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted Aug. 4-10, 2025, among 3,554 adults.

Related: Americans say politically motivated violence is increasing, and they see many reasons why

How we did this

Pew Research Center conducted this analysis to understand how the public views the use of heated or aggressive language by elected officials.

For this analysis, we surveyed 3,554 U.S. adults from Aug. 4 to 10, 2025. Everyone who took part in this survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), a group of people recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses who have agreed to take surveys regularly. This kind of recruitment gives nearly all U.S. adults a chance of selection. Interviews were conducted either online or by telephone with a live interviewer. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education, presidential vote (among voters) and other factors. Read more about the ATP’s methodology.

Here are the questions used for this analysis, the topline and the survey methodology.

Americans across the political spectrum largely share the view that elected officials should avoid heated language:

• 83% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say such language should be avoided. That is unchanged since we first asked the question in 2019.
• 75% of Republicans and Republican leaners also say this, up from 56% in early 2024 and 61% in 2019.

CORRECTION (Nov. 25, 2025): The final sentence of this post previously gave an incorrect survey year. It was 2019 when 61% of Republicans and GOP leaners said elected officials should avoid heated language.

Note: Here are the questions used for this analysis, the topline and the survey methodology.