If American politics over the past few years has felt frightening or potentially unsafe, well, that’s because it has been.
Assassinations of politicians and activists marred 2025, a year after Donald Trump narrowly survived an attempt on his life in Butler, Pa. Elected officials and candidates have been inundated with threats and harassment.
The specter of violence is an unfortunate but relentless force shaping the country’s politics. It has led to visible changes, like candidates opting against walking in a parade or holding an outdoor rally. But it has also prompted invisible shifts, like elected officials feeling pressured to vote a certain way out of fear for their physical safety.
Some groups are working to mitigate such worries. They include the Democracy Security Project, a nonprofit group that was started by Democratic strategists in 2024 and offers training for candidates and elected officials on how to shore up security at their offices and campaign events as well as online.
The group, which plans to expand its staff this year, said interest in its services had surged. Of the 900 candidates it trained in 2025, more than 800 approached the organization after the assassination last June of Melissa Hortman, the former speaker of the Minnesota House, and her husband, Mark.
We called up the group’s co-founders, Jess O’Connell and Maju Varghese, to learn a bit more. The interview has been edited and condensed.
What prompted your decision to expand this year?
Maju Varghese: There’s a climate of political violence that is just serving as a cloud that’s sitting on top of everything, if you look at its impact on the way people vote, the way lawmakers vote, the threats to judges, other public servants. So the climate demanded it.
Jess O’Connell: Part of why we’re still going is because the sheer numbers, the sheer volume. We’ve served over 10,000 people in less than two years, in all 50 states.
What have you heard from candidates and potential candidates — what are their fears or concerns?
Varghese: The most immediate concern we hear about is the safety of their families. We talked to people who recruit candidates. And the conversation used to be: Can I raise money? Or what’s the impact on my career, or what’s the impact on my family in terms of finances and press?
Now, they’re worried about the safety of their kids at home. They’re worried about the safety of their partners and spouses. They’re worried about doxxing attacks and potential swatting attacks and the other things that they read about, and that is oftentimes the linchpin between whether they run or don’t run.
What do you tell candidates about what they need to do differently to address threats?
Varghese: Well, first of all, what we tell them to do differently is to talk about it. Have these conversations with their loved ones, with their kids, with their partners — about their digital footprint, about what they post on social media, about the fact that they are raising their profile, and what that may mean for them in their day-to-day lives. We talked to them about having honest conversations about the safety and security of their homes and how they secure their homes. And that it’s OK to talk about it, because if you don’t, you can’t prepare.
What keeps you up at night?
Varghese: We’re in an environment where we’re not denouncing political violence as a blanket rule. We should be denouncing political violence no matter who the perpetrator is and no matter who the victim is. Right now, it’s selective denunciation, and we need to be better.
Will your group help any candidate who comes to you? Or will it only help Democratic candidates?
O’Connell: We’ve never turned anyone away in nearly two years of doing this. We are focused on pro-democracy groups and leaders. But the truth is that, as it relates to safety and security, we’re in a bipartisan era. The reality is that if you are a public figure in this country right now, you are at risk. So, yes, our door is open.
I’ve covered a lot of candidates who ran shoestring campaigns where it was just them knocking on doors and paying for their own gas. How will they be able to access your support? Will they have to pay?
O’Connell: We have a sliding scale, but as we said, we’ve never turned anyone away.
What would be your message to a potential candidate whose only reluctance about running is fear?
O’Connell: We have your back. It’s actually that simple. That’s what I want them to know.
There are people out here whose whole job is going to bed and waking up thinking about how to help keep them and their teams and their volunteers and their families safe so that they can do the work of helping to govern this country out of the mess that we’re in. So we’re here for them and we have their back.
quote of the day
“Are we ready now? I don’t know. Prove us wrong. I would love that.”
That was Michelle Obama, doubling down on remarks she made late last year that American voters weren’t ready for a female president.
But another prominent Democratic woman, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, disagrees: “I think America is ready,” she said.
A Republican donor’s final big donation
My colleague Theodore Schleifer, who covers campaign finance, brings us some intriguing news about the Republican money world.
Six weeks before he died, one of the country’s largest Republican donors started a $100 million dark-money group that could give him a lasting influence, according to a tax filing reviewed by The New York Times.
The donor, Bernie Marcus, a co-founder of Home Depot who long served as its chief executive, died at 95 on Nov. 4, 2024 — the day before his favored candidate, Donald Trump, won back the presidency.
But in late September, Marcus made a final move: He set up a nonprofit organization called Forward America Inc. By the end of the year, it had about $100 million of Home Depot stock in its coffers, the tax filing shows.
The purpose of the group is to fund and operate programs that “advance capitalism, free enterprise and national security.” Its precise activities are not yet public — it listed no activity in 2024 — and will probably not come into clearer focus until later this year.
Aides to the Marcus family declined to respond to questions about Forward America Inc., saying only that the money was a “personal donation by Bernie” made before his death.
Marcus, a longtime supporter of Israel and a doctrinaire believer in free markets, donated about $74 million to political committees for federal office during his lifetime, including nearly $20 million to back Trump. After he died, Trump wrote the afternoon of Election Day that Marcus had been a “legendary entrepreneur and political genius.”
ONE LAST THING
Trump is talking differently now
Repeal. Collusion. Leaks.
These are some of the words that peppered President Trump’s speeches in 2017, the first year of his first term. He frequently discussed changes to Obamacare and the tax code, and furiously tried to bat away allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Fast-forward to 2025, and the words he’s using in public are very different, according to an analysis by my colleague Jonah Smith. Trump is more focused on foreign countries, and he’s using more hyperbole.
And Trump is also speaking far more words in public, primarily in interviews and so-called press gaggles. Read more about his second-term speech patterns.
Theodore Schleifer and Taylor Robinson contributed reporting.
Nick Corasaniti is a Times reporter covering national politics, with a focus on voting and elections.
The post This Group Wants to Protect Candidates From a ‘Cloud’ of Political Violence appeared first on New York Times.
