The number of people who are 'extremely proud' to be American is at a record low
For the first time in 18 years of Gallup polling on this question, fewer than half of Americans say they are "extremely proud" of their nationality.
From a peak of 70 percent in 2003, the proportion of those who are "extremely proud to be Americans" has steadily declined, plateauing in the final years of the George W. Bush administration and most of former President Obama's tenure and starting to noticeably decline in 2015.
Still, most Americans continue to express some degree of pride in their country. The 47 percent who are "extremely proud" are joined by 25 percent who are "very proud" and 16 percent who are "moderately proud" for an easy proud majority of 88 percent. Just 3 percent say they are not proud at all.
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Extreme pride in being American varies considerably along demographic lines: Republicans are more likely to be extremely proud than Democrats, men are more likely than women, white people than minorities, the old than the young, and those who have not graduated from college than those who have.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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