New America Statement on the Violent Assault on our Democracy

Yesterday was a horrifying day. New America strives to hold our country to its highest ideals. We condemn the violent effort to overturn the certification of the election results in the strongest terms. Our national institutions will hold, but they hold in spite of the president’s continued efforts to undermine our democracy and they are weakened with each assault. As a nation, we watched this unfold in real time, struggling to reconcile the country that we believe in with the images that we see. What we witnessed is certainly not all of America, but it is a part, an ugly part that demands an honest reckoning. 

As a non-partisan institution that creates and incubates ideas intended to build and strengthen our country, we believe in the power of America to unite, to evolve, to be better tomorrow than it is today. Yesterday, however, we saw the result of an assault on our democracy not only over the past two months, but the past four years. The president and some of his supporters have refused to accept the results of a certified legal election, fomenting division, crisis, and violence. We also condemn the racist double standard in the descriptions of and aggressive use of force against last summer’s Black Lives Matter protesters, particularly peaceful Black protesters, in sharp contrast to the response to the armed white insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol. 

Those who truly wish to strengthen America know that there is no patriotism in silence. We must speak out for a peaceful transition of power to President-elect Biden and work to become a democracy of equal justice under law.