Poll: 38% of Democrats Say They Are Ashamed to Be American, Six Weeks Before the U.S. Turns 250

Since this outlet's prior coverage this week touched on national pride in the context of World Cup visitors encountering American culture, a new data point has landed: a formal survey measuring how Americans actually feel about their own country.

The Economist/YouGov poll, conducted June 13-15 with 1,549 U.S. adult citizens and a margin of error of ±3.5 percentage points, found that 38 percent of Democrats say they are ashamed to be American. That includes 26 percent somewhat ashamed and 12 percent very ashamed, according to Breitbart News, which first reported the findings.

What the Numbers Actually Say

Among all U.S. adult citizens polled, 20 percent report some level of shame: 12 percent somewhat ashamed, 8 percent very ashamed. Democrats account for a disproportionate share of that number — roughly twice the overall rate.

Republicans sit at the opposite end. Seventy-eight percent of GOP respondents say they are very proud to be American, and another 15 percent say somewhat proud. Only 3 percent of Republicans report any shame, with just 1 percent saying very ashamed.

Americans overall still tilt toward pride. Forty-two percent say they are very proud, 18 percent somewhat proud. That's 60 percent net-positive on national pride across the full sample.

Among Democrats, the picture is more fractured. Twenty-two percent say they are very proud, 18 percent somewhat proud — so a slight majority of Democrats still land somewhere in the proud column. Another 22 percent say neither proud nor ashamed.

The Comparison Question

The poll also asked respondents how America stacks up against other countries. Forty-five percent of Democrats say America compares poorly — 25 percent say it is worse than average, 14 percent say it is among the worst, and 6 percent say it is the worst country in the world.

Overall, 54 percent of all respondents rate America favorably relative to other nations: 21 percent say it is the greatest, 20 percent among the greatest, and 13 percent better than average.

The Strongest Case for Why This Gap Exists

The concern driving Democratic shame deserves a fair hearing. Critics on the left argue that patriotism without self-criticism is just nationalism, and that a country serious about its ideals should be capable of confronting failures — on race, economic inequality, healthcare access, or foreign policy — without reflexively calling dissent unpatriotic. A willingness to say "we can do better" can function as civic engagement, not contempt. That's a position a reasonable person can hold.

The data, however, don't simply capture that nuance. "Ashamed" is a specific word with a specific emotional weight. Shame is not the same as critical thinking or reform-minded civic engagement. And the magnitude of the gap — 38 percent of Democrats versus 3 percent of Republicans — reflects something more than a difference in willingness to acknowledge flaws.

Methodological Honesty

The Economist/YouGov poll is a credible, methodologically transparent survey. YouGov uses online opt-in panels with post-stratification weighting. It is not a random-digit-dial probability sample, which matters when interpreting the ±3.5 point margin of error. The sample size of 1,549 is adequate for national estimates but not for fine-grained subgroup analysis. The Democratic and Republican breakdowns carry wider effective margins than the headline figure.

Breitbart's framing emphasized the Democratic shame numbers prominently. It did not highlight that a majority of Democrats still identify as proud or neutral, or contextualize the overall pride numbers showing 60 percent of all Americans remain net-positive on national identity. Those omissions don't invalidate the findings, but they narrow the story.

Timing

The poll was fielded approximately three weeks before July 4, 2026 — the United States' 250th anniversary. The semiquincentennial is already generating public programming, debate over national narratives, and competing visions of what "America at 250" should mean. How political parties frame that milestone is likely to amplify this divide, not close it.

The unresolved question is not whether the partisan gap on national pride exists — the data confirm it does — but whether it is growing. A single cross-sectional poll cannot answer that. Longitudinal data from Gallup's annual national pride survey, which has tracked this question since 2001, would provide the trend line. Gallup's most recent iteration of that survey has not yet been released for 2026.