Yale Program on Climate Change Communication

8. Political Advocacy

8.1 About one in three registered voters are participating in, or willing to join, a campaign to convince elected officials to take action to reduce global warming. Current participation is low.

About one in three registered voters (34%; +8 percentage points since we last asked this question in Fall 2024) say they are either “definitely” (13%; +6 points) or “probably” (20%) willing to join a campaign to convince elected officials to take action to reduce global warming or are currently participating in such a campaign (2%; refer to data tables, p. 52). This includes 60% of liberal Democrats (+10 points; 5% “currently,” 21% “definitely,” 35% “probably”), 45% of moderate/conservative Democrats (+13 points; 1% “currently,” 19% “definitely,” 26% “probably”), 18% of liberal/moderate Republicans (none “currently,” 3% “definitely,” 14% “probably”), and 10% of conservative Republicans (none “currently,” 4% “definitely,” and 6% “probably”).

8.2 Many registered voters are willing to take political actions to reduce global warming if asked.

More than half of registered voters (56%; +8 percentage points since we last asked this question in Fall 2024) say they would sign a petition about global warming if someone they like and respect asked them to, including majorities of liberal Democrats (89%) and moderate/conservative Democrats (73%), but fewer liberal/moderate Republicans (31%) and conservative Republicans (24%). Additionally, about one in three registered voters would donate money to an organization working on global warming (34%; +6 points), write letters, email, or phone government officials about global warming (33%; +6 points), or volunteer their time to an organization working on global warming (32%; +6 points), and 27% would meet with an elected official or their staff about global warming.

About one in four registered voters (27%; +5 points) would support an organization engaging in non-violent civil disobedience against corporate or government activities that make global warming worse, and 14% (including 27% of liberal Democrats and 17% of moderate/conservative Democrats) would personally engage in such non-violent civil disobedience.

8.3 Relatively few registered voters would be willing to get arrested as part of a non-violent civil disobedience action.

Although 14% of registered voters say they would personally engage in non-violent civil disobedience against corporate or government activities that make global warming worse (refer to section 8.2), only 3% say they would be willing to get arrested as part of such an action (1% “definitely would,” 2% “probably would”; refer to data tables, p. 54). This includes 7% of liberal Democrats and 5% of moderate/conservative Democrats, but no liberal/moderate Republicans and less than 1% of conservative Republicans.

According to the most recent data available from the U.S. Census Bureau, there are approximately 174 million registered voters in the United States. Given that 1% say they “definitely would” get arrested as part of a non-violent action against activities that make global warming worse, and an additional 2% “probably would,” it suggests that approximately 1.7 million to 5.2 million registered voters may be willing to do so.

8.4 Relatively few registered voters have engaged in political actions to reduce global warming in the past year.

Relatively few registered voters have engaged in political actions to reduce global warming over the past 12 months, including 15% who say they have signed a petition about global warming at least “once” (-5 percentage points since we last asked this question in Spring 2024), 13% who say they have donated money to an organization working on global warming at least “once,” and 5% who say they have volunteered their time to an organization working on global warming.

8.5 Eight percent of registered voters have urged elected officials to reduce global warming.

Eight percent of registered voters have contacted government officials to urge them to take action to reduce global warming at least once over the past 12 months. This includes 17% of liberal Democrats, 11% of moderate/conservative Democrats, 2% of liberal/moderate Republicans, and 1% of conservative Republicans.

8.6 Barriers to engaging in political advocacy on global warming

A large majority of registered voters (80%) say nobody has ever asked them to contact officials about global warming. This is true across the political spectrum, including large majorities of liberal Democrats (74%), moderate/conservative Democrats (82%), liberal/moderate Republicans (92%) and conservative Republicans (83%).

Half or more of registered voters say that contacting elected officials about global warming wouldn’t make any difference (67%), they do not contact elected officials because they are not an activist (63%), they don’t know which elected officials to contact (62%), they wouldn’t know what to say (54%), or they would feel uncomfortable contacting elected officials (52%).

Many registered voters also say they are too busy to contact elected officials (48%), it’s too much effort (47%), it’s not important (42%), they are concerned about attracting unwanted attention from government authorities (38%), they are already taking other actions (27%), or people will criticize or make fun of them (17%).