America Needs a Nonaggression Pact
We haven’t seen the end of political violence. Leaders must commit to lowering the heat.
In the months to come, another American politician will be attacked, possibly alongside their family. This incident will shock the national conscience and spark another round of condemnations on X. Tears will be shed, security spending will be increased. For about 24 hours, politicians and pundits will shake their heads and wonder how we got here. Suddenly, some will question everything. This is a moment known, in conflict research, as a “saturation point.” It’s a window of time when people question whether a conflict is still worth the costs. Usually, it follows some sort of major shock, not unlike “hitting rock bottom” in an addiction.
Imagine if, when the next high-profile assault happens, we invited American politicians to reset the terms of engagement in our country. What would that look like? And can we prepare that invitation now, so we are ready?
I’ve been writing about polarization and dysfunctional conflict for the past seven years, and I’ve seen political violence become increasingly normalized in America. It feels exactly how it feels in other high-conflict countries. Politicians, judges and journalists begin to withdraw from public life as they face death threats and intimidation. In the first three months of 2025, according to a survey of municipal, county and town officials across America, two-thirds said they were less willing to engage in certain activities (such as running for another office, posting on social media or appearing at public events) due to concerns about hostility.
It’s not hard to see why. Last week in Alvarado, Texas, ten people were charged with attempted murder after a police officer was shot in the neck outside an ICE detention center on July 4. In Minnesota last month, a man was charged with stalking and murdering state legislator Melissa Hortman and her husband before shooting and wounding state Senator John Hoffman and his wife. In April, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro had to flee his burning home with his wife and children after an arson attack. In January, a man armed with a handgun made it past security and took a tour of the U.S. Capitol before being arrested. In the first five months of this year, according to the Threats and Harassment Dataset at the Bridging Divides Initiative, local officials reported more than 200 threats or harassment incidents. Meanwhile, threats against federal judges spiked in March and April, around the same time that President Donald Trump and his allies began blaming judges for blocking the administration’s agenda.
Violence, once it gets going, is very hard to stop. Each new assault by one side requires a response from the other. And when people are frightened, distrustful and armed (as many Americans are), they start to take matters into their own hands. Soon, terrified by the mayhem, the public may give up their freedoms for a sense of security.
Already, many Americans are at risk of falling into this trap. About 40 percent of Democrats say they would support the use of force to remove Trump from office, according to a May survey by the Chicago Project on Security and Threats. About 25 percent of Republicans say they’d support using the military to stop protests against Trump’s agenda. Those numbers have more than doubled since the fall.
In thrall to high conflict, it is very easy to convince ourselves that the only answer to violence is more violence. When we feel threatened and disrespected, no evidence to the contrary will change our minds.
So what then? When countries do manage to shift out of this spiral, it often starts with intentional, coordinated action by political parties and the politicians themselves. Not all of them; that is unrealistic. Just enough of them to start to lower the threat level.
At a National Governors Association event in 2023, Rachel Kleinfeld, an expert on political violence, explained: “When polarization becomes a political strategy, it takes politicians to unravel it. People look to the governors, to our nation’s politicians as leaders of their group, and they say, ‘What’s acceptable? What should I do?’ We need to make violence abnormal again in this country.”
Globally, it is now common for politicians and their parties to help transition their countries out of war and violence by agreeing to certain basic guardrails. Sometimes these agreements are known as “codes of conduct” or “nonaggression pacts.” They are not magical, but they can reduce violence by lowering the ambient temperature. People (including lone vigilantes like the ones committing most of the political violence in America today) are less likely to lash out and attack scapegoats when influential leaders make violence seem inappropriate and unnecessary.
You’re probably thinking, “Good luck with that!” It is admittedly hard to imagine America’s most divisive politicians—including our president—agreeing to any kind of nonaggression pact. After all, aggression is how they won fame, profit, elections and followers. What possible incentive would they have to disarm now?
It is a daunting challenge. But if it’s impossible, why has it happened so many times before? In Ghana last year, the main political parties agreed to a code of conduct promising to “demonstrate humility in service, measured language, and respect for citizens,” among other commitments. They also agreed to establish a monitoring commission, including party representatives, election officials and third-party mediators, to help hold politicians to their word.
Meanwhile, in 2020, no fewer than 40 ruling and opposition parties in Georgia voluntarily signed onto a 32-point code vowing to “respect the dignity of our competitors and refrain from personal insults” while rejecting violence and “hate speech, xenophobic and/or intimidating expressions.” There are dozens of examples like this from all around the world.
The results, to be clear, are always mixed. Too often, these agreements lack teeth. During a ten-day period leading up to that election in Georgia, media monitors detected more than 300 violations of the code. Accusations and insults flew in all directions. While politicians refrained from using hate speech or calling for mass violence, according to a post-election analysis by the Georgian Institute of Politics, the agreement lacked meaningful monitoring and enforcement mechanisms. In the resulting stew of vindictiveness and polarization, it was easy for Russia to interfere in the 2024 Georgian election and turn regular citizens against one another. Today, the country has reverted to authoritarianism following disputed elections and the jailing of opposition leaders.
This work is complicated—and never done. But to be helpful, these agreements do not have to eliminate misbehavior; they just have to reduce it—and create a meaningful process for dealing with violations.
Even right here in America, we’ve seen some modest efforts to re-establish basic norms of decency. While leading the National Governors Association, Utah’s Republican Governor Spencer Cox convinced 22 other governors and mayors to film ads with members of the opposing party—calling on politicians to “disagree better” and solve problems together. This “Disagree Better” effort now lives on through a newly established, nonpartisan nonprofit (to which, full disclosure, I am an unpaid, occasional adviser).
Meanwhile, a cross-partisan group has created a tool called the Dignity Index (which I’ve written about previously) to help politicians and the public recognize contempt in political speech and aspire to something better. Last year, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt signed onto the Dignity Pledge and challenged others in his state to do the same. In Utah, a PAC called Governing Group has endorsed and supported over two dozen GOP state and local candidates who are committed to “civil discourse and sound policy over divisive and heated rhetoric.”
Finally, in the state of Georgia, 70 candidates, elected officials and other civic leaders have signed onto a set of “Principles for Trusted Elections” since 2022. This is an agreement to uphold “integrity, nonviolence, secure voting, responsible oversight, and trusted outcomes.” Nonviolence, in this case, is defined as a commitment to “encourage a peaceful election atmosphere … Denounce any attempt to intimidate, harass, threaten or incite violence against opponents, their supporters, and election workers [and] respect voters’ freedom to exercise their lawful rights to register and vote, free from interference, obstruction, or intimidation.” Nationwide, more than 7,600 officials and regular citizens have signed onto these principles so far.
All of these agreements were voluntary; no one forced these leaders to sign on. So why did they? They have different reasons, no doubt, but one thing politicians have in common is that they are human. They do not want to get hurt. And they don’t want their children to get hurt, either.
That is where you start, as Curtis Toler, a former gangleader who now works at the nonprofit Chicago CRED to prevent violence, has taught me. “At least 80 percent of the folks that are highly involved in conflicts, they want to get out. But no one has asked them,” Toler said. This is why it is so important to start preparing for the next saturation point now—by reaching out to politicians before the next crisis and building momentum for change. “The sales pitch is really asking the question: Do you want to continue this cycle? And sometimes they will say Yes. Then the next question is, Do you want your family members to have to go through what you’re going through? Sometimes it helps to remind them of the effect of the conflict on others, beyond themselves.”
In every case, the most influential people do not usually come to the table right away. You start with whomever you can get, and you build from there. It helps if respected organizations help convene these negotiations and monitor effectiveness. (The principles adopted in the state of Georgia came out of work spearheaded by the Carter Center, for example.) The most durable agreements tend to be ones co-created by the politicians themselves. While the codes do not have the rule of law behind them, party leaders can help by agreeing to stop supporting candidates who violate them.
Without any system of disincentives, of course, these pledges can lose all power. Congress, for example, has a Problem Solvers Caucus as well as a Congressional Civility Caucus (formed in 2005), not to be confused with the Congressional Civility and Respect Caucus (2018) nor the Congressional Honor and Civility Caucus (2017). Many state political parties have codes of conduct, too. All are well-intentioned, but none have managed to disincentivize some of their members and supporters from brazenly and repeatedly violating their ideals.
In a 2024 survey conducted by the Congressional Management Foundation, almost half of senior Congressional staffers said they are “considering leaving Congress due to heated rhetoric from the other party.” (Interestingly, Republican staffers were much more likely to say they were considering leaving Congress due to heated rhetoric from their own party, with 59% agreeing to this statement—versus 16% of Democratic staffers.) They are reaching a saturation point, just like voters.
Nine out of 10 Americans see political violence as a serious problem. More and more of us are questioning how we got here—and wondering how we get out. The sense of powerlessness is overwhelming.
But current and former politicians and staffers that I interviewed for this story told me that regular people can help incentivize better behavior in small ways. Notice when your local, state or federal representatives refuse to take the bait. When they answer contempt with something other than contempt. When they disagree with a witness at a hearing without attacking that witness personally. Write them an email, send them $20, call their office in gratitude or post about it on social media. “It is rare for a member’s office to receive positive feedback like that—to be thanked for their tone and tenor and engagement,” says Marianne Viray, who has worked with politicians and their staff in different roles for two decades and now leads Disagree Better. “That positive reinforcement counts for a lot.”
Eventually, of course, we need entire systems to reward this behavior and recognize it as a sign of strength and patriotism. For now, we can start to do this on our own. And when the next saturation point comes, we can invite our elected officials to come to the table and do this for themselves—before the window slams shut again.
Amanda Ripley is an investigative journalist and the author of High Conflict, The Unthinkable and The Smartest Kids in the World. She writes the Substack Unraveled.
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Interesting timing. What We Can Do Week(s), an initiative in Minnesota against political violence and encourage peaceful civic engagement, was just launched.
www.WhatWeCanDoWeek.org
Interesting. I'll be checking out your linked blog in hopes of more ideas in this vein.