PRESS RELEASE

Interviews with more than 150 officials shed light on both effective mitigation strategies and urgent needs.

Princeton, NJ – Over the past two years, BDI has conducted interviews with more than 150 local elected officials to gain a deeper understanding of the impact of threats and harassment on local government. These conversations have painted a concerning picture of hostility at the local level, but they have also revealed a wide array of tools officials are leveraging to respond to threats and harassment. Analyzing the variety of risk mitigation strategies surfaced throughout the interview research, our new report – Responding to Threats and Harassment Against Local Government – breaks down five key response types that were consistently highlighted by officials at the frontlines of local government.

• Individual strategies: Personal behavioral changes that can be made in response to, or to be prepared for, hostility.
• Peer support: Networks with other local officials that can help to navigate the difficult experiences of hostility. 
• Connections with town administrators and service providers: Community relationships with policy makers, other non-elected staff, and local law enforcement that can support threat assessment and response.
• Official procedures and community outreach approaches: Ways to leverage the resources of local government to effectively and safely engage with constituents.
• Legal and security options: Frameworks for when and how to elevate credible threats.

Overall, officials articulated a deep commitment to serve their communities and resolve conflict constructively, even in the face of threats and harassment. Focused on steps that are within their direct control, they have developed a range of creative, resilient approaches aimed at managing the symptoms of the current climate of hostility and mitigating immediate short-term risks. At the same time, officials also underscored the need for systems-wide solutions that would enable local government to move out of this hostile climate over the long term. The insights from these interviews offer guidance, lessons, and best practices for other officials navigating hostile situations, and can inform further research into curative interventions to protect local democracy and civic space going forward. 

Recommendations

The report findings identify multiple areas where government, civil society, community leaders, and other stakeholders can better support local officials – and officials can better support each other – to address hostility now and in the future. 

1. Providing greater assistance to candidates and new officials to build trusted support systems that center their reasons for serving in office. 
2. Providing greater investment in regional peer-to-peer networks. 
3. Establishing new or specific training programs for city attorneys, town managers, and law enforcement personnel on approaches to mitigating threats and harassment. 
4. Ensuring training on local governance procedures continues to be widely and freely available, augmented by modules on managing contentious topics and situations. 
5. Developing clear, easily accessible guidance on the types of hostility that warrant legal or law enforcement action across different contexts and jurisdictions, as well as alternative strategies for cases that are “just below the line.” 
6. Ensuring resources – especially for therapy, physical security, de-escalation training, and out-of-state network opportunities – are reaching officials less traditionally connected to these tools.
7. Collaborating on whole-of-society solutions to push back on the climate of hostility and the normalization of threats over the long term.

Media Contact: Sam Jones, Communications Manager

Since 2022, BDI has collaborated with CivicPulse to undertake quarterly surveys reaching out to a representative sample of over 3,500 local officials to better understand the scope, scale, and trends of hostility over time. From these surveys, over 150 officials have opted to participate in further in-depth interviews with BDI. This report builds on earlier research from BDI’s interview program, which focused on the effects and mechanisms of hostility at the local level.

The interview program is part of BDI’s Understanding Threats and Harassment Against Local Officials (UTH) project, a mixed methods approach to systematically monitor the full scope of threats and harassment facing local officials across the United States, which is powered by the UTH consortium. Current members of the consortium include the Anti-Defamation League, the Brennan Center for Justice, CivicPulse, the Prosecution Project, the National League of Cities, and the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, among others. 

We are grateful to the Brennan Center for Justice and flexible contributions from BDI’s core funders for the financial support that made these surveys and qualitative interviews possible, following earlier essential start-up funds from the Anti-Defamation League and Stand Together Trust. 

For more about the UTH project and how to cite the research, check our FAQ sheet.