A record 89% of Americans believe corruption in the US government is widespread, according to a new Gallup poll. This is the highest figure in 20 years of observation and 10 percentage points more than a year earlier. Moreover, the opinion about the scale of the problem is shared by supporters of both major parties: 91% of Democrats and 83% of Republicans say that corruption is widespread.
Between 2010 and 2025, the share of Americans who believed government corruption was widespread ranged from 72% to 79%. Now the figure has reached 89%.
The attitude to the problem has changed especially sharply among Democrats. In 2024, when Joe Biden was president, 57% of party supporters considered corruption to be widespread. After Donald Trump returned to the White House, the figure rose to 76% in 2025, and reached 91% this year.
Among independent voters, 90% hold the same opinion—12 percentage points more than in 2024.
Republicans were much more consistent in their assessments. Over the past two years, about eight in 10 party supporters believed corruption was widespread, despite the Republicans returning to the White House and the party gaining control of Congress. In 2024, 87% of Republicans held this position; now it is 83%.
Gallup notes that the same responses from supporters of two parties do not necessarily mean that they mean the same thing by corruption. The attitude of the Democrats, judging by the dynamics, largely depends on which party controls the executive branch. Among Republicans, perceptions of corruption have changed significantly less since their party returned to power.
“In a country where there is polarization on a wide range of issues, this is one of those cases where bipartisanship reflects both shared anxiety and shared consensus,” said study author Benedict Wiegers.
The US has overtaken other developed countries in perceptions of corruption
Gallup also compared survey results in 38 member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which includes the United States, Canada, European countries, Australia, Japan, and the Republic of Korea. In 2009, the median perception of corruption among the countries of the organization was 69%, but since 2022 it has remained below 60%. In 2025, the median was 59%, while in the US it was 79%.
Thus, the gap reached 20 percentage points. Moreover, for the first time in 2025, the United States ranked first among OECD countries in the percentage of residents who believe government corruption is widespread. The maximum figure among other members of the organization was then 79%.
Data for 2026 has not yet been collected for all OECD countries, so Gallup cannot yet make a full comparison with the current American 89%. But the US figure is also high on a global scale. Among the 132 countries in which Gallup asks this question annually, since 2023, only four have shown results higher than the current American 89%: Lebanon in 2024 and Peru in 2025 – 92% each, Ghana and Nigeria in 2024 – 90%.
