CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — As Americans prepare for another high-stakes election cycle and the 2026 midterms, a new book reveals how political polarization is reshaping family life. Drawing on interviews with 125 people in politically divided relationships and a national survey of nearly 1,000 Americans, the book explores how some couples develop strategies for navigating disagreement, while others experience political differences as moral conflicts that threaten their closest relationships.
Couples in cross-cutting relationships — those in which romantic partners have dissimilar politics — may tell us a lot more about the current state of democracy in the U.S. and how to
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