To view the interview on the Vigilant Positivity YouTube channel, click here.
During chaotic political times, it’s easy for citizens to assume a dystopian future awaits. But such seismic shift are common throughout history and poses the opportunity to build a pro-topian future. So says Ade Salami, program director for Pro-democracy Political Coalitions at Democracy 2076. Founded in 2023, the organization works long-term to change our constitution, political culture, and political parties.
Ade most recently served as a senior policy aide for two Minneapolis City Council members and as a lobbyist at Park Street Public, where she led bipartisan lobbying efforts on policy and funding at the state, local, and federal levels. She received her BA from the University of Minnesota.
Transcript of interview
Martha Engber: Hello, Ade!
Ade Salami: Hello! How are you today, Martha?
Martha Engber: Very good. Thanks for joining me.
As I understand it, Democracy 2076 aims to ward off authoritarianism in America. For those of us who have only known democracy, what are the signs of authoritarianism?
Ade Salami: Of course. I want to start by slightly reframing that. Democracy 2076 wasn’t created specifically to stop authoritarianism. It was created because something in our democracy feels broken to many people. It doesn’t feel effective, responsive, or representative.
When people feel that way, they’re more open to strongmen and shortcuts. Our work is really about helping people imagine and build a democracy that actually works for them. When that gap isn’t filled, authoritarianism tends to fill it. That said, I think many Americans have had a real-world crash course in what authoritarianism looks like, even if they don’t always call it that.
One resource I often reference is Protect Democracy’s authoritarian playbook. It identifies tactics like corrupting elections, including attacks on the legitimacy of free and fair elections. The Big Lie is a clear example. It encouraged people to doubt the 2020 election results.
Another tactic is quashing dissent, using state power to silence criticism. What happened with Jimmy Kimmel last year is a good example. There’s also politicizing independent institutions, such as appointing leaders of institutions like the FBI or the Federal Reserve based on loyalty rather than expertise or the rule of law.
President Trump’s ongoing fight with Jerome Powell at the Fed, or his attacks on James Comey, are examples. Another tactic is scapegoating vulnerable communities. We’re seeing that nationally with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), including escalating violence, which is also part of the authoritarian playbook. Normalizing political violence creates unrest and fear.
There’s also the spread of disinformation and propaganda. COVID stands out for me, when President Trump was one of the biggest spreaders of COVID-related misinformation. Those are some of the key ways authoritarianism shows up.
Martha Engber: What’s interesting is that everything you mentioned is what Democrats often say about Republicans, and Republicans say about Democrats. Each side claims the other is corrupting politics, spreading disinformation, and behaving badly.
So is authoritarianism reflected in that level of polarization? Does it pit citizens against one another and make the other side look like the villain?
Ade Salami: I don’t think that dynamic itself is part of the authoritarian playbook. I do think it’s a side effect. It shows up as authoritarianism begins to take root.
One important thing to remember is that authoritarianism doesn’t come from just one side. In the U.S., especially over the last decade, we’ve seen clear examples from the right, but that doesn’t mean it can’t come from the left. Overlooking that is concerning.
Martha Engber: That finger-pointing is interesting. Depolarizing that dynamic is something your organization and others are working on, but cutting through misinformation is difficult. What is Democracy 2076 doing in that regard?
Ade Salami: Much of our focus is on helping Americans build connections, relationships, and coalitions beyond the political binaries they’re used to. A lot of politics is rooted in a false binary. The work I’m focused on right now is about disrupting that comfort and expanding people’s ability to engage in unlikely partnerships as a way to build connection and make progress.
Martha Engber: Your organization also promotes the idea of a pro-topian future rather than a dystopian one. Dystopian means everything is bad, while pro-topian suggests hope. Can you explain that idea and why people might find a pro-topian future hard to imagine? And why we seem to dwell on dystopian futures? They dominate books, TV, and movies.
Ade Salami: I like the definitions you gave. Utopia is perfect and unrealistic. Dystopia is The Handmaid’s Tale, where everything is falling apart. Pro-topia sits in the middle. It’s a realistic, incremental path of continuous improvement. Things are getting better, even if they’re not perfect.
The term comes from Kevin Kelly, the editor of Wired magazine in 2009. A pro-topian future is not fantasy or collapse, but a pathway where society becomes more fair, functional, and humane. Our goal isn’t to sell people on a single pro-topian future, but to co-create one and move away from a nihilistic mindset where nothing matters.
We want people actively imagining what a better future could look like and what it would take to get there. It’s not about prescribing the destination. It’s about creating space for people across differences to imagine a better future for themselves and work toward it together. When people feel nothing can change, that’s when they disengage.
Dystopian futures are easier to imagine because they’re essentially today, just worse. They’re built around conflict, scarcity, and winners and losers. Our brains are wired for that. We have a built-in negativity bias, so those futures feel familiar. We’re always scanning for threats.
Martha Engber: Because if we don’t pay attention to threats, we could be killed. It’s our animal instinct.
Ade Salami: I agree.
Martha Engber: In support of deterring authoritarianism and promoting an achievable, brighter future, Democracy 2076 has three programs. The first is Imagining 2076, which fosters imagination and focuses on media that shows what a pro-topian future looks like.
The second pushes for a new constitution, including 68 amendments identified by past convention delegates to shore up democracy in the U.S., which is fascinating, but a topic for another show. The third is your program, which looks closely at political coalitions. Can you define what a coalition is, as opposed to a group or partnership, and tell us more about the program?
Ade Salami: Of course. When we say “coalition,” it’s not just a group. We’re talking about three things: who’s in it, what they believe, and what divides them from other groups. What are the wedge issues? If you look at politics, for example, in Congress, we already use this language all the time. We talk about the Squad, the Blue Dogs, MAGA, the Tea Party. Those are factions, but in many ways they’re also coalitions. The same thing exists among voters, organizations, and movements. It’s not something that only happens with politics and elected officials.
What makes this moment different is that the coalitions are shifting. They’re realigning along the three axes I mentioned. The people in our parties are changing, the issues that divide them are changing, and the ideas holding coalitions together are changing. That’s part of why so many people feel politically disoriented right now. You find yourself agreeing with people you were never aligned with before, people you thought you had nothing in common with.
At the same time, you may clash with people who were once your allies, people you were always on the same side as. That can feel unsettling, but it’s also where opportunity exists.
When coalitions start to move, a lot more possibilities open up. You can build majorities that didn’t exist before. You can move legislation that’s been stuck for decades because there’s now a group willing to coalesce around a shared cause.
On the flip side, there’s also risk. Some of the changes we’re seeing are pulling people in a more authoritarian direction.
My program is about naming what’s changing, tracking what new coalitions are forming and what they could accomplish, and also watching where democratic norms begin to break down so we can intervene before it’s too late.
Martha Engber: As you were talking, I kept thinking about a political earthquake. And it’s not just happening in our country, it’s global. When an earthquake hits, people get scared. They duck, they take evasive action, and the instinct is to follow the one person saying, “Follow me, I know what to do.”
That’s essentially the appeal of authoritarianism. You go to the person who insists they know what’s going on. But you’re also saying that at the same time, there’s opportunity. That’s what people don’t always see. Things are chaotic, everything feels like it’s rolling around, and people miss the opportunity in that. So is the idea that people like you can help surface that opportunity?
Ade Salami: I think so. And I think this moment is especially ripe for that.
When you look at voter identification over the last several years, the number of people identifying as independent has grown significantly. Many people say they no longer feel aligned with a party or that they don’t have good options. A common refrain is that they feel like they’re choosing between two evils.
Your earthquake analogy fits. Authoritarianism can emerge as the figure who promises certainty and action. And the reason that’s appealing is because the system people are being moved through doesn’t feel like it works. No one seems in charge. No one seems to have a direction. When that’s missing, people attach themselves to whatever feels most certain, and someone who insists they can fix things feels certain.
Martha Engber: That’s fascinating. When I was researching your organization, I noticed your website says American political coalitions realign roughly every 30 years, and that we’re living through another realignment now. What was the last realignment? And how long do these typically take? Are we talking a year, a decade? And why 30 years?
Ade Salami: That’s a great question. There’s actually a lot of debate among political scientists about when the last realignment even happened. Some point to the 1980s, others to the 1990s. One moment that’s often used as a marker is 1994, the so-called Republican Revolution, when Republicans took control of Congress for the first time in about 40 years.
That period also solidified the South as a Republican stronghold and brought cultural and religious issues to the center of politics in a new way.
What’s important to understand is that these political shifts don’t happen all at once. You don’t wake up one day and everything is different. They unfold slowly over time, and they’re much clearer in hindsight.
A big part of my work is asking whether we can see these shifts as they’re happening and shape them, rather than only writing about them later in history books.
As for the 30-year rhythm, I don’t think it’s a magic formula. My best guess is that it roughly aligns with a generation. Every couple of decades, new voters come in. They have new leaders, new experiences, different values. Their culture is different, their priorities are different, and eventually politics has to reorganize around that energy. That’s why those timelines tend to cluster around 30 years.
Martha Engber: That’s interesting, because when people think about coalitions, they usually think Republicans and Democrats, the two-party system. And because of laws passed by both parties over the years, it’s almost impossible for a third party to emerge. So how do you change the two main parties? Neither one seems to listen to the people within them, and a lot of people are unhappy.
Of course, there are cheerleaders on both sides, but many people want both parties to change. So how do you actually do that?
Ade Salami: I have a lot of ideas. I don’t know that I have definitive answers. One thing I think about is the growing number of independent voters. Ideas like open primaries, where candidates have to campaign on issues because they can’t rely on party loyalty alone, become really important.
I also think about recent campaigns, like Zohran Kwame Mamdani, the new major of New York City, where a coalition was built by addressing people’s needs and focusing on what they shared as priorities, rather than party labels.
I think we’re entering a moment, especially with younger voters, where the two parties not only don’t appeal to them, but don’t feel representative. That’s what makes this moment ripe for realignment. I don’t think the current configuration is sustainable. We’re already seeing signs of that.
I wouldn’t be surprised if we moved toward a multiparty future. I wouldn’t be surprised if more people stopped identifying with any party at all and voted issue by issue. All of those possibilities are on the table.
Martha Engber: That’s very interesting. I consider myself an independent now, and I believe strongly in the common ground movement, the broad middle of America, the large majority who are unhappy with both parties and want to come together around shared values. It will be interesting to see how this unfolds.
Can you explain more about your Foresight cohort of 14 leaders? Who are they? What political perspectives do they represent? And why did you intentionally seek such a broad range of viewpoints?
Ade Salami: That’s a great question. The Foresight cohort helped us write and stress-test the research in our reports. What we were trying to understand was the type of political realignment we’re living through right now.
There’s a lot of good writing about voter groups, like Latino voters or college-educated voters, but by the time those books or reports come out, the shifts have often been happening for years.
We wanted something closer to real time. So we asked: who is in constant contact with large numbers of people right now? Who is seeing changes before they show up in polls or headlines? That led us to leaders of large, membership-based organizations, people working with cross-ideological communities, across regions, identities, and backgrounds.
We’re also in a very different media environment than we used to be. Political beliefs used to be shaped in a very top-down fashion. I don’t think that’s how they work anymore. Now people’s political beliefs are shaped by social media, YouTube, WhatsApp groups, TikTok. You can’t just read The New York Times and say you know what people think. That’s why we wanted to bring people together and track different communities: Jewish voters, Asian voters, rural voters, urban voters, people who are watching extremism.
Those are all Americans, and they’re all part of the coalitions forming in this moment. They’re ultimately the ones who will shape what our parties look like over the next few decades. We didn’t want pundits. We didn’t want people with a very set idea of how things should work who want to impose that on others. We wanted to be intentional about finding people who are in their communities, talking to their neighbors, and seeing change happen in real time.
Martha Engber: I think it’s worthwhile to go back for a moment. When you say political viewpoints used to be formed from the top down, that meant there were three networks on TV saying certain things, and it funneled down to viewers. Newspapers worked the same way. But with social media, anyone at the bottom can push a message upward.
Ade Salami: Exactly. One hundred percent. You can go on TikTok today and see a video with 4.1 million views from someone you’ve never heard of before.
Martha Engber: And that person might not even be American, which I understand is now happening on both sides politically, with parties outsourcing messaging. Very interesting.
On your organization’s website, I meant to ask about the report you mentioned. Which report are you referring to, so I don’t get it wrong?
Ade Salami: There are reports for all of our programs, but the one I’m referencing is the inaugural report for the Pro-Democracy Political Coalitions in 2076 program. It was released in November of 2025.
Martha Engber: I was also fascinated by the five scenarios your organization outlined on how political parties might realign over the next 30 years. Can you explain those scenarios, and how your organization might help stimulate democracy even if both parties become authoritarian, which is one of the scenarios?
Ade Salami: To start, when we do this work, we hear a lot about short time frames: two-year grant cycles, four-year election cycles. But changes to democracy, authoritarianism, or party realignments happen over decades. That makes it hard to know whether progress is actually happening.
If you look at our current national political environment, Donald Trump came to power in 2016, Joe Biden won in 2020, and then Trump won again in 2024. That can be confusing. People ask, does this mean Americans want authoritarianism? Are they supporting it more now than in 2016? How do we make sense of that?
Progress isn’t linear. There’s backsliding. Globally, progress toward democracy has never been linear.
There’s always a push and pull between democracy and authoritarianism. Understanding that helps us recognize that chaos in the information environment doesn’t mean progress isn’t happening at the same time.
The scenarios were designed to help us look 30 years ahead and imagine how parties could evolve. One scenario has both parties authoritarian. Another has both parties pro-democracy. Another imagines a multiparty bloc. The goal isn’t to predict which one is most likely, but to understand the full range of possibilities, identify the ones we clearly don’t want, and think about how to intervene early to prevent them.
Martha Engber: So don’t wait to find out.
Ade Salami: Exactly. There’s been a lot of focus on right-wing authoritarianism, but the risk is ignoring the possibility of left-wing authoritarianism. That could emerge if people aren’t paying attention. We included that scenario because we felt it was being overlooked, even though it’s absolutely possible.
You also asked how we stimulate democracy if both sides become authoritarian. That’s not really how we think about using the scenarios. The goal is to avoid that outcome altogether. We want to identify warning signs and intervene before it happens.
The reason the scenarios look 30 years out isn’t so we can prepare for them once they arrive. It’s so we can look at today, determine which direction we’re headed, and decide whether that’s a direction we want. If it is, we reinforce it. If it isn’t, we intervene.
Martha Engber: What does intervention actually look like? From the perspective of the average American? We already have laws that reduce opportunities to change our government, and that expand presidential power and deter third parties. What does intervention mean in practice?
Ade Salami: That’s a great question. Intervention isn’t about huge, abstract forces beyond our control. There are individual actions we can take today that either strengthen or weaken democratic defenses. It’s about making informed choices.
For each scenario, we identified signposts we’re already seeing, or might expect to see, that indicate which direction we’re heading. We also offered recommendations showing how smaller groups can have outsized influence. We made recommendations for local government, for community organizations like food banks, and for different sectors of society where people can step in and have a real impact.
I think it’s important for everyday Americans to understand that. I’ll use a simple analogy. At the beginning of the year, people make New Year’s resolutions, often about weight loss. Losing 50 pounds sounds overwhelming. Most people think, I don’t know if I can do that.
But if instead you start with something smaller, like walking 5,000 steps a day, it feels achievable. You don’t focus on the entire 50 pounds. You focus on the next step and see where it gets you.
Martha Engber: There are a lot of really good ideas out there. But as you know, we live in a place where the noise is so high that getting good ideas out is difficult. So what does it look like for your organization to say, “Okay, here are our ideas,” and actually get them out to the public, to people like me? Is that the coalition-building part? Are you working with groups to methodically disseminate these ideas through social media?
Ade Salami: It’s less about us dispersing our ideas and more about focusing on people who want to collaborate on making effective change to ensure a representative and responsive democracy, and figuring out whether we have tools or information that can support them in that work.
For example, with our scenarios work, there may not be many organizations looking 50 years into the future. But there are organizations that have identified issues they care about that are emerging now.
Helping them understand that there are small actions their members can take today, actions individuals can take today, that have long-term impact, is often something they’re interested in. We’re happy to help them on that journey.
Martha Engber: As I mentioned before, I’m a member of Braver Angels, which operates in this space, and even there, just getting ideas out is a big challenge.
Ade Salami: One hundred percent. Braver Angels is a great example. Much of their work focuses on helping people bridge difference and disagreement. What I think could be really powerful is encouraging people to have conversations about issues that aren’t politicized yet.
Many of the issues we introduce in our 17 spectra aren’t yet locked into the current political binary. Someone on either side of the aisle could land on the same side of one of these spectra. Introducing those concepts and encouraging conversation across difference is often the first step.
Martha Engber: Your organization created an interactive tool that shows where people fall on 17 emerging wedge issues. For those who may not know, a wedge issue is a natural division that political parties exploit to intentionally divide Americans.
For example, your site asks if you see education as a social equalizer or a status enforcer; whether you lean toward identity-centered politics or issue-centered politics; whether you tend toward gender-role traditionalism or gender-role fluidity. Who came up with that idea?
Ade Salami: We created the interactive tool because we were really struck by More in Common’s perception gap research. It shows that people tend to believe those with opposing political views think much more differently than they actually do. People often exaggerate how extreme their opposition is.
That insight made us curious about emerging wedge issues and the assumptions we make about what people who align with us believe, and what people who don’t align with us believe.
We also wanted to show people that some of their beliefs differ from others within their own party. Some Democrats don’t agree with other Democrats on certain issues. Some Republicans don’t agree with other Republicans. We wondered what would happen if we applied that insight to emerging wedge issues.
Many people assume everyone in their party agrees with them on things like education, identity, or gender. That’s often not true. Some of the biggest disagreements you have are actually with people on your own side. We thought it would be powerful for people to discover that for themselves.
To realize, “I’m not as aligned with my party as I thought,” or, “I have unexpected things in common with people across the aisle.”
One piece of feedback we received was that many of these wedge issues feel like false binaries. And honestly, that’s the point. Political divides are simplified into binaries. We’re just used to the old ones. This tool helps people see that many of the lines we fight over are constructed, and the reality is far more nuanced.
Martha Engber: I’ve done programs where people talk about perception gaps. You see the other side as completely evil, and they see you the same way. But when you actually talk about issues, you’re often fairly close in belief.
Ade Salami: Exactly.
Martha Engber: It’s kind of crazy to see that happen.
Does the tool give a scale, like telling you you’re more independent, more Republican, or something like that?
Ade Salami: What we did instead was create a GPT-based prompt that generates a response based on what someone submits. You can answer as many or as few of the spectra as you want. Then you answer a few demographic questions, like party affiliation, gender, age, and education.
The GPT then looks at your responses and compares them with responses from others who share similar demographic characteristics. For example, it might say, “You identify as a Democrat, you completed all 17 spectra, and you agree with other Democrats on nine of them. On eight, you don’t.”
That insight has been really impactful.
I know people who were confident they were in lockstep with their party and then learned they only agreed on about half the issues.
Opening that conversation has been meaningful, and we hope the tool has been beneficial for those who’ve taken the survey.
Martha Engber: I did take it. People love surveys. You get one and think, “I have to know where I stand.” It was really fun. For people reading or viewing this interview, if you haven’t done it, go to their website and try it. What I want to ask next is: how worried are you about authoritarianism?
Ade Salami: That’s the million-dollar question. I’m probably more worried than I’ve ever been, but I’m not fatalistic.
Part of that is because more people see what’s happening now. In 2016, conversations about authoritarianism felt alarmist. That’s not the case anymore. You see it in discussions of niche policy issues, like the War Powers Act, becoming part of mainstream conversation.
You see it in places like the Minneapolis, in how people respond to ICE, the protests, and the pushback. I’m worried about what the government is doing, but I’m also more encouraged than I’ve ever been by how aware and engaged the public is.
People aren’t just watching anymore. They’re responding and engaging, and that matters.
Martha Engber: So this upheaval is forcing people to be more civically minded, more engaged, more knowledgeable. Everyone now understands misinformation in a way we weren’t talking about even eight or ten years ago.
Ade Salami: Exactly. People also aren’t content anymore to be told not to worry. They want to understand what’s happening. They want information so they can decide whether they like what’s happening or believe something different could work. They need to understand the system before they can change it.
Martha Engber: What would you like to see in the future, and what gives you hope that we’ll get there?
Ade Salami: What I want is a democracy where it’s normal to disagree, where we expect to persuade one another instead of trying to rig the system so one side always wins.
One idea we’ve lost is that our visions of the future don’t have to match. That’s the whole point of democracy. We’re not arguing about survival. We’re arguing about what kind of life we want.
I joke that I’m a refined, non-alcoholic champagne socialist. Fundamentally, I want everyone’s basic needs met. But also, once your needs are met, maybe you want something extra. Maybe you want something nice. Maybe you want guac at Chipotle. That’s normal.
And what gives me hope is that there are new coalitions already starting to form around things most Americans actually agree on. Most Americans want control over their bodies. Most Americans want leaders who understand their struggles.
We want freedom from religious persecution. We want to trust the news. We want responsible leadership. People may come at those ideas from different places, but they’re shared ideals. They’re shared outcomes that we have in common.
I don’t think people who support President Trump are there because they want authoritarianism. I think they’re there because they want change. They know the system is broken, just like people who don’t support Donald Trump.
We disagree on why the system is broken and how to fix it.
Another thing that gives me hope is candidates who actually speak to that brokenness and offer concrete ways to improve people’s lives. I’m thinking of Mayor Mamdani’s recent election and campaign. When candidates offer real solutions, voters respond, even if the candidates themselves seem imperfect.
In many 2025 elections, we saw people voting for different kinds of leaders than they typically would, because they were hungry for something to shift and look different.
The fact that people across the political spectrum are saying, “This isn’t working, we need to do something different,” makes me optimistic.
That recognition, that shared understanding, shows we do have a collective affirmative vision. And I think that’s the first step.
Martha Engber: Wonderful. I’m all for hope. Thanks, Ade.
Ade Salami: Thank you, Martha.
Join the Common Ground Movement!
If you’ve found this post helpful, please subscribe below and share with others. Please also join the Vigilant Positivity Facebook page and YouTube channel.
Definition of Common Ground Movement: placing your loyalty with other Americans, rather than any political party, and embracing the fact we have more in common than not.
Vigilant Positivity 