In the October 2018 issue of The Atlantic, the senior editor Yoni Appelbaum argues, “The American system of government functions properly only when embedded in a culture deeply committed to democracy; that culture sustains the Constitution, not the other way around.” Trump’s presidency has sparked increased interest in the health of American democratic institutions and the ways in which culture has sustained—or degraded—those institutions, with a number of related theories advanced involving the disintegration of community cohesion, an “epidemic of despair” among white communities, and the solidification of what appears to many to be an era of political hyperpolarization. Many of these investigations either attempt to tackle the American polity as a whole or to grapple exclusively with the segment of the country that chose to vote for Trump, leaving gaps in understanding about how Trump’s candidacy and then presidency have themselves changed culture, and changed American democracy.

But the new poll from PRRI and The Atlantic, conducted with more than 1,800 Americans and focused on their past and current experiences with civics, suggests that the effects have been powerful and highly distortive in black communities especially. “African Americans are less likely to say over the last two years they’ve become more civically engaged,” says Robert P. Jones, the CEO of PRRI. “They’re less likely to say they’ve considered running for office, and less likely than whites to say they’re likely to consider a career in government.” Thirty-seven percent of black people and 34 percent of Hispanic people report that over the past two years they’ve become less active in civics or politics, as opposed to 28 percent of whites. Fifty-seven percent of black respondents said that over the past two years they’ve been less likely to run for office.

The PRRI poll also contains important data for contextualizing and understanding that result. Across several measures, black respondents report a higher historic level of engagement, but one that has dropped off in the past year. Thirty percent of all black respondents said they’d been to a political rally ever in their life, against only 19 percent of white and 18 percent of Hispanic respondents. But there’s no significant difference between the groups in attendance over the past year, indicating that a disproportionate amount of black experience with public rallies came about before the current environment of mass demonstrations against Trump.

“In the data, we see a sense of something like despair or cynicism or something over the last 12 months that has certainly dampened the kinds of engagement that they would have historically reported,” Jones told me.

Similar numbers hold for other kinds of involvement in local activism and engagement outside of the ballot box. Black respondents were more likely than white and Hispanic respondents to have ever volunteered for groups or causes or to have donated to them, but no more so over the past year. The same pattern holds for their likelihood of having encouraged others to be more involved in politics on social media, of posting about important political issues on social media, and of engaging in boycotts. Overall, black respondents reported that they’d actually been more involved in local activism and organizing than white respondents—just not in the past year.