Mar 31, 2025 | Current Events, expert analysis, Michigan
By Franshelly M. Martinez-Ortiz
Conspiracy theories are not a new feature of American Society. Throughout history, many conspiracy theories have become a standpoint of pop culture—even when debunked by scientific evidence.
Research shows that half of Americans consistently endorse at least one conspiracy theory. This pattern continues today. According to a Pew Research Center survey, 25% of U.S. adults believe there is at least some truth to the claim that powerful elites planned the coronavirus outbreak. The persistence of debunked claims underscores the broader role that conspiratorial thinking plays in shaping mass opinion.
In the past, conspiracy theories were confined to marginal outlets and fringe networks. Today, they are pervasive in mainstream media. The presence of political figures who openly endorse and promote conspiratorial thinking reflects the growing appeal of these narratives among the public. This has reached new levels of salience with the confirmation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the new Secretary of Health and Human Services, who has publicly claimed that Wi-Fi causes cancer and a “leaky brain.” His appointment indicates that conspiracy beliefs may play an increasing role in steering governance and public policy.
Government Suspicion
The mainstream assumption is that believing in conspiracy theories results from a deeper sense of paranoia or from falling for misinformation. However, conspiracy thinking is closely linked to government suspicion.
When people believe that powerful forces secretly control major events, they are more likely to question the motives and transparency of public institutions. Many people who are suspicious of the government have good reasons to be. Communities that have lived through government failures are often the most distrustful of public institutions.
This creates a tricky situation. How do we rebuild trust in government while recognizing the real harm it has done in the past?
Previous research has established a link between government suspicion, race, and education. However, my research (co-authored with Mara Cecilia Ostfeld) shows a more complicated story. It highlights a new factor driving this relationship: individuals’ proximity to and familiarity with government-inflicted harms.
For many communities, conspiracy thinking or suspicion toward government institutions is deeply rooted in lived experiences. Events like the Flint Water Crisis and the U.S. Public Health Service Untreated Syphilis Study conducted at Tuskegee are not distant historical moments; they are lasting traumas that continue to shape public perceptions of government accountability.
My research examines how familiarity with these injustices and identification with the communities affected contribute to government suspicion, particularly in Michigan.
Michigan Survey Findings
Through the Michigan Metro Area Communities Study (MIMACS), we surveyed Flint, Grand Rapids, and Ypsilanti residents to assess government suspicion levels and explore how past harm influences present-day trust.
The findings reveal widespread skepticism. Key findings:
- More than half of surveyed residents believe the public is routinely kept in the dark about major events.
- Black residents are the most likely to express government suspicion, with 64% holding this view, compared to 51% of Latino and 45% of White respondents.
- Education also plays a role—people without a bachelor’s degree report higher levels of suspicion 58% than those with more formal education 37%.
The impact of government suspicion extends beyond attitudes—it influences behaviors essential for democratic participation. Individuals who are more skeptical of the government are less likely to vote or trust public health guidance. Among respondents with low levels of suspicion, 87% reported that they planned to vote in the 2024 election, compared to just 71% of those with high levels of suspicion.
A similar pattern emerges with vaccine attitudes: while nearly all 98% of those with low government suspicion believe in vaccine effectiveness, support drops to 80% among those with high government suspicion.
Flint serves as a particularly striking example of how government failures contribute to long-term suspicion.
The city’s 2014 water crisis exposed thousands of residents to lead-contaminated water, leaving deep scars on public confidence in government institutions. Sixty percent of Flint residents surveyed expressed high levels of government suspicion– significantly more than in Grand Rapids or Ypsilanti. Familiarity with the crisis further amplifies suspicion—63% of Flint residents who are highly familiar with the water crisis report high levels of government suspicion, compared to just 37% of those with moderate knowledge of the event.
A similar pattern emerges when we examine the long-term effects of the U.S. Public Health Service Untreated Syphilis Study, in which Black men were intentionally denied treatment for syphilis between 1932 and 1972. The study has had a lasting impact on Black communities’ trust in medical institutions, and our data reflects this reality. Among Black respondents familiar with the study, 74% expressed high levels of government suspicion. While awareness of the study had a weaker effect on non-Black respondents, the historical weight of such an injustice continues to shape public trust in government and healthcare.
My findings demonstrate that government suspicion is not simply a product of misinformation—it is often a rational response to systemic failures and historical violence.
Government suspicion does not develop overnight; it is built over years of broken promises, neglect, and systemic harm. Understanding its origins is the first step toward repairing relationships between the government and the communities it serves.
About the Authors:
This post is based on the policy paper, “Trauma and Trust: How familiarity with government harm and identification with harmed groups shapes government suspicion in Michigan,” by Franshelly Martinez-Ortiz and Mara Cecilia Ostfeld.
Franshelly Martinez Ortiz is a doctoral candidate in political science and public policy at the University of Michigan and a fellow at the U-M Center for Racial Justice. She is also a Converse Miller Fellow at the Center for Political Studies and a Next Generation Scholar at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research.
Mara Cecilia Ostfeld is a faculty lead of the Detroit Metro Area Communities Study, a faculty associate at the U-M Center for Political Studies, and an associate research professor at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at U-M. She is an affiliate of the Center for Political Studies at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research.
This research was supported by the Knight Foundation, the Ballmer Group, the Kresge Foundation, Poverty Solutions, and the Center for Racial Justice at the University of Michigan. For more details, visit Michigan CEAL.
CPS affiliates have also measured increasing mistrust in government in American political attitudes over time and written on its effects on increasing partisan hostility.
Tevah Platt of the Center for Political Studies assisted with the development of this post.
Nov 30, 2017 | Current Events, Elections, Michigan, Race, Student Experiences
Post developed by Mara Ostfeld and Catherine Allen-West
The effectiveness of America’s system of democratic representation, in practice, turns on broad participation. Yet only about 60 percent of voting eligible Americans cast their vote in presidential elections. This number is nearly cut in half in off-year elections (about 36 percent), and participation in local elections is even lower. This lack of electoral engagement does not fall equally across racial and ethnic subgroups. Latinos, for one, are particularly underrepresented at polling booths across the country. In 2016, eligible Latino voters were about 20 percentage points less likely to vote than their White counterparts, and about 13 percentage points less likely to vote than their Black counterparts.
This fall, a group of 24 University of Michigan undergraduate students sought to explore this disparity and pinpoint what, if anything, works to increase Latino political participation. In the class, entitled The Politics of Latinidad, CPS Faculty Associate and U-M Political Science Professor Mara Ostfeld taught her students how to measure public opinion and challenged them to analyze the factors that affect Latino political participation.
Today, more than 50,000 Latinos live in Detroit and a majority of them reside in City Council District 6 in Southwest Detroit which is precisely where this course focused. The students began by studying the history of Latinos in Southeast Michigan and exploring how Latinos played critical roles in the city’s development dating back to before World War I. They analyzed broad trends in Latino public opinion, and considered how and why these patterns might be similar or different in Detroit. Students then designed their own pre-election polls to take into the field.
In order to understand what affects voter turnout, students surveyed over 300 residents of Southwest Detroit to measure the issues that were most important to them.
Students pictured here: Storm Boehlke, Mohamad Zawahra, Alex Tabet , Hannel So, Sion Lee.
The results illustrate some powerful patterns. Among the issues that the residents found most important, immigration and crime stood out. Forty-nine and 45 percent of Latinos listed immigration and crime, respectively, as issues of particular concern, with only 31 percent of residents saying that they felt safe in their own home.
Latinos in Southwest Detroit feel extremely high levels of discrimination. Seventy percent of Latinos surveyed said they felt Latinos face “a great deal” of discrimination. This significantly exceeds the roughly half of Latinos nationwide who say they have experienced discrimination.
Student Alex Garcia visits residents in Detroit.
Local issues were also at the forefront of residents’ minds. Latinos had mixed views on the city’s use of blight tickets to combat housing code violations, with one third of respondents supporting them and one third opposing them.
As local organizations, like Michigan United, continue trying to get a paid sick leave initiative on the ballot in 2018, they can expect strong support among Latinos in Southwest Detroit. About two out of every three Latinos in the area indicated they would be more likely to support a candidate who supports the paid sick leave requirement.
The students then followed up with the residents a month later to see if they planned to vote in the upcoming city council election. At this point, the students implemented some interventions that have been used to increase political participation like, evoking emotions that have been shown to have a mobilizing effect, framing voting as an important social norm, and speaking with voters immediately before an election. With the election now over, students are back in the classroom analyzing the effectiveness of these interventions and will use their first-hand experience to better understand public opinion and political participation.
Nov 29, 2016 | Elections, Michigan, National
Post written by Josh Pasek, Faculty Associate, Center for Political Studies and Assistant Professor of Communication Studies, University of Michigan.
If Rick Snyder weren’t the Governor of Michigan, Donald Trump would probably have 16 fewer electoral votes. I say this not because I think Governor Snyder did anything improper, but because Michigan law provides a small electoral benefit to the Governor’s party in all statewide elections; candidates from that party are listed first on the ballot.
Yesterday, Donald Trump was declared the winner in Michigan by a mere 10,704 votes, out of nearly 5 million presidential votes cast. Although this is not the smallest state margin in recent history – President Bush won Florida and the election by 537 votes and Al Franken won his senate seat in Minnesota by 225 (after the result flipped in a recount) – it represented a margin of 0.22%. The best estimate of the effect of being listed first on the ballot in a presidential election is an improvement of the first-listed individual’s vote share of 0.31%. Thus, we would expect Hillary Clinton to have won Michigan by 0.4% if she were listed first and about 0.09% if neither candidate were consistently listed in the first position.
It may seem surprising to suggest that anyone’s presidential vote would hinge on the order of candidates’ names, but the evidence is strong. In a paper I published with colleagues in Public Opinion Quarterly in 2014, we looked at name order effects across 76 contests in California – one of the few states that rotates the order of candidates on the ballot – to estimate the size of this benefit. We later replicated the results in a study of North Dakota. Both times, we found that first-listed candidates received a benefit and that the effect was present, though smaller, at the presidential level.
There are many reasons that voters might choose the first name, even if they started their ballots without a predetermined presidential candidate. Some individuals might have been truly ambivalent and selected the first name they had heard of (in this case, “Trump”), others may have instead checked the first straight party box – listed in a similar order – without intending to select our new President-elect. Regardless of the cognitive mechanisms involved, the end result is clear – the “will” of the voters can be diverted by seemingly innocuous features of ballot design.
How broadly is this first-position benefit a problem? Across the country, only seven states vary the order of candidate names across precincts. Another nine choose a single random order for listing candidates in each contest, but use that same order across the entire state. And the rest generally use some combination of alphabetic ordering or a listing based on who won in prior elections at the state level. Michigan’s system – prioritizing the candidate who last won the Governor’s office – is among the most common methods.
Given the control that Republicans currently hold over governorships, this bias likely helps Republicans maintain their dominance over many state legislatures. And the effects of being listed first only grow as you move down the ballot. In our study of California, we found the average benefit for a Governor was also 0.31 percent*, Senators gained 0.37 percentage points of additional votes, and candidates for other statewide offices gained an average of 0.63 percentage points.
Source: Prevalence and moderators of the candidate name-order effect evidence from statewide general elections in California Pasek J., Schneider D., Krosnick J.A., Tahk A., Ophir E., Milligan C. (2014) Public Opinion Quarterly, 78 (2) , pp. 416-439.
For a better answer, we might look to the strategy adopted by Michigan’s neighbor to the South. Ohio produces a unique ballot for each precinct where the ordering of candidates’ names is rotated. Although it is too late to prevent this effect from altering the 2016 election, it may have less of an impact if everyone were not filling out ballots with the same candidates listed first.
*this would likely be larger if California did not elect its Governors in non-presidential years.
Jul 26, 2016 | Michigan, Race, Social Policy
Post developed by Rosemary Sarri in coordination with Linda Kimmel.
This blog includes a brief report of ongoing research on career patterns of youth who drift from the child welfare system to the juvenile and adult justice system. It is taken from a paper that has been published by Rosemary Sarri, Elizabeth Stoffregen and Joseph Ryan, researchers with affiliations in the University of Michigan’s Center for Political Studies (CPS), Population Studies Center (PSC), and School of Social Work.
A growing body of research has shown that children who run away from foster care placement increase their probability of subsequent involvement in the juvenile and adult justice systems, especially for males. In the research reported here we used Michigan Department of Human Services and Wayne County administrative records to examine the experiences of two samples of youth in the child welfare system, one of which were youth who had run away from placement one or more times, and they were compared with a matched sample who had no history of running away from placement. The study covered their experiences over an eleven-year period from 2003-2011. Those selected were twelve years or older and had been assigned to the agency because of neglect or abuse by a parent. Most were also identified as having a behavioral problem such as mental illness, substance abuse or delinquency. As is the case throughout the U.S., children in this study were disproportionately youth of color (84%). Most were children of single parents and resided in urban areas of poverty, unemployment, crime and social disorganization. A slight majority were female, most of whom were placed in individual foster care and small community agencies whereas males were more likely to be placed in residential care away from their home community. When the males ran away, they typically returned to their home communities and were involved in “survival crime” until apprehended. On the other hand most females remained in their home community and often circulated among family relatives but were seldom arrested.
(more…)
Feb 13, 2014 | Michigan, National, Social Policy
Post developed by Katie Brown in coordination with Rosemary Sarri.
Photo credit: Thinkstock
400,000 youth are placed out of home in residential treatment institutions in the United States because they were abused or neglected their family. Just 2% of these youth placed out of home in institutions will run away each year, compared to the annual runaway rate of of 6-8% for American youth overall. But the ramifications for the institutionalized runaway youth are grave, including homelessness, poverty, substance abuse, exploitation, and crime.
Center for Political Studies (CPS), School of Social Work, and Women’s Studies Professor Emerita Rosemary Sarri studies the impact of social policy on children. A forthcoming paper with her colleagues Joseph P. Ryan and Elizabeth Stoffregen, who are also of the Institute for Social Research (ISR), considers the serious risks for these youth running away from the child welfare system. The article asks: Does running away from these institutional placements pose an increased risk of future involvement with the juvenile and/or adult justice systems?
Focusing on Wayne County, Michigan, home of the city of Detroit, the study includes 371 children aged twelve or older from the child welfare system that ran away at least once in 2003, matched against similar children in the system that did not run away. The data trace involvement of the youth from the two groups in the justice system over eight years.
Sarri finds that running away is indeed associated with negative outcomes. Overall, youth who run away from institutional placements have a 40% chance of ending up in the adult justice system. For males, this increases to 71.5%. The table below breaks down the most serious offenses by status and gender for the youth who ran away from institutions. Indeed, youth who run away from institutions commit more serious crimes, especially males.
Most Serious Juvenile Justice Offense by Gender and Runaway Status (the term “AWOL” identifies youth who ran away from institutions)
Given these staggering results, what can be done? Most of the youth are neglected, often with deep issues relating to substance abuse, mental health, homelessness, and crime. As such, Sarri calls for a positive, restorative approach that sets goals and offers resources to help youth achieve them. The Annie E. Casey Foundation and the Center for Juvenile Justice Reform have developed an inter-agency collaborative proposal to provide more effective treatment for these “crossover” youth who are at high risk when they drift to the justice system.
Jan 15, 2014 | Elections, Innovative Methodology, Michigan, National
Developed by Katie Brown in coordination with Arthur Lupia.
Photo credit: Thinkstock
Voters are ignorant and we must fix them. This belief has spawned much political science research and many efforts to inform the “ignorant. ” But what if this premise is false?
In a forthcoming book – The trouble with voters and those who try to fix them – Center for Political Studies (CPS) researcher and professor of political science Arthur Lupia suggests that voters aren’t as ignorant as many fear.
First, it is impossible to know all potentially relevant political information. Lupia presents his own position as a citizen as a case study. To be informed about all legislation that could affect him, Lupia should know about the more than 2,000 laws passed by the United States Senate and signed by the President. He should also know about the 40,000 additional proposed bills. As a resident of Michigan, Lupia should know about the 1,239 proposed bills, 42 concurrent resolutions, 26 joint resolutions, and 174 resolutions from the Michigan House of Representatives, as well as the 884 bills, 25 continuing resolutions, and 19 joint resolutions from the Michigan Senate in 2011 alone. Living in Ann Arbor, Lupia should also know about the many city ordinances passed in recent years. Does he know the gist, let alone the details, of each of these? No. Does he or anyone need to? No.
Second, even if you could know all potentially relevant political information, shortcuts can get you there faster. That is, voters without certain knowledge tend to vote the same as if they possessed that knowledge. Lupia likens this to traffics signals. It is impossible for a driver to know the traffic flows and locations of all vehicles in all directions when approaching an intersection. A traffic light signals the optimal time to go and stop. Voters can therefore seek out signals in a saturated, sometimes chaotic political environment to make informed choices.
So, voters are not crippled by ignorance. What then of those who try to fix voters? Lupia sees fixers as playing an integral role in civic society. But these fixers would benefit from changing their baseline assumption. Voters are not broken. With this paradigm shift in place, fixers could appeal to this group with precision and tact. To this end, Lupia offers the latest from biology and brain science, strategic communication, and marketing to help fixers better deliver their messages.
Lupia summarizes his argument in succinct terms: “From these facts alone, we can draw an important conclusion. When it comes to political information there are two groups of people. One group is almost completely ignorant of almost every detail of almost every law and policy under which they live. The other group is delusional. There is no third group.”
