About FixUS

FixUS is a convenor of the growing movement of Americans who share a deep concern about the polarizing division threatening our nation’s future. We provide a community for reformers, scholars, and other politically homeless Americans to work with each other to better understand and address the division, distrust, and dysfunction in our democracy. Through a number of research projects, public engagement efforts and partnerships, we seek to bring attention and visibility to these issues, build support for necessary changes, and ultimately help to regain a sense of shared aspirations, values, and a belief that there is more that unites us than divides us.

Sustainable public policy solutions to the challenges our nation faces will remain elusive until the country comes together to address the underlying root causes of hyper-partisanship and public distrust. The reasons how we got to this point are complex, integrated, and long-term in the making, and we must confront these causes broadly and holistically in order to bring about lasting change, with deep and meaningful citizen engagement required to guide necessary changes given the declining trust of many with our political process.

FixUS is housed within the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization committed to educating the public on issues with significant fiscal policy impact. It has become increasingly clear to the leadership of the Committee that meaningful

progress on a range of pressing policy issues will not be possible until the underlying division, dysfunction, and distrust in our politics are remedied. The political environment most conducive to enacting solutions—one that focuses on policy over politics, the long-term over the immediate, and a willingness to compromise and make hard choices—does not currently exist. 

In 2018 the Committee soft launched FixUS and began a series of projects to guide our path forward, including undertaking a Roadshow and Listening Tour, hosting multiple conferences with thought leaders and experts on the topics of polarization and partisanship, and undertaking an extensive landscape review of existing groups and literature focused on these issues. We began hosting a recurring breakfast meeting of democracy reform groups, with over 100 representatives participating to date to share updates and strategies. These efforts led to an official launch of FixUS in January of 2020.