(crowd chanting)

- January 6th revealed that democracy

is a lot more fragile than I thought it was.

I knew that intellectually, as a historian and as a scholar,

but watching that on TV and watching it transpire,

drove that home for me in a way that it hadn't before.

- We're in the crucible right now,

we're in the midst of that conflict,

that ongoing, seemingly redundant,

conflict in American history,

the conflict over voter access,

the conflict over basic democracy,

all that's going on right now.

And if we wanted to understand

anything about this particular moment,

then history is our guide.

(upbeat music)