While Black Americans support Democrats at rates of 90% or higher, many feel captured by the party rather than genuinely served by it. Scholars have attributed this loyalty to racial linked fate, but this framing leaves little room for Black voters who are dissatisfied with the Democratic Party and feel their political priorities are being ignored.

This dissatisfaction is part of a broader decline in Americans' trust in government and attachment to political parties, with independent identification rising and institutional trust at a seven-decade low. For Black Americans specifically, this shift carries particular significance given their historic loyalty to the Democratic Party. This book introduces the concept of racial group apathy, a decline in motivation to engage in historic Democratic support and voting, driven by disillusionment with the lack of meaningful political change. Drawing on political behavior, political psychology, and identity politics, it develops a novel psychological measure of this phenomenon and argues that, left unaddressed, growing apathy among Black voters will have serious consequences for American democracy.