https://www.npr.org/2022/09/10/1122089076/is-america-a-democracy-or-a-republic-yes-it-is
Throughout our history we have functioned as both. Put another way, we have utilized characteristics of both. The people decide, but they do so through elected representatives working in pre-established, rule-bound and intentionally balky institutions such as Congress and the courts.
The government seated in Washington, D.C., represents a democratic republic, which governs a federated union of states, each of which in turn has its own democratic-republican government for its jurisdiction.
The relationship between the democratic and republican elements of this equation has been a dynamic and essential part of our history. But it has not always been easy, and in our time the friction between them has become yet another flashpoint in our partisan wars...Republicans, by contrast, have seemed of late to be stressing the role of the republic and its restraint on democracy. Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, an outspoken Republican but hardly an outlier, got considerable attention for saying bluntly on Twitter in October 2020: "We are not a democracy."
Lee then posted online an explanation of what he meant. It said, in part: "Our system is best described as a constitutional republic [where] power is not found in mere majorities, but in carefully balanced power." (just snippets, but reading the whole article carefully shows the difference between the 2 words and how they work together in the US.)