All Aboard the Elections Express | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
Choo choo!! All aboard the Elections Express! Grab a seat, your favorite snacks, and make yourself comfortable, because today we’re going halfway across the country to highlight the most dynamic data-driven trends of may’s local elections.
Online Hostility Towards Local Election Officials Surged in 2020 | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
Since the 2020 election, the lives of election officials across the nation have changed dramatically. As a result of former President Donald Trump’s abrasive tirades against the integrity of American elections, many election officials have experienced an influx of violent and even criminal threats.
What Happens When the President Calls You An Enemy of the People | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
Since the 2020 election and the rise of the Big Lie, election officials across the nation have been under threat. The people who run American elections are traditionally low-profile officials, but in recent years they have been singled out for abuse on a national scale.
Oz and Fetterman: Duking it out ’til the Twitter end | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
A significant part of the highly contentious race for one of Pennsylvania’s Senate seats has occurred in an unlikely place and in an unusual format.
Encouraging Voter List Maintenance Efforts with an ERIC Indicator | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
Membership in ERIC was added as an indicator to the Elections Performance Index in 2020. ERIC has long been regarded as the gold standard of interstate cooperative arrangements in keeping voter registration rolls accurate in a way that honors the laws governing voter registration, encourages the registration of the unregistered, and protects vital personal information.
How Policy Influenced the Partisan Divide over Voting by Mail | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
The 2020 election opened up a big chasm between the parties in the use of mail-in ballots; 58% of Democrats voted by mail, compared to 29% of Republicans. In previous years, there was little-to-no partisan difference in voting by mail.
The Eyes and Ears of Polling Places | MIT Election Data & Science Lab
How long did you wait at the polls in the November 2020 election? 10 to 15 minutes, 30 minutes, maybe an hour, or perhaps even more? What might surprise you is that whether you’re a Floridian, Texan, New Yorker, or even a Michagander, the answer to that question varies greatly.
How Democrats’ voter-registration advantage eroded in Pennsylvania | NBC News Digital
Pennsylvania is perhaps the most pivotal swing state up for grabs in this election, just like it was in 2020. But there have been some big changes in the state since last time at the registered voter level.
One reason why Republicans are optimistic about their chances to retake the state is Pennsylvania’s voter registration numbers: While there are still more registered Democrats than registered Republicans, in March 2021, there were 630,000 more registered Democrats than Republicans in Pennsylvania. In October 2024, this discrepancy was cut in half, now standing at around 300,000.
What weeks of early-voting data tell us about how Democrats and Republicans are turning out in 2024 | NBC News Digital
Early voting is getting underway throughout the country, including in key battleground states like Georgia, where more than 300,000 people voted Tuesday, the first day of early voting.
While Virginia isn’t a core battleground state this year, it does have more than two weeks of mail-in and early in-person voting already in the books, including hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots already cast. We closely monitor early-voting trends to set expectations for election night outcomes, and in Virginia a clear pattern has emerged that could be part of a national trend.
How to avoid misreading the early voting numbers | NBC News Digital
One week out from Election Day, who is casting early votes is getting increased attention. NBC News’ tracker of early ballot returns is one of several presenting information on who has already cast ballots state by state — tantalizing hard numbers after a campaign full of polling suggesting a close race but nothing more definitive than that.
But while early voting is a useful tool for understanding what has transpired to date, it is easy to read more than is appropriate into these patterns and what they mean for the 2024 election, given what we know about when different types of people are likely to vote. In particular, we know that younger people disproportionately wait until closer to Election Day to cast their early votes.