As of December 7, 2020, 66.7 percent of the eligible voting population in the United States voted in the 2020 presidential election. As of this date, voter turnout was highest in Minnesota, at 80 percent.

As of late October 2024, young voter registration is lagging across a number of states when compared to the number registered on Election Day 2020. However, voter registration in swing states Michigan and Nevada increased by over 11 percent among 18 to 29-year-olds.

In the 2024 presidential election, Republicans received a larger share of votes in every U.S. state compared with 2020, flipping six states in the process. New York saw the greatest increase in Republican votes, reporting 6.43 percent more votes cast for Donald Trump in 2024 than in 2020. Additionally, the share of Republican votes in New Jersey and Florida increased by almost five percent.

Throughout United States history, voter turnout among the voting eligible population has varied, ranging from below twelve percent in uncontested elections, to 83 percent in the 1876 election. In early years, turnout in presidential elections was relatively low, as the popular vote was not used in every state to decide who electors would vote for. When this was changed in the 1824 election, turnout increased dramatically, and generally fluctuated between seventy and eighty percent during the second half of the nineteenth century. Until the 1840 and 1842 elections, midterm elections also had a higher turnout rate than their corresponding presidential elections, although this trend has been reversed since these years.

Declining turnout in the twentieth century An increase in voting rights, particularly for black males in 1870 and for women in 1920, has meant that the share of the total population who are legally eligible to vote has increased significantly; yet, as the number of people eligible to vote increased, the turnout rate generally decreased. Following enfranchisement, it would take over fifty years before the female voter turnout would reach the same level as males, and over 150 years before black voters would have a similar turnout rate to whites. A large part of this was simply the lack of a voting tradition among these voter bases; however, the Supreme Court and lawmakers across several states (especially in the south) created obstacles for black voters and actively enforced policies and practices that disenfranchised black voter participation. These practices were in place from the end of the Reconstruction era (1876) until the the Voting Rights Act of 1965 legally removed and prohibited many of these obstacles; nonetheless, people of color continue to be disproportionally affected by voting restrictions to this day.

Recent decades In 1971, the Twenty-sixth Amendment lowered the minimum voting age in most states from 21 to 18 years old, which greatly contributed to the six and eight percent reductions in voter turnout in the 1972 and 1974 elections respectively, highlighting a distinct correlation between age and voter participation. Overall turnout remained below sixty percent from the 1970s until the 2004 election, and around forty percent in the corresponding midterms. In recent elections, increased political involvement among younger voters and those from ethnic minority backgrounds has seen these numbers rise, with turnout in the 2018 midterms reaching fifty percent. This was the highest midterm turnout in over one hundred years, leading many at the time to predict that the 2020 election would see one of the largest and most diverse voter turnouts in the past century, although these predictions then reversed with the arival of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. However, 2020 did prove to have the highest turnout in any presidential election since 1900; largely as a result of mail-in voting, improved access to early voting, and increased activism among grassroots organizations promoting voter registration.

This web map displays data from the voter registration database as the percent of registered voters by census tract in King County, Washington. The data for this web map is compiled from King County Elections voter registration data for the years 2013-2019. The total number of registered voters is based on the geo-location of the voter's registered address at the time of the general election for each year. The eligible voting population, age 18 and over, is based on the estimated population increase from the US Census Bureau and the Washington Office of Financial Management and was calculated as a projected 6 percent population increase for the years 2010-2013, 7 percent population increase for the years 2010-2014, 9 percent population increase for the years 2010-2015, 11 percent population increase for the years 2010-2016 & 2017, 14 percent population increase for the years 2010-2018 and 17 percent population increase for the years 2010-2019. The total population 18 and over in 2010 was 1,517,747 in King County, Washington. The percentage of registered voters represents the number of people who are registered to vote as compared to the eligible voting population, age 18 and over. The voter registration data by census tract was grouped into six percentage range estimates: 50% or below, 51-60%, 61-70%, 71-80%, 81-90% and 91% or above with an overall 84 percent registration rate. In the map the lighter colors represent a relatively low percentage range of voter registration and the darker colors represent a relatively high percentage range of voter registration. PDF maps of these data can be viewed at King County Elections downloadable voter registration maps. The 2019 General Election Voter Turnout layer is voter turnout data by historical precinct boundaries for the corresponding year. The data is grouped into six percentage ranges: 0-30%, 31-40%, 41-50% 51-60%, 61-70%, and 71-100%. The lighter colors represent lower turnout and the darker colors represent higher turnout. The King County Demographics Layer is census data for language, income, poverty, race and ethnicity at the census tract level and is based on the 2010-2014 American Community Survey 5 year Average provided by the United States Census Bureau. Since the data is based on a survey, they are considered to be estimates and should be used with that understanding. The demographic data sets were developed and are maintained by King County Staff to support the King County Equity and Social Justice program. Other data for this map is located in the King County GIS Spatial Data Catalog, where data is managed by the King County GIS Center, a multi-department enterprise GIS in King County, Washington. King County has nearly 1.3 million registered voters and is the largest jurisdiction in the United States to conduct all elections by mail. In the map you can view the percent of registered voters by census tract, compare registration within political districts, compare registration and demographic data, verify your voter registration or register to vote through a link to the VoteWA, Washington State Online Voter Registration web page.

In the 1824 U.S presidential election, which was the first where a popular vote was used to determine the overall winner, approximately three percent of the U.S. population voted in the election, while only one percent actually voted for the winner. Over the following decades, restrictions that prevented non-property owning males from voting were gradually repealed, and almost all white men over the age of 21 could vote by the 1856 election. The next major development was the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution following the American Civil War, which granted suffrage to all male citizens of voting age, regardless of race. Turnout then grew to almost twenty percent at the turn of the century, however Jim Crow laws played a large part in keeping these numbers lower than they potentially could have been, by disenfranchising black communities in the south and undoing much of the progress made during the Reconstruction Era. Extension of voting rights Female suffrage, granted to women in 1920, was responsible for the largest participation increase between any two elections in U.S. history. Between the 1916 and 1920 elections, overall turnout increased by almost seven percent, and it continued to grow to 38 percent by the 1940 election; largely due to the growth in female participation over time. Following a slight reduction during the Second World War and 1948 elections, turnout remained at between 36 and forty percent from the 1950s until the 1990s. Between these decades, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Twenty-Sixth Amendment in 1971 respectively re-enfranchised many black voters in the south and reduced the voting age in all states from 21 to 18 years old. Participation among female voters has also exceeded male participation in all elections since 1980. Recent trends The 1992 election was the first where more than forty percent of the total population cast ballots, and turnout has been above forty percent in all presidential elections since 2004. Along with the extension of voting rights, the largest impact on voter turnout has been the increase in life expectancy throughout the centuries, almost doubling in the past 150 years. As the overall average age has risen, so too has the share of the total population who are eligible to vote, and older voters have had the highest turnout rates since the 1980s. Another factor is increased political involvement among ethnic minorities; while white voters have traditionally had the highest turnout rates in presidential elections, black voters turnout has exceeded the national average since 2008. Asian and Hispanic voter turnouts have also increased in the past twenty years, with the growing Hispanic vote in southern and border states expected to cause a major shift in U.S. politics in the coming decades.

In terms of the most popular presidents, in the 1940 election, Franklin D. Roosevelt became the first president to have been elected by more than one fifth of the total population. Three presidents were elected by more than 22 percent of the total population, respectively Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964, Richard Nixon in 1972 and Barack Obama in 2008, while Ronald Reagan's re-election in 1984 saw him become the only president in U.S. history to win with the support of more than 23 percent of the total population. While the vote count for the 2020 election is still to be finalized, President-elect Joe Biden has already received 81.28 million votes as of December 02, which would also translate to over 24.5 percent of the total population, and will likely near 25 percent by the end of the counting process.

Terms of Access: By downloading the data, you agree to use the data only for academic research, agree not to share the data with outside parties, and agree not to attempt to re-identify individuals in the data set. We require this in order to protect the privacy of individuals in the data set and to comply with agreements made with TargetSmart. Abstract: We present the results of a large, $8.9 million campaign-wide field experiment, conducted among 2 million moderate and low-information “persuadable” voters in five battleground states during the 2020 US Presidential election. Treatment group subjects were exposed to an eight-month-long advertising program delivered via social media, designed to persuade people to vote against Donald Trump and for Joe Biden. We found no evidence the program increased or decreased turnout on average. We find evidence of differential turnout effects by modeled level of Trump support: the campaign increased voting among Biden leaners by 0.4 percentage points (SE: 0.2pp) and decreased voting among Trump leaners by 0.3 percentage points (SE: 0.3pp), for a difference-in-CATES of 0.7 points that is just distinguishable from zero (t(1035571) = −2.09, p = 0.036, DIC = 0.7 points, 95% CI = [−0.014, −0.00]). An important but exploratory finding is that the strongest differential effects appear in early voting data, which may inform future work on early campaigning in a post-COVID electoral environment. Our results indicate that differential mobilization effects of even large digital advertising campaigns in presidential elections are likely to be modest.

The 2020 presidential election brought expanded vote-by-mail opportunities, a rise in attacks on this process’s integrity, and the implementation of novel programs such as California’s Where’s My Ballot? system to ensure confidence in mail balloting. Can heightening awareness of this ballot-tracking system and other election protections alleviate fraud concerns and raise turnout? We assess whether messages reinforcing election integrity increased participation in the 2020 election through a large-scale voter mobilization field experiment. California registrants were mailed a letter that described either existing safeguards to prevent vote-by-mail fraud or the ability to track one’s ballot and ensure that it was counted. Analysis of state voter records reveals that neither message increased turnout over a simple election reminder or even no contact, even among subgroups where larger effects might be expected. In the context of a high profile, high turnout presidential election, assurances about ballot and electoral integrity did not increase turnout.

Since 1824, when the popular vote was first used to determine the overall winner in U.S. presidential elections, the share of the population who participate in these elections has gradually increased. Despite this increase, participation has never reached half of the total population; partly due to the share of the population below the voting age of eighteen, but also as many potential voters above the age of eighteen do not take part, or are ineligible to vote. For example, in the 2016 election, approximately twenty million U.S. adults were ineligible to vote, while over 94 million simply did not participate; in this election, Donald Trump won the electoral college with 63 million votes, which means that 19.4 percent of the total U.S. population (or 27.3 percent of eligible voters) voted for the current president.

Development throughout history

While the figures for the 2016 election may appear low, over 42 percent of the total population participated in this election, which was the third highest participation rate ever recorded (after the 2008 and 2020 elections). In the first election decided by a popular vote in 1824, only 350 thousand votes were cast from a total population of 10.6 million, although this increased to over four million votes by the 1856 election, as restrictions that applied to non-property holding white males were gradually lifted. Participation levels then dropped during the Civil War and Reconstruction era, as those who lived in Confederate states could not vote in 1864, and many white southerners were restricted or discouraged in the following election. Although universal suffrage was granted to black males in the wake of the Civil War, the majority of black Americans lived in the southern states, where lawmakers introduced Jim Crow laws in the late 1800s to suppress and disenfranchise the black vote, as well as poor white voters.

The next major milestone was the introduction of women's suffrage in 1920, which saw voter participation increase by seven million votes (or seven percent) between the 1916 and 1920 elections. Between the 1910s and 1970s, the Great Migration saw many black Americans move away from the south to northern and western states, where they faced fewer obstacles when voting and greater economic mobility. This period of black migration began to decline in the 1960s and 1970s, during which time many Jim Crow laws were repealed in the south, through legislation such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Female participation also grew gradually, and has exceeded male voting participation in all elections since the 1980s. The minimum voting age was lowered from 21 to 18 in all states in 1971, although this seemingly had a minimal impact on the short-term trajectory of voter participation.

Recent elections

The 1992 election was the first in which more than one hundred million votes were cast, which was almost 41 percent of the total population. All elections since 2004 have also had more than one hundred million votes cast, which has again been more than forty percent of the total population. Another key factor in the increase in voter participation is the fact that people are living longer than ever before, and that those aged 65 and over have had the highest turnout levels since 1992. While some figures may be subject to change, the 2020 election set new records for voter turnout. Despite the global coronavirus pandemic, which many thought could cause the lowest turnout in decades, a record number of voters cast their ballots early or by mail, setting a new record of votes just shy of 160 million. In the 2020 election, Joe Biden and Donald Trump received 81.3 million and 74.2 million votes respectively, both beating Barack Obama's previous record of 69.3 million ballots in 2008.

This fileset contains the supplement, the data and the replication code for the paper "Higher turnout increases incumbency advantages: Evidence from mayoral elections"

Abstract: We analyze the relevance of electoral turnout for incumbency advantages by exploring mayoral elections in the German state of Bavaria. Mayors are elected by majority rule in two-round (runoff) elections. Between the first and second ballot of the mayoral election in March 2020, the state government announced an official state of emergency. In the second ballot, voting in person was prohibited and only postal voting was possible. To construct an instrument for electoral turnout, we use a difference-in-differences strategy by contrasting turnout in the first and second ballot in 2020 with the first and second ballots from previous elections. We use this instrument to analyze the effect of turnout on incumbent vote shares. A 10-percentage point increase in turnout leads to a statistically robust 3.4 percentage point higher vote share for incumbent mayors highlighting the relevance of turnout related incumbency advantages.

According to a December survey, Donald Trump's favorability among Republicans remained strong following the 2024 election, with 72 percent viewing him very favorably and 18 percent somewhat favorably. This overwhelming support from his party base contrasts sharply with Democrats, of whom 84 percent viewed Trump very unfavorably. Independents were more divided, with 47 percent expressing some degree of favorability towards the former president. Electoral college victory Trump's popularity among Republicans translated into electoral success in the 2024 presidential election. He secured 312 electoral votes, surpassing the 270 needed to win the presidency. This victory came as Trump won all seven swing states, some by significant margins, despite pre-election polls showing only a slight lead in most battleground states. Increased republican support The 2024 election saw Republicans gain ground across the country. Every state reported an increase in Republican votes compared to 2020, with New York showing the largest gain of 6.43 percent. New Jersey and Florida also saw significant increases of nearly five percent. This surge in Republican support led to Trump flipping six states that he had lost in the previous election, contributing to his decisive victory.

Forecasted versus actual result of the 2020 U.S. presidential election in six states.

In addition to new precincts, new proposed polling locations were based off of the precinct realignment in October 2021. New voting locations will be added throughout the City as a result of new precincts being created. Following the 2020 U.S. Census, the City’s Election Department worked with community groups and the state legislature on the adopted precinct changes. These changes focus on equity in the voting populations of each precinct to reduce wait times and increase voter access.

The Politbarometer has been conducted since 1977 on an almost monthly basis by the Research Group for Elections (Forschungsgruppe Wahlen) for the Second German Television (ZDF). Since 1990, this database has also been available for the new German states. The survey focuses on the opinions and attitudes of the voting population in the Federal Republic on current political topics, parties, politicians, and voting behavior. From 1990 to 1995 and from 1999 onward, the Politbarometer surveys were conducted separately in the eastern and western federal states (Politbarometer East and Politbarometer West). The separate monthly surveys of a year are integrated into a cumulative data set that includes all surveys of a year and all variables of the respective year. The Politbarometer short surveys, collected with varying frequency throughout the year, are integrated into the annual cumulation starting from 2003.

In 2022, there were 161.42 million people registered to vote in the United States. This is a decrease from the previous election, when 168.31 million people were registered to vote.

Voting requirements

While voting laws differ from state to state, the basic requirements are the same across the entire country. People are allowed to vote in elections in the United States if they are a U.S. citizen, meet their state’s residency requirements, are at least 18 years old before Election Day, and are registered to vote before the registration deadline.

Vote early and often

Generally, younger people are not registered to vote at the same rate as older individuals. Additionally, young people tend not to vote as much as older people, particularly in midterm elections. However, in the 2016 presidential election, a significant number of people across all age groups voted in the election, resulting in a high voter turnout.

Florida was admitted to the union in 1845, and has taken part in 43 U.S. presidential elections since this time. In these 43 elections, Florida has voted for the overall winner thirty times, giving a success rate of seventy percent. Since 1928, Florida has voted for the winning candidate in 21 out of 24 elections, and is considered a key battleground state in modern elections. Florida has voted for a major party nominee in every election, backing the Republican nominee 17 times, Democrat 25 times, and the only time it did not vote Republican or Democrat was in 1848 when it voted for the Whig Party's Zachary Taylor. Florida did not take part in the 1864 election due to its secession from the Union in the American Civil War, and like most other southern states it primarily voted Democrat until the mid-twentieth century, when it then started leaning more Republican. No U.S. President has ever been born in Florida, or resided there when taking office; although Donald Trump declared himself a resident of Florida in 2019, therefore making it his official home state during the 2020 election. The 2020 election in Florida proved to be a surprise for many, as Donald Trump won the popular vote by a 3.4 percent margin; most polls had favored Biden going into election day, however intensive campaigning and increased Republican support among Cuban Americans has been cited as the reason for Trump's victory in Florida.

Florida's importance

In 1920, Florida's population was fewer than one million people; however it has grown drastically in the past century to almost 22 million people, making Florida the third most populous state in the country. With this population boom, Florida's allocation of electoral votes has surged, from just six in the 1920s, to 29 in recent elections (this is expected to increase to 31 votes in the 2024 election). Unlike the other most populous states, such as California and New York, which are considered safe Democratic states, or Texas, which is considered a safe Republican state, presidential elections in Florida are much more unpredictable. Florida is a southern state, and its majority-white, rural and suburban districts tend to vote in favor of the Republican Party (Republicans have also dominated state elections in recent decades), although, Florida is also home to substantial Hispanic population, and is a popular destination for young workers in the tourism sector and retirees from across the U.S., with these groups considered more likely to vote Democrat. However, the discrepancy between voters of Cuban (58 percent voted Republican) and Puerto Rican (66 percent voted Democrat) origin in the 2020 election shows that these traditional attitudes towards Hispanic voters may need to be re-evaluated.

2000 controversy The 2000 U.S. presidential election is one of the most famous and controversial elections in U.S. history, due to the results from Florida. The election was contested by the Republican Party's George W. Bush and the Democratic Party's Al Gore; by the end of election day, it became clear that Florida's 25 electoral votes would decide the outcome, as neither candidate had surpassed the 270 vote margin needed to win nationwide. While Florida's early results showed Bush in the lead, Gore's share of the results in urban areas then brought their totals close enough to trigger a recount; after a month of recounts and legal proceedings, Bush was eventually declared the winner of Florida by a margin of 537 popular votes (or 0.009 percent). Although Gore did win a plurality of the votes nationwide, Bush had won 271 electoral votes overall, and was named the 43rd President of the United States; this was just one of five elections where the candidate with the most popular votes did not win the election. In the six most recent U.S. presidential elections in Florida, the difference in the share of popular votes between the Republican and Democratic candidates has been just two percent on average.

2024 General Election: Trump vs. Biden | RealClearPolling

Multiple regression predicting perceived election legitimacy from participant partisan identification, election timing, and their interaction (Model 1) and additionally from the mean centered averages of perception of Fox News and of other media outlets, and their interactions (Model 2).

BackgroundIdentifying groups at increased risk for political violence can support prevention efforts. We determine whether “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) Republicans, as defined, are potentially such a group.MethodsNationwide survey conducted May 13-June 2, 2022 of adult members of the Ipsos KnowledgePanel. MAGA Republicans are defined as Republicans who voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election and deny the results of that election. Principal outcomes are weighted proportions of respondents who endorse political violence, are willing to engage in it, and consider it likely to occur.FindingsThe analytic sample (n = 7,255) included 1,128 (15.0%) MAGA Republicans, 640 (8.3%) strong Republicans, 1,571 (21.3%) other Republicans, and 3,916 (55.3%) non-Republicans. MAGA Republicans were substantially more likely than others to agree strongly/very strongly that “in the next few years, there will be civil war in the United States” (MAGA Republicans, 30.3%, 95% CI 27.2%, 33.4%; strong Republicans, 7.5%, 95% CI 5.1%, 9.9%; other Republicans, 10.8%, 95% CI 9.0%, 12.6%; non-Republicans, 11.2%, 95% CI 10.0%, 12.3%; p < 0.001) and to consider violence usually/always justified to advance at least 1 of 17 specific political objectives (MAGA Republicans, 58.2%, 95% CI 55.0%, 61.4%; strong Republicans, 38.3%, 95% CI 34.2%, 42.4%; other Republicans, 31.5%, 95% CI 28.9%, 34.0%; non-Republicans, 25.1%, 95% CI 23.6%, 26.7%; p < 0.001). They were not more willing to engage personally in political violence.InterpretationMAGA Republicans, as defined, are more likely than others to endorse political violence. They are not more willing to engage in such violence themselves; their endorsement may increase the risk that it will occur.

As the next round of redistricting approaches, many states have enacted a number of reforms to their mapmaking practices. One reform that has received increased attention in recent years is a ban on prison gerrymandering-the practice of counting incarcerated individuals in prisons instead of their home addresses. At present, eight states are poised to draw districts while counting incarcerated persons in their homes for the first time after the 2020 Census. Though substantial research has investigated redistricting practices, far less attention has been paid to empirically examining the effect of prison gerrymandering on elections. We seek to fill this void by evaluating the effect of New York’s ban on prison gerrymandering on state legislative elections between 2002 and 2020. We find that altering how the prison population is counted, indeed, altered the electoral dynamics across the state.