Election Data

2024 election drop-off analysis

What is “Drop-off”?

Drop-off is a term that describes the difference between how many votes are cast at the top of the ticket, and how many votes are cast for races lower down on the ballot. Following the 2024 election, SMART Elections coined this term to refer to the difference between the votes for the President and the next down-ballot race. In 2024 the drop-off was large and remarkably different for Democratic and Republican candidates.

raw votes vs percentages

The overview graphs above shows the difference in drop-off between the six swing and eleven non-swing states that we analyzed in this data set. We calculated the drop-off in both total votes and in percentages for each major party (Democratic and Republican) for 17 states.

The total number of votes show that the drop-off numbers are large (larger than the margin of victory in five of the six swing states we analyzed). The percentage chart makes it easier to compare the differences between more and less populated states.

Swing States (minus Georgia*)

*Georgia did not have a statewide race to compare

**In NC we compared the Attorney General’s race

Non-Swing States

*In Delaware we compared the Governor’s race

Use these links to go directly to the specific analysis of each state.

learn more

We also compiled this data into a bar chart for each state. Next to each state’s bar chart is a link to a document where you can explore the data in a spreadsheet format, and view the election results by county for that state.

You can read more about the analysis on our original Substack post. There is also a full data set spreadsheet for the multi-state comparison.

get involved

There are different ways to comment or join the conversation. Leave a comment on Substack, or send us an email at SMARTelectionsAct@gmail.com. If you’re a data geek and want to join our data team… nice! Sign up here.

How is drop-off calculated?

Drop-off by number of votes is calculated by subtracting the Senate (or down-ballot votes) from the presidential votes for each political party. We calculated the drop off percentage by dividing the number of drop-off votes by the number of presidential votes for that political party (Democratic or Republican). This shows what percentage of each presidential candidate’s votes might be an over or under performance when compared to the down-ballot race of their own party.

2024 takeaways

In November 2024, these percentages are vastly different on the Republican and Democratic side. The drop-off on the Republican side is very high – in some swing states it averages close to 10%. Meaning close to 10% of Republican Presidential voters did not vote for a Republican Senate candidate. In Ohio the Republican drop-off is over 10%. In Rockland County New York the Republican drop-off rate is 23%.

The Democratic drop-off by contrast is low in most states we examined and actually in negative territory in more than half of this data set. In Arizona, North Carolina and Ohio, the Democratic drop-off is -5%, or lower. That means that according to these results 5% or more of democratic leaning voters chose to vote for the Democratic Senate candidate, but decided not to vote for the Democratic candidate for president. In Arizona for example there is an almost 16% spread between the Republican and the Democratic drop-off.

our process

This data is preliminary election data that was available shortly before certification in 2024. Our data is accurate, based on the available election data at the time of the analysis.

The data for this study is from uselectionatlas.org, which was recommended as a reliable source of clean election data by one of our top technical advisors. For the North Carolina Attorney General race we took our data from the North Carolina State Board of Elections website.

Multiple team members checked each data extraction.

The analysis was performed independently by two experienced data scientists. They did not share results until each one had completed the analysis. Their results were identical, giving us confidence that the analysis is accurate. We are extremely grateful to them, and the entire SMART Elections Data Team for the enormous amount of time, skill and dedication that has been devoted to this effort.

If you think there is a mistake in the data, please alert us at SMARTelectionsACT@gmail.com. Please put DATA UPDATE in the subject line.

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Graphics & Analysis by the SMART Elections Data Team.

https://smartelections.us/

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