← The project How it works

U.S. elections, 2012–2024

If only they voted

Mark the groups to count. Every state and district is tallied again using only those voters' ballots, for president, Senate, House and governor.

 

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Key races

    All races

    How the count is made

    1 · Who voted

    The Census Bureau's November voting survey (CPS) gives each state's voters by race and ethnicity, education, family income, gender and age: 800 combinations in all. For a House district, the state's electorate is reshaped to Census ACS figures for that district's citizen adults, weighted by how often each group turns out.

    2 · How they voted

    The Cooperative Election Study interviews about 60,000 Americans each cycle and checks them against voter files. A regression on its verified voters estimates each group's Democratic-versus-Republican vote, letting the pattern differ by state and region. National group results are then brought in line with Pew Research Center's validated-voter studies (2016–2024).

    3 · Matching the real results

    Each race is shifted so that counting everyone reproduces its certified result exactly. Erasing groups then shows what that same electorate would have decided without them. Turnout stays at its actual level: the map counts the ballots each group really cast and does not guess how many more of them might have voted.

    4 · One state up close

    Click a state to see its congressional districts as circles, placed where they are and sized by the ballots counted in each. For the House these are the real races. For president, Senate and governor, district results are estimates: each district's mix of voters plus its lean in House races, adjusted so the districts add up to the statewide result. A popular House member can tilt that estimate.

    Read with care

    • These are estimates. Narrow groups in small states, like Asian voters in Wyoming, rest on few survey respondents.
    • Two-party vote only. Independents who ran as the main opponent of the Republican (Sanders, King, Osborn, McMullin) count on the Democratic side.
    • Maine's and Nebraska's district electors are not modeled, so every state is winner-take-all.
    • Seats with no candidate from one side keep their winner under every filter.
    • Income brackets are in each year's dollars, not adjusted for inflation.

    Sources