Reports about the death of split-ticket voting may be greatly exaggerated.
Voters for decades were perfectly willing to choose candidates for high office from different parties simultaneously. But such split-ticket voting has declined starkly in recent years. That’s been, at least in part, a reflection of increased partisanship in the electorate, compounded by the uber-polarizing nature of former President Donald Trump’s successful 2016 presidential bid.
That year, every state holding a Senate election voted for the same party for Senate and president. Meaning each state where Trump won also elected a Republican senator, with Democratic Senate candidates prevailing in states that backed the party’s presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton. That was the first presidential race of such White House-Senate straight-ticket voting since the 17th Amendment was ratified in 1913, allowing senators to be elected by popular vote, as opposed to being chosen by state legislatures.
Now, though, split-ticket voting may be making a comeback. It took a tentative step in 2020 when one state, Maine, split its ticket, backing Republican Sen. Susan Collins for reelection while choosing Democratic President Joe Biden over Trump.
The 2022 midterm elections could see split-ticket voting come roaring back, including in Georgia, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. There and in up to a dozen states this year, a Senate seat and the governor’s mansion might plausibly go to different parties.
In Pennsylvania’s open Senate race, the Republican nominee, Dr. Mehmet Oz, has recently shot up in polls and may defeat Democratic rival John Fetterman, the state’s lieutenant governor. But the Pennsylvania Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Attorney General Josh Shapiro, will likely beat GOP opponent Doug Mastriano — as seen in a string of October polls, many of which put his lead in the double-digits.
Georgia voters may also split their tickets. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp is in strong shape to win a second term in a rematch against his 2018 Democratic opponent, Stacey Abrams. Yet in the Peach State’s Senate race, Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock holds a narrow but steady lead over GOP nominee Herschel Walker, a University of Georgia football legend and one of the first 2022 Senate candidates endorsed by Trump.
In Wisconsin, voters appear poised to reelect Republican Sen. Ron Johnson, though his race against Democratic Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes has tightened of late. But a Johnson win could still happen while Badger State voters reelect Democratic Gov. Tony Evers to a second term. Evers holds a narrow but persistent lead over Republican candidate Tim Michels, a construction company executive.
Positive sign after years of rank partisanship
These split-ticket potentials can be seen as a hopeful sign in U.S. politics — that voters haven’t completely given in to mindless partisanship. And that they’re willing to consider the merits and policy proposals of individual candidates as much as party labels.
“Ticket-splitters are a good thing. It gives you faith that the voters are looking at the quality of the candidate, not just along ideological lines,” said former Rep. Erik Paulsen (R-MN), who represented a district in the western suburbs of the Twin Cities from 2009-19.
“The independent nature of the voter has been dissipating, and candidates tend to play more to their base,” Paulsen told the Washington Examiner. That, in turn, complicates efforts to craft legislation in a bipartisan way, which is already difficult enough in an age of ideological news outlets and partisans on social media.
“I think the influence of social media and cable news is a reason for party-line voting. People tend not to listen to information outside of your bubbles,” said Paulsen, who won his seat in 2008 when it came open while Democratic President Barack Obama carried the district by 9 points, part of a 54% to 44% Minnesota statewide victory over GOP nominee John McCain.
“I was the beneficiary of voters that actually looked at the candidate rather than the party,” recalled Paulsen, who before his congressional career spent 14 years as a state representative, including four years as majority leader. “My approach and my strategies were to emphasize the work I was doing across the aisle without compromising my principles. People expect their policymakers to get stuff done. If you’re getting 80% of what you want, you’re making progress.”
Some party-line voting persists
To be sure, voters in some competitive states are likely to go one way or another in the midterm elections. That’s due, at least in part, to the scorching negative ads and scare tactics used by both parties in painting political opponents as unfit for office.
Former Rep. Shelley Berkley (D-NV) said she’s not seeing a lot of reason to think Nevada voters will split their tickets. The state features a swath of nationally watched races, including for Senate, three of the Silver State’s four House seats, governor, attorney general, secretary of state, and control of both chambers in the legislature, among other contests.
“There’s no programming on any television station in Nevada. It’s all campaign commercials,” Berkley told the Washington Examiner in a quip about campaign ads’ saturation of the Las Vegas media market.
All of that’s sending Nevada voters into one partisan corner or another, she said.
“This is not Georgia — they’re not going to be splitting tickets like they may be for Brian Kemp and Raphael Warnock,” said Berkley, who represented a Las Vegas-based House district from 1999-2013.
Berkley held the seat during a golden age of sorts in split-ticking voting. Her first House election, in 1998, came when Nevada voters routinely went back and forth between the parties. Two years before, Democratic President Bill Clinton narrowly won Nevada in his successful reelection bid, while four years later, Republican President George W. Bush nabbed the state’s electoral votes by a slim margin.
But now, even in Nevada, where voters pride themselves on their political independence, party-line ballot picks are more likely.
“My gut is telling me this is definitely a tribal election,” Berkley said. “I’ve never seen it like this.”
Part of that is unavoidable, Berkley said, since the bulk of Republican candidates in the state have questioned the legitimacy of Biden’s 2020 win over Trump.
“Every constitutional office on the Republican side is an election denier,” Berkley said.
Even more centrist voters who might otherwise be open to backing Republican candidates won’t do so if democracy itself is at stake.
Specifically, GOP Senate nominee Adam Laxalt said earlier this year the 2020 election was “rigged.” And the Republican nominee for secretary of state, Jim Marchant, has said his No. 1 priority would be to “overhaul the fraudulent election system.” Meanwhile, Sigal Chattah, the Republican nominee for state attorney general, alleged, without evidence, that there was wide-scale corruption in the 2020 presidential campaign.
