Using & Understanding
2020 General Election Vote History
VOTE HISTORY IN VAN: OVERVIEW
Due to the prevalence of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic in 2020, the Commonwealth of Kentucky expanded the ways in which eligible Kentuckians could vote in the Primary and General Elections.
During the General Election, the Kentucky State Board of Elections (SBOE) agreed to provide political parties with a list of voters who REQUESTED A VOTE-BY-MAIL BALLOT, RETURNED A VOTE-BY-MAIL BALLOT, and/or VOTED EARLY IN PERSON. Normally, this information was not made available to campaigns or parties pursuant to KRS 117.085.10.
However, input from both major parties led the SBOE to make this information available twice per week (Tuesday and Thursdays). Based upon this information, campaigns could adjust their targeting, such as contacting voters who had not returned their ballots or by removing voters who returned their ballots/voted early.
With the change in voting methods in 2020 and the Absentee/Early Voting data being available, this presented the need to add this granularity to vote history in Votebuilder.
To view future updates to this document, please visit: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uJUcHH3Da1dbOVAo4-s70EOu4KmFdvJAFK-vS2pADJ4/edit?usp=sharing
VOTE HISTORY IN VAN: CREATE A LIST
In Votebuilder, vote history for the 2020 General Election will be found in several places. In these sections, there will be new codes and terms that users will see and want to know.
In Create a List (CAL), users will see the familiar election name (2020 General) in the left column and ‘Voted’ or ‘Didn’t Vote’ in the right column. However, two new options (shown below) appear in the right column to let users sort on those who voted ‘Early’ or by ‘Mail’. Selecting ‘Voted’ will select everyone who voted, regardless of their vote method. Similarly, selecting ‘Early’ or ‘Mail’ will just display those voters who used that specific method.
If a user wants to view those voters who voted on Election Day, they will need to do three steps:
Select ‘2020 General’ + ‘Voted’
Remove ‘2020 General’ + ‘Early’
Remove ‘2020 General’ + ‘Mail’
VOTE HISTORY IN VAN: VOTER PROFILE
When a user wants to view individuals voters and their 2020 General Election vote method, those will be found in the voters’ profile under ‘Voting History’. For the 2020 General, users will see four different codes to reflect how a voter cast their ballot in the 2020 General Election:
Y → Voted in the 2020 General Election, in person on Election Day
E → Voted in the 2020 General Election, early in person
M → Voted in the 2020 General Election, by mail
Null/Blank “ ” → Did not vote in the 2020 General Election
Directly in Votebuilder, these codes will appear as:
VOTE HISTORY IN VAN: METHODOLOGY
On the raw voter file provided by the SBOE, the only information on each person's record is whether they voted or not (referred to as voter credit). Voter credit includes the two digit year (20 for 2020) and two additional binary code numbers to represent the primary and general election. For instance, for 2020, a voter with primary and general voter credit will have the code of 2011; if they did not vote in either, the code would be 2000.
To determine the vote method to display in Votebuilder, KDP and the DNC utilized the Absentee and Early Vote file provided by the SBOE to link records in the backend.
In order for someone’s vote method to display in Votebuilder, they must have voter credit on the raw file from the SBOE. If no voter credit is displayed, and the voter requested a ballot, the value will still appear as ‘blank/null/ “ ” ’.
Due to problems with the way the files are provided (specifically the lack of a unique voter file ID), it is impossible to provide full coverage of the vote method.
Based upon the data received, a few of the vote methods appearing in VAN can be defined as:
VOTE HISTORY IN VAN: DNC MATCH RATE
Based upon the matching of the Voter File / AVEV data by the DNC, the following table represents the coverage rate for the 2020 General Election Vote History in VAN.
VF/AVEV Match refers to voters who both have voter credit and were present on the AVEV file; the VAN Total is the total number of voters with that specific credit in Votebuilder. Match rate shows the total percent of which are directly matched using both files.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uJUcHH3Da1dbOVAo4-s70EOu4KmFdvJAFK-vS2pADJ4/edit?usp=sharing