Abstract
This paper develops a theory in which heterogeneity in political preferences produces a partisan disagreement about objective facts. A political decision involving both idiosyncratic preferences and scientific knowledge is considered. Voters form motivated beliefs in order to improve their subjective anticipation of the future political outcome, which is determined by two-party competition à la Downs (1957). We provide conditions on preferences under which equilibrium beliefs are monotone along the political spectrum, as voters tend to deny the scientific arguments advocating the political orientations that run counter to their interests. Collective denial is the strongest in societies where contingent policy is the least likely to be implemented. Political competition does not imply policy convergence, as there exists an equilibrium in which each party targets a different group of voters as a function of their (endogenous) level of denial.
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