Early Voting and Campaign News Coverage

Abstract

The proportion of votes cast before election day has risen steadily over the last two decades. Previous research asked how early voting has impacted voter participation. In this article, we ask how early voting has affected the flow of information to voters through the mass media. By increasing the number of days voters are able to vote, are we also increasing the number of days that candidates and campaigns continuously disseminate campaign-related information to the news media? Is news coverage of campaigns quantitatively and qualitatively different when opportunities to vote early are available and utilized? Our expectation is that early voting significantly influences the volume and nature of campaign news coverage. We study the effects of early voting on campaign news coverage of gubernatorial and Senate races in 2006 and 2008. Our findings reveal that the volume and content of campaign news coverage is significantly influenced by early voting. [Supplementary material is available for this article. Go to the publisher's online edition of Political Communication for the following free supplemental resource: Appendix for Early Voting and Campaign News Coverage—Alternative Model Specifications.]