How Candidates Influence Each Other in Electoral Politics: Intercandidate Agenda-Building in Florida’s 2018 Midterm Election

Abstract

This study investigates how the electoral campaigns in Florida’s 2018 gubernatorial and Senate races used information subsidies to influence each other’s integrated marketing communications. Informed by agenda-building theory, the study probes which campaign and which party had the strongest transfer of issue and stakeholder salience (first-level) and sentiment (second-level) in campaign communications across the two races. Data include issue statements, press releases, tweets, and email blasts. Results of a lexicon-based automated content analysis show evidence for both unidirectional and bi-directional agenda-building influence of stakeholder salience. Further, data suggest the gubernatorial campaigns (DeSantis and Gillum) engaged in subtly more positive, self-promotion-based marketing than their counterparts in the Senate race (Scott and Nelson). Findings contribute theoretical and practical applications to political communication in election campaigning.