COVID-19 and the 2020 Election: Executive Pandemic Political Accountability at the State and Federal Level

Abstract: Constitutionally, each state is responsible for handling its own elections. This setup presents plenty of opportunities for states to conduct elections in various and disparate ways but when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States in early 2020 differences between state capacity and willingness were made starker. On top of election duties, states were left to craft their own policy responses to the public health crisis leading to divergent outcomes for infections and deaths. Given the lack of national consensus on pandemic policy and expanded access to voting, the electorate of each state had to reflect on the competence displayed by their incumbent President and Governor during times of natural disaster. Previous literature suggests that voters are reflective and punitive, but also specific, holding their incumbents accountable to their decisions by rewarding them with reelection or punishing them with an end of term. This project examines six states’ presidential and gubernatorial elections to uncover the relationship, if any, between a county’s COVID-19 death rate and its subsequent impact on voter turnout and incumbent favorability. These variables, in addition to measures of a states’ previous history of voter disenfranchisement and differences in demographic and economic conditions, are used to assess the relationship between overall voter turnout and voter preferences. This research seeks to understand in which ways the COVID-19 infections and death rates affected the 2020 general election turnout. It also explores how voters held their incumbent politicians accountable to their pandemic response relative to the severity of the infection and death rate.