The Electoral College’s Impact on Presidential Campaigns

Abstract

An analysis of the relationship between the electoral college and its impact on presidential candidates’ attention or visits to each state. The study seeks to understand and answer the question of how the electoral college impacts the attention of presidential candidates to each state. The analysis found that certain states defined within the study as "battleground" or "toss up" states are much more likely to be visited by presidential candidates, and, in addition, the data showed that there is a hierarchy within battleground states. The states that have a higher number of electoral votes were visited more often than other smaller electoral vote tossup states. This shows there is a direct correlation between a state being deemed a "battleground" state, thus having more electoral votes to the attention or visits a presidential candidate shows to that state.