The Federal Election Commission (FEC) administers federal campaign finance laws, but the authority for governing elections and certifying results is largely vested in state and local jurisdictions. The FEC compiles election statistics for House, Senate and presidential elections. The data appear by state and include the official vote count for each candidate. You can also get information about past Electoral College votes.
Unlike many countries, the United States has an Electoral College system that assigns electoral votes to each state based on its population, rather than using a nationwide popular vote. As a result, candidates must spend significantly more time and money in a small number of states in order to win the presidency, as well as focus their efforts on so-called “swing” states.
In some states, a close race may trigger a recount. A recount typically involves a thorough examination of ballots, often by hand or machine, to determine which candidate each voter intended to vote for. A court will decide if the recount results should be used to re-certify the original voting outcome.
In the United States, voters’ choices matter significantly for their representation in Congress and in state legislatures. Combining electoral and legislative roll-call data in a regression discontinuity design, this study finds that the effects of coin-flip elections in the US House, Senate, and state legislatures persist for at least a decade in most settings, and sometimes for three decades.