How Presidential Running Mates Influence Turnout

• Published date: 01 September 2015
• DOI: 10.1177/1532673X14566069
• Author: Michael S. Lynch,Whitney L. Court
• Date: 01 September 2015
• Subject Matter: Articles

American Politics Research

2015, Vol. 43(5) 897 –918

© The Author(s) 2015

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DOI: 10.1177/1532673X14566069

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Article

How Presidential

Running Mates Influence

Turnout: The Risks and

Rewards of Revving up

the Base

Whitney L. Court1 and Michael S. Lynch2

Abstract

Primaries frequently exacerbate ideological divisions within a party. When

parties select more moderate candidates whom they believe will appeal to a

broader audience, the nominee must find a way to win over their party’s base.

We investigate the potential rewards of using the vice presidential nominee

to increase voter turnout among those ideologically alienated by a party’s

moderate nominee. We also examine the risks of a more extreme vice

presidential nominee costing a president the support of moderate voters.

To perform this analysis, we examine how voters’ ideologies and attitudes

toward Sarah Palin affected their voter turnout and their vote choice. By

doing this, we are able to assess the effectiveness of the attempt to activate

the base and find that while vice presidential nominees may provide the

opportunity to effectively target ideological groups, they may also contribute

to a loss of support from moderately inclined voters.

Keywords

voter turnout, securing the base, Sarah Palin, campaign strategies, vice

president

1College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University, Collegeville, MN, USA

2University of Georgia, Athens, USA

Corresponding Author:

Whitney L. Court, Assistant Professor, College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University,

2850 Abbey Pl, Simons 1st Floor, Collegeville, MN 56321, USA.

Email: wcourt@csbsju.edu

566069APRXXX10.1177/1532673X14566069American Politics ResearchCourt and Lynch

research-article2015

898 American Politics Research 43(5)

It’s a risk. No matter how great the candidate, it’s a significant risk to put

someone on the ticket. They obviously felt it was worth the risk to rev up the

base . . . .

—Dan Schnur, former McCain aide,

commenting on the selection of Sarah Palin as vice president1

Introduction

During the presidential primary season, political parties vet prospective pres-

idential nominees and select a candidate to represent their party’s ticket in the

general election. After a candidate secures the nomination, the party must

begin the task of uniting the party behind that candidate. It can be difficult for

the party’s nominee to win the support of various party factions, especially

those factions that strongly supported candidates who failed to garner the

nomination. While party divisions may be indicative of a variety of factional

preferences resting on characteristics such as gender, age, race, and regional

preferences, unifying the party can be especially difficult when party factions

are defined by ideological differences.

Primaries frequently exacerbate ideological divisions within a party: divi-

sions that must be bridged if a nominee is to be successful in the coming

general election. When more moderate candidates end up winning primaries,

they must find a way to win over their party’s base. Ideological differences

between a moderate nominee and the party base can make this difficult, espe-

cially if members of the party base have recently invested their time, money,

and energy in the support of a candidate that the moderate nominee defeated

in the primary.

The need for more moderate candidates to reach out to their party base

runs counter to the conventional wisdom on effective campaigning strategies.

Political scientists have long recognized the importance of the courting the

median voter in U.S. elections (Black, 1948; Downs, 1957). The median

voter theorem posits that the candidate that can win the support of the median

voter should be able to win the election. However, appealing to the median

voter is not without its risks. More extreme voters may decide to not vote at

all if a candidate’s attempt to win the median moves them too far away from

the base of their party. Election models that allow for abstention due to alien-

ation or indifference show that candidates seeking the support of the middle

are likely to reduce turnout among more extreme voters (Adams & Merrill,

2003; Adams et al., 2006; Brody & Page, 1973; Peress, 2011).

While courting moderate voters or securing the base of a party is often

seen as mutually exclusive strategies, additional political science literature