The Policy Views of Partisan Election Officials*

In the debate about partisan election administration, little attention has been focused on the views of local election officials. Election officials can be purveyors of partisanship as well as observers of the election administration environment. We use a series of national surveys of local election officials to examine the degree to which local officials of opposing parties have different policy preferences about election administration. We find that partisan differences are largely confined to officials serving heavily populated local jurisdictions. We also examine whether partisanship is related to the views of local officials toward state election administration. We find evaluations of state administrators have less to do with party affiliation and more to do with outside forces largely beyond their control.