Brian Schaffner

🚨🚨🚨 The Cooperative Election Study's 2024 vote validation data is now available! Microdata: doi.org/10.7910/DVN/... Or easy interactive analysis of the data on... vote choice: cooperativeelectionstudy.shinyapps.io/VoteTrends/ demographics of voters: cooperativeelectionstudy.shinyapps.io/votercomp/

we’re hiring an assistant professor in American politics 🐘 apply.interfolio.com/194599

who had the better season? @miacosta.bsky.social @uchicagopress.bsky.social @apsa.bsky.social

old (source: umass polls)

Nice post from Elliott here walking through why this screen is not a perfect LV screen but it's useful. The long and short is screening out all people who say they won't vote undersamples those people (lots of them vote) and oversamples people who say they will definitely vote (lots of them don't)

Are Jewish Americans really leaving the Democratic Party? Fewer identify as Democratic, but most still plan to vote for Democrats. Read the latest from @bfschaffner.bsky.social: goodauthority.org/news/are-jew...

from 2024 to 2025 there was a stunning 8-point drop in the share of Jewish Americans who identified as Democrats, but it is not clear that this will translate into a shift in voting behavior in November. my latest piece for @goodauth.bsky.social goodauthority.org/news/are-jew...

Article in the WSJ today about my piece last week and UMich’s defense. Don’t know how else to put it but their defense of not weighting on partisanship was weak and stubborn. www.wsj.com/economy/cons...

“Americans have been told for at least two decades that they share less and less, while the data show the actual overlap holding roughly steady,” the political scientists Brian Schaffner and Stephen Ansolabehere write.

we wrote a thing based on our book project to offer some hope this 4th of July. if you choose to see it, we have quite a lot in common with our political foes. www.nytimes.com/2026/07/04/o...

We Hate to Break It to You, but Maybe We’re Not That Polarized. (Stephen Ansolabehere and @bfschaffner.bsky.social) 🎁Gift article: www.nytimes.com/2026/07/04/o...

Not all popular state politicians are created equal. Andy Beshear stands out for being remarkably popular given the politics of Kentucky. Read the latest from @bfschaffner.bsky.social: goodauthority.org/news/not-all...

somebody should run an adaptation of our inauguration crowd experiment asking Trump supporters what color the water is...

Why are American politics so volatile? Both parties are divided. Older issues divide Republicans by education, while newer ones divide Democrats by race. See the research results here: goodauthority.org/news/why-are...

the perspective that "Dems should be Dems" begs the question, but which Dems should they be? goodauthority.org/news/secular...

Ideological moderation might appeal to conservatives, but it can also rankle liberals. Here are some Democrats that have established moderate credentials. See the breakdown from @bfschaffner.bsky.social. goodauthority.org/news/these-d...

lots of talk among Democrats about how whether and how much they need to moderate. in a new @goodauth.bsky.social post, i look at which candidates have actually staked out a moderate reputation in their states...one clear standout here 1/3

I don't know what the phrase is when your nephew is a lot like you, but my nephew was in @bfschaffner.bsky.social's methods class this semester and did an interesting study on ideological extremity and politicians raising money and being mean on the internet. tufts-pol.medium.com/who-is-drivi...

we recently upgraded the CES shiny apps...most of the improvements are aesthetic, but one notable addition is the ability to see breakdowns of the vote for governor and senate in states with large enough samples! full set of apps are here: tischcollege.tufts.edu/research-fac...

we recently upgraded the CES shiny apps...most of the improvements are aesthetic, but one notable addition is the ability to see breakdowns of the vote for governor and senate in states with large enough samples! full set of apps are here: tischcollege.tufts.edu/research-fac...

sometimes i see a @today.yougov.com poll question and think that the only possible reason for its existence is to settle a bet between two of their employees

Democrats and Republicans disagree on what political violence even is... The crux of the disagreement? Whether the government’s actions can constitute violence. Read why this matters here: goodauthority.org/news/democra...

earlier this month @tufts.edu senior Miles Kendrick and I fielded a survey with @today.yougov.com to better understand what acts people think are political violence. there are some points of agreement & some clear differences of opinion. goodauthority.org/news/democra...

earlier this month @tufts.edu senior Miles Kendrick and I fielded a survey with @today.yougov.com to better understand what acts people think are political violence. there are some points of agreement & some clear differences of opinion. goodauthority.org/news/democra...

This feels like a pretty significant development that's not likely to reverse.

in conjunction with this report, we are also today releasing the data for the 2025 CES common content. includes interviews with 17,000 American adults conducted in late 2025. dig in! doi.org/10.7910/DVN/...

there's a new report out from YouGov using CES data to plot trends in partisanship over the past two decades. i've got a piece up today in @goodauth.bsky.social summarizing some key findings. check out both! GA piece: goodauthority.org/news/long-st... YouGov report: yougov.com/en-us/articl...

we've put out the call for teams for the 2026 cooperative election study! be the unsung hero who organizes your colleagues for a module tischcollege.tufts.edu/research-fac...

we've put out the call for teams for the 2026 cooperative election study! be the unsung hero who organizes your colleagues for a module tischcollege.tufts.edu/research-fac...

Most Americans don’t see compromise as central to good citizenship. Our election survey data reveal some surprising findings. The latest from @bfschaffner.bsky.social, see the data here: goodauthority.org/news/most-am...

in 2024, Trump improved most on his vote share in counties that saw the smallest numbers of people moving there. the newest @TuftsUniversity Public Opinion Lab blog post from Toby Winick. tufts-pol.medium.com/trumps-suppo...

there are a lot of things that Americans think are important for being a good citizen, engaging in compromise is not one of them ... my latest post with @goodauth.bsky.social goodauthority.org/news/most-am...

I have a new paper. We look at ~all stats articles in political science post-2010 & show that 94% have abstracts that claim to reject a null. Only 2% present only null results. This is hard to explain unless the research process has a filter that only lets rejections through.

in a new Tufts Public Opinion Lab post, Seona Maskara (class of '26) shows that LGBTQ liberals are more supportive of Gaza than other liberals tufts-pol.medium.com/queers-for-p...

📝Inattentive respondents are a growing concern in online surveys. ➡S Blatte & @bfschaffner.bsky.social that 4 to 6% of respondents pass attention checks yet remain inattentive, biasing public opinion estimates for small subgroups www.cambridge.org/core/journal... #FirstView

i have a new article out in @psrm.bsky.social with Scott Blatte exploring respondent attentiveness in the Cooperative Election Study. we find fairly low rates of inattentiveness but our intervention failed to nudge respondents to pay more attention (thread) www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

If you need a cite backing up that issues commonly associated with African Americans (like criminal justice and poverty) *are actually perceived to be* associated with African Americans and we aren't just all talking out of our @$$ assuming that criminal justice=Black, Tatishe and I did the work: