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2020 United States elections

The 2020 United States elections were held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020. The Democratic Party's nominee, former vice president Joe Biden, defeated incumbent Republican president Donald Trump in the presidential election. Despite losing seats in the House of Representatives, Democrats retained control of the House and gained control of the Senate. As a result, the Democrats obtained a government trifecta, the first time since the elections in 2008 that the party gained unified control of Congress and the presidency.[1] With Trump losing his bid for re-election, he became the first defeated incumbent president to have overseen his party lose the presidency and control of both the House and the Senate since Herbert Hoover in 1932.[2][3] This was the first time since 1980 that either chamber of Congress flipped partisan control in a presidential year, and the first time Democrats did so since 1948.

Election day

November 3

Donald Trump (Republican)

117th

Democratic gain

Democratic +4.5%

306

232

Democratic gain[a]

35 of 100 seats
(33 seats of Class II + 2 special elections)

Democratic +3

Democratic hold

All 435 voting-members
All six non-voting delegates

Democratic +3.1%

Republican +13

13 (11 states, two territories)

Republican +1

Biden became his party's nominee after defeating numerous challengers in the Democratic primaries, while Trump faced token opposition in the Republican primaries. In the congressional elections, Democrats lost seats in the House of Representatives but retained their majority in the chamber by a narrow margin. Democrats made a net gain of three seats in the Senate for a total of 50 seats, taking control of the chamber as newly elected vice-president Kamala Harris could cast tie-breaking votes. Contests for the six non-voting congressional delegates from the District of Columbia and the permanently inhabited U.S. territories were also held during the 2020 elections.


Regularly-scheduled elections were held in 86 of the 99 state legislative chambers, and 11 states held their gubernatorial elections. Only one state governorship and two legislative chambers changed partisan control, as Republicans won the gubernatorial race in Montana and gained control of both legislative chambers in New Hampshire. Various other state executive and judicial elections, as well as numerous referendums, tribal elections, mayoral elections, and other local elections, also took place in 2020. The 2020 elections were the last major set of elections to impact the redistricting cycle that will take place following the 2020 census. Significant issues for voters included the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, as well as health care, the economy, racial unrest and climate change. Social distancing guidelines resulted in unprecedented levels of postal voting and early voting. Voter turnout greatly exceeded recent elections; one projection has turnout by voting eligible population being higher than any election since 1900.


After Biden won the election, Trump and other Republicans refused to concede, making baseless and disproven claims of widespread voter fraud,[4][5][6] despite U.S. election security officials saying that the election was "the most secure in American history".[7] These attempts to overturn the election resulted in a deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol, which led to Trump being impeached for the second time and deplatformed across several major social media platforms.[8][9][10]

Issues

During the campaign, the most prominent issues were the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, health care, economy, race, and abortion.[11] Democrats emphasized coronavirus economic relief and public health measures such as contact tracing, face mask usage, and social distancing, whereas Republican downplayed the coronavirus,[12] scuttled coronavirus economic relief negotiations in the lead-up to the election,[13][14] and advocated for laxer public health measures to deal with the spread of the coronavirus.[15] Trump himself held events across the country, including in coronavirus hotspots, where attendees did not wear masks and were not socially distancing; at the same time, he mocked those who wore face masks.[16][17][18]


The Republican Party opted not to provide a comprehensive platform of its policy positions for the election; the 2020 platform was a one-page resolution which stated that the party "has and will continue to enthusiastically support the president's America-first agenda."[19] Democrats ran on protecting and expanding the Affordable Care Act, while criticizing Republicans for jeopardizing protections for individuals with preexisting conditions.[20][21] Republicans generally did not emphasize health care issues, as their opposition to the Affordable Care Act had become a political liability by 2020, as the legislation had grown in popularity.[21][22]


On the environment, Democrats proposed plans to combat climate change, including through investments in renewable energy and rejoining the Paris Climate Accords, whereas Republicans emphasized increased production of oil and natural gas.[23]


During the election campaign, Democrats made calls for criminal justice reform and spoke of a need to reduce systemic racism in the criminal justice system.[24][25] Republicans ran on a "law and order" and pro-police messaging.[26][27] While Democrats in many races were moderate, Republicans depicted them as extremists or secret "socialists" who held radical views on criminal justice or climate legislation.[26]


The rhetoric of incumbent president Donald Trump and his allies during the election campaign was marked by frequent use of falsehoods and promotion of unfounded conspiracy theories.[28][29][30] In the lead-up to the elections, Republicans attacked voting rights and spread falsehoods about voter fraud.[31][32][33][34] Trump refused to commit to a peaceful transition of power in case he lost the election.[35] While senior Republicans disapproved of Trump's rhetoric in private, they refused to rebuke him publicly.[36]

: Republican Mike Garcia defeated Democrat Christy Smith to replace Democrat Katie Hill who, on October 27, 2019, announced her intent to resign in the wake of ethics concerns surrounding a relationship with a staffer.[61] The district has an even partisan index.[62]

California's 25th congressional district

: Democrat Kwanza Hall defeated Democrat Robert Michael Franklin Jr. to succeed Democrat John Lewis after his death from pancreatic cancer on July 17, 2020.[63][64][65] The district has a partisan index of D+34.[66]

Georgia's 5th congressional district

: Democrat Kweisi Mfume defeated Republican Kimberly Klacik to replace Democrat Elijah Cummings, who died in office on October 17, 2019.[67] The district has a partisan index of D+26.[68]

Maryland's 7th congressional district

: Republican Chris Jacobs defeated Democrat Nate McMurray[69] to succeed Republican Chris Collins, who resigned from Congress on October 1, 2019, ahead of his pleading guilty to insider trading.[70] The district has a partisan index of R+11.[71]

New York's 27th congressional district

: Republican Tom Tiffany defeated Democrat Tricia Zunker to replace Republican Sean Duffy, who announced his resignation effective September 23, 2019, ahead of the birth of his ninth child, who was diagnosed in utero with severe medical complications.[72][73] The district has a partisan index of R+7.[74]

Wisconsin's 7th congressional district

In the , Puerto Ricans decisively voted for statehood; the measure was nonbinding (since only Congress may admit a state to the Union) but was a significant step forward in Puerto Rico's effort to become a state.[88][89]

2020 Puerto Rican status referendum

Four states : New Jersey, South Dakota, Montana (Montana I-190), and Arizona (Proposition 207).[90] The measures passed by broad margins.[90]

legalized marijuana for recreational use

became the first U.S. state to decriminalize possession of small amounts of "harder drugs" such as cocaine, heroin, or methamphetamine, making possession a civil violation rather than a criminal offense. The measure also directed revenue raised from marijuana sales taxes to drug addiction treatment.[90]

Oregon

Oregon also became the first state to legalize the use of , with Measure 109 passing with 56% of the vote. The measure allows the regulated use of psychedelic mushrooms by adults over the age of 21 in supervised, therapeutic settings, and requires secure storage at licensed facilities.[91]

psychedelic mushrooms

Colorado, and Florida voters passed state constitutional amendments narrowing the right to vote in elections by replacing language in the state constitution stating "every citizen" has the right to vote with "only a citizen." These measures had no practical impact since non-citizens were not permitted to vote in U.S. elections before the measures were adopted.[92][93][94]

Alabama

voters decided to keep the state in the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact by a 52-to-48 margin, rejecting a repeal effort.[95]

Colorado

Voters in decided to remove "and Providence Plantations" from the state's official name.[96]

Rhode Island

In California, voters rejected , a measure to repeal the state ban on affirmative action.[97][98]

Proposition 16

In California, passed with 58% of the vote; the measure, which was backed by $200 million from Uber/Postmates, Lyft, DoorDash, and Instacart, reversed a recently passed state law requiring those companies to treat "gig economy" workers as employees (entitled to the full array of employee benefits) rather than as independent contractors.[99][100]

Proposition 22

In California, , a veto referendum, passed by broad margins, thus nullifying a state bill that would have replaced cash bail with risk assessments for suspects detained pending trial.[101]

Proposition 25

In voters overwhelmingly approved a new state flag, replacing the former divisive state flag, which included the Confederate battle flag.[102][103]

Mississippi

voters approved an initiative amending their state constitutions to expand Medicaid under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, circumventing the Republican-dominated state legislature, which had refused to do so.[104][105][106] The Missouri constitutional amendment will expand Medicaid access to a quarter-million more adults starting in July 2021.[106]

Missouri

voters approved a legislatively referred state constitutional amendment prohibiting the unreasonable search and seizure of electronic data and electronic communications and requiring state and local police to obtain a search warrant before searching electronic data.[107] The measure, passed with 89% of the vote.[108] Michigan became the 13th state to include privacy protections in a state constitution, and the third state to add such protection by ballot measure.[107]

Michigan

voters approved by a 2–1 margin, a ballot measure to legalize sports betting at stadiums and casinos, with tax proceeds benefiting K-12 public schools; the vote made Maryland the 18th state to legalize sports betting.[109]

Maryland

Ballot measures to remove "penal exceptions" from state constitutional prohibitions on (language that allowed slavery as a criminal punishment) passed in Nebraska and Utah, with about 68% and 80% of the vote, respectively. These unenforceable and obsolete provisions were once used for convict leasing and forced prisoner labor.[102][110]

slavery

voters, in the March 2020 primary ballot, rejected (by a wide margin) a veto referendum that sought to overturn a new Maine state law that eliminated religious and philosophical exemptions from mandatory vaccinations for K-12 and college students and employees of healthcare facilities.[111]

Maine

voters narrowly approved an initiative to replace partisan primaries with top-four open primaries and ranked-choice voting for state, federal, and presidential level.[112][113][114][115]

Alaska

In , a proposed state constitutional amendment to establish open "jungle primaries" (also called "top-two" primaries), with the top two vote-getters advancing to the November ballot (irrespective of party) was defeated; 57% voted to approve, short of the three-fifths (60%) vote required.[116][117]

Florida

voters rejected Question 2, an initiative to implement ranked-choice voting for future state elections, with about 55% voting against the question.[118][119] Massachusetts voters approved Question 1 with a 75% "yes" vote,[119] extending the "right to repair" to certain vehicles, extending 2012 legislation and consumers' rights to obtain telematics data.[120][121]

Massachusetts

voted against the Illinois Fair Tax, a proposed state amendment championed by Governor J. B. Pritzker, which, had it passed, would have changed the state income tax system from a flat tax to a graduated income tax.[122][123]

Illinois

approved, by wide margins, ballot questions that aimed to make funds collected from taxes and fees used for their intended projects (passed with 82% of the vote); waived sovereign immunity in cases alleging unconstitutionality of a law; and exempting certain charities from property tax.[124][125][126][127]

Georgia

Arkansas and North Dakota voters defeated legislatively-referred measures which would have restricted the ability of citizens to place questions on the ballot or added hurdles to enacting laws via ballot measure. In Florida, voters defeated a measure would have required voters to pass future state constitutional amendments by 60% in two successive elections (rather than one election) in order for the amendment to be adopted.[128] In North Dakota, voters defeated a measure would have required future successful citizen-initiated constitutional amendments to be sent to the legislature for further approval, and would refer those which failed to get legislative approval back to the ballot in the next general election;[129] In Arkansas, voters defeated Issue 3, a measure would have required future ballot initiatives to gain half of the required petition signatures from each of 45 counties instead of the current 15 counties and also raised the threshold for the legislature to place a proposed constitutional amendment on the ballot from a simple majority of both chambers to three-fifths vote of both chambers.[130]

Florida

Local elections

Mayoral elections

Since the beginning of 2020, various major cities have seen incumbent mayors re-elected, including Bakersfield (Karen Goh),[135] Fremont (Lily Mei),[136] and Sacramento, California (Darrell Steinberg);[137] Baton Rouge, Louisiana (Sharon Weston Broome);[138] Chesapeake (David West),[139] Fairfax City (David Meyer),[139] Fredericksburg (Mary Katherine Greenlaw),[139] Hampton (Donnie Tuck),[139] Richmond (Levar Stoney),[140] and Virginia Beach, Virginia (Bobby Dyer);[141] Glendale (Jerry Weiers),[142] Mesa (John Giles),[143] and Phoenix, Arizona (Kate Gallego);[144] Irving (Rick Stopfer)[145] and Lubbock, Texas (Dan Pope);[146] Milwaukee, Wisconsin (Tom Barrett);[147] Portland, Oregon (Ted Wheeler);[148] Salt Lake County, Utah (Jenny Wilson);[149] Wilmington, Delaware (Mike Purzycki);[150] Winston-Salem, North Carolina (Allen Joines);[151] and Bayamón, Puerto Rico (Ramón Luis Rivera Jr.).[152]


In Norfolk, Virginia, Mayor Kenny Alexander was unopposed in seeking reelection,[139] as was Mayor John Cruz in Hagåtña, Guam.[153] In Tulsa, Oklahoma, incumbent mayor G. T. Bynum earned reelection by winning an outright majority in the August primary.[154]


Open mayoral seats were won in Clearwater (Frank Hibbard)[155] and Miami-Dade County, Florida (Daniella Levine Cava);[156] Fresno (Jerry Dyer),[157] Riverside (Patricia Lock Dawson),[158] San Diego (Todd Gloria),[159] and Santa Ana, California (Vicente Sarmiento);[160] Gilbert (Brigette Peterson)[144] and Scottsdale, Arizona (David Ortega);[144] Honolulu, Hawaiʻi (Rick Blangiardi);[161] and San Juan, Puerto Rico (Miguel Romero).[162]


In Baltimore, Maryland, city council president Democrat Brandon Scott was elected to replace incumbent Democrat Jack Young who came in fifth in a crowded primary.[163][164] In Stockton, California, Kevin Lincoln defeated one-term incumbent mayor Michael Tubbs, who was first Black mayor of the city and the youngest person elected to the position when he unseated incumbent mayor Anthony Silva in 2016.[165] In Texas, two mayoral runoff elections in December saw incumbents defeated: In Corpus Christi, city councilwoman Paulette Guajardo defeated incumbent Joe McComb,[166] and in El Paso, former mayor Oscar Leeser unseated one-term incumbent Dee Margo.[167] In Ely, Minnesota, Eric Urbas defeated three-term incumbent mayor Chuck Novack despite Urbas having dropped out of the race in August.[168] In Rabbit Hash, Kentucky, incumbent Brynneth Pawltro was ousted by Wilbur Beast, a 6-month-old French bulldog.[169] The town has never had a human mayor; Pawltro is a pit bull terrier.

In March, the approved a referendum allowing medical and recreational marijuana while also opposing a referendum allowing alcohol sales at the Prairie Wind Casino on the Pine Ridge Reservation.[199]

Oglala Lakota Tribe

In July, voters approved a referendum supporting a long-range Oneida language initiative.[178]

Oneida Nation of Wisconsin

In October, the narrowly approved a referendum supporting establishment of a cannabis marketplace on tribal land.[200]

Yurok Tribe

Public perceptions and analysis

In a poll conducted in 2019, 59% of respondents expressed that they are not confident in the "honesty of U.S. elections".[214] In an August 2020 survey, 49% of respondents said that they expect voting to be "difficult", up from 15% in 2018; 75% of Republicans, but less than half of Democrats were confident that the elections "will be conducted fairly and accurately".[215] In an October 2020 survey, 47% of respondents disagreed with the statement that the election "is likely to be fair and honest", 51% would not "generally agree on who is the legitimately elected president of the United States";[216] 56% said that they expect "an increase in violence as a result of the election".[216] 49% of college students polled in September 2020 said that the elections won't be "fair and open", 55% that "it will not be administered well", and 81% that "special interest groups have more influence over election outcomes than voters".[217]


According to an October 2020 poll, eight out of ten Americans consider misinformation a "major problem";[218] Biden supporters were more likely than Trump supporters to trust the news media and their candidate's messaging.[218][219]


Historian Timothy Snyder, an expert on authoritarianism, said that "it's important not to talk about this as just an election. It's an election surrounded by the authoritarian language of a coup d'etat. [...] [Trump] seems pretty sure he won't win the election, [but] he doesn't want to leave the office." According to Snyder, in order to overcome Trump's "authoritarian's instinct", the opposition "has to win the election and it has to win the aftermath of the election."[220]


According to political scientist Gary C. Jacobson, "The 2020 elections extended several long-term trends in American electoral politics that were driven to new extremes by the singularly divisive person and presidency of Donald J. Trump. The election set new records for electoral continuity, party loyalty, nationalization, polarization, and presidential influence on the down-ballot vote choices, to the point where local factors such as incumbency, candidate quality, and campaign spending barely registered in the congressional election results."[221]

Attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election

Russian interference in the 2020 United States elections

Voter suppression in the United States, 2019–2020

Astor, Maggie (September 25, 2020), , The New York Times

"'A Failed System': What It's Like to Vote With a Disability During a Pandemic"

Marks, Joseph (September 28, 2020), , The Washington Post

"Here are five big things election experts are really worried about"

, The Economist, UK, October 10, 2020

"American democracy: The spreading scourge of voter suppression"

, BBC News, UK, October 16, 2020

"US sees record-breaking early voting numbers"

Thompson, Stuart A. (October 19, 2020), , The New York Times, Pay attention to these five things when you vote

"How Could Your Ballot Be Rejected? Let Us Count the Ways"

(October 26, 2020), "20,000 Ballots an Hour, With Paper and Ink by the Ton", The New York Times. (Photos depicting printing of paper ballots)

Payne, Christopher

, Ncsl.org, Washington, D.C.: National Conference of State Legislatures, State legislation related to the administration of elections introduced in 2011 through this year, 2020

"State Elections Legislation Database"

of the American Library Association, Voting & Elections Toolkits, Reference guides for each state

Government Documents Round Table

McDonald, Michael P., , U.S. Elections Project, Detailed state statistics

"2020 General Election Early Vote Statistics"