Nationalized Strategies for Local Campaigns

This chapter examines how congressional candidates have adapted their electoral strategies to meet the challenges of nationalization. The chapter combines television advertising data with information on office seekers and their constituencies to provide a richer look into campaign messaging from 2008-2020. I use regression analysis and other techniques to examine candidate behavior to understand how district demographics and other factors shape officeholder strategies. In addition to these broader trends, I engage in a more thorough examination of candidate behavior during the 2008 elections. Using original data on candidate advertising, the 2008 case study finds that policy, rather than local spending or other pork, dominates credit claiming messages. One consequence of this electoral strategy is a further nationalization of political engagement. Voters are conditioned to think about politics as a contest between two distinct, national teams, with the result carrying profound policy repercussions at both the federal and local level.