U.S. Elections & Voters

Many Americans support the idea of several election policies, including same-day and automatic voter registration. This election, voters in many states weighed in on specific ballot measures.

Latinos made up an estimated 11% of all voters nationwide on Election Day, nearly matching their share of the U.S. eligible voter population.

There were wide differences in voting preferences between men and women, whites and nonwhites, as well as people with more and less educational attainment.

White evangelical or born-again Christians backed GOP candidates for the House at about the same rate in 2014. Religious "nones" and Jewish voters again largely backed Democratic candidates.

Many of the millions of Americans voting in Tuesday's midterm elections will have to do so while working around the demands of their jobs – hitting their polling places before work, taking an extra-long lunch break or going afterward and hoping to make it before the polls close. As they stand in line, many of them may wonder why it is that the United States votes on a Tuesday, of all days.

Some 44% of liberal Democrats say they have used social media in the past year to encourage others to take action on an issue that was important to them. A similar share (43%) have taken part in a group that shares their interest in a cause.

Voters are more enthusiastic about voting than in any midterm election in over 20 years of Pew Research Center polling. Still, millions of Americans will not exercise their right to vote on Tuesday.

More Hispanic registered voters say they have given “quite a lot” of thought to the upcoming midterm elections compared with four years ago and are more enthusiastic to vote this year than in previous congressional elections. But they lag behind the general public on some measures of voter engagement.

With this year’s midterm elections just a week away, here are some key findings from Pew Research Center surveys over the past several months about some of the dynamics and issues shaping the battle for Congress.

On election night 2018, besides the exit polls there will be an additional source of data on who voted and why, developed by The Associated Press, Fox News and NORC at the University of Chicago and based on a very different methodology. That means that depending on where you go for election news, you may get a somewhat different portrait of this year's electorate.