Who Donates to Party Switchers?

Abstract

What are the causal effects of legislative party switching on campaign fundraising? Using a selection-on-observables strategy (a first in the study of U.S. party switchers), we demonstrate that relative to other similarly situated legislators, party switchers rely more heavily on partisan and ideological, out-of-district individual donors, and direct party contributions. In short, switchers—in trying to alleviate the electoral costs of switching—rely disproportionately on donors motivated to protect vulnerable incumbents of a particular party. We conclude with a discussion of how these dynamics reinforce partisan polarization and raise normative questions about representation and the role of the “surrogate constituency.”

Profiles in party switching: The case of Southern Party activists

“…In contemporary U.S. party politics, the South has undergone the greatest partisan change Black, 2002, 2007;Hood, Kidd, and Morris, 2012;McKee, 2019), and most studies on party switching emphasize the region, but as mentioned, scholarship primarily addresses D-to-R switchers (e.g., Hamel and Yoshinaka, 2020;Yoshinaka, 2012Yoshinaka, , 2016. With the use of the SGPA data, we evaluate party switching going in both directions when the GOP was ascendant (McKee and Yoshinaka, 2015).…”

Perfect timing: Leveraging the timing of defection to assess the effect of electoral rules on party switching

“…Several other studies report similar results. For example, Hamel and Yoshinaka (2020) show that defectors' within-district support takes a dip and they have to rely disproportionately on partisan donors from outside their district. In terms of increased electoral competitiveness, Grose and Yoshinaka (2003) find that the first post switch election attracts higher quality candidates from both the opposition and within party.…”

“…Empirically, there is significant evidence to suggest that party defectors are less likely to be voted back into office (Gherghina, 2016; Grose and Yoshinaka, 2003; Hamel and Yoshinaka, 2020; Heller and Mershon, 2005; Kerevel, 2017; Mershon and Shvetsova, 2013b; Samuels, 2000; Shabad and Slomczynski, 2004). Why do defectors perform worse than party loyalists?…”

“…This approach alleviates the concern that unobserved between-country heterogeneity may drive the results. Other recent studies focus on between-individual heterogeneity, and employ matching techniques to more tightly control for legislator characteristics (Hamel and Yoshinaka, 2020; Hott and Sakurai, 2020; Kerevel, 2017). This technique is useful in that it can reduce imbalances or systematic differences in the distributions of covariates between party switchers and party loyalists.…”

“…There are close to two dozens within country studies, among them Desposato (2006), Desposato and Scheiner (2008), Gherghina (2016), Giannetti and Laver (2001), Grose and Yoshinaka (2003), Hamel and Yoshinaka (2020), Heller and Mershon (2005, 2008), Kerevel (2017), Klein (2016), McElroy (2009), McElroy and Benoit (2009), McLaughlin (2012), Mershon and Shvetsova (2008), Mershon (2008), Pinto (2015), Radean (2019), Reed and Scheiner (2003), Thames (2007), etc. While a notable presence, there are fewer cross-national studies; among them Klein (2018, 2019); Mershon and Shvetsova (2013a, 2013b); O’Brien and Shomer (2013); Volpi (2019), etc.…”