What Is Split-Ticket Voting and How Did It Impact 2024 Election?

Political candidates in the U.S. often hope that if their party runs a wildly popular presidential nominee that success will trickle down from the top of the ballot to statewide races.
Sometimes, presidential candidates can give their parties a boost in other contests, but other times, the mostly dormant phenomenon of ticket-splitting thwarts those plans.
When voters split their tickets, they cast ballots for candidates of opposing parties in the same election. The practice has become increasingly rare in a hyper-partisan climate, but even with a White House victory for Republicans, some state Democrats are coming out on top.
Donald Trump was declared the president-elect early Wednesday after he won the Electoral College and was on track to take the popular vote. In at least four states, however, voters have made clear that their support for Trump doesn’t necessarily translate to the rest of the GOP.
North Carolina was the first of the battleground states to be called for Trump on Tuesday night, but even before the presidential race was called in the Tar Heel State, Democrat Josh Stein defeated Republican Mark Robinson, who was endorsed by Trump, in the governor’s race. Stein won by a 14.6-point margin.
Trump was also declared the winner Michigan and Wisconsin early Wednesday. The Democratic Senate candidates in both states also eked out victories over their GOP opponents.
Representative Elissa Slotkin held the Democrats’ seat in Michigan after defeating former GOP Representative Mike Rogers by just 0.3 points, while Senator Tammy Baldwin won reelection over Republican Eric Hovde in Wisconsin by 0.9 points.
There’s still a chance that ticket-splitting will be observed in Arizona and Pennsylvania, where Senate races are neck-in-neck. Pennsylvania was the state that secured Trump’s 2024 victory. The president-elect is also leading in Arizona with 108,000 votes with 64 percent of the vote in.
In 2020, only voters in three states split their vote. Vermont and New Hampshire reelected their Republican governors, Phil Scott and Chris Sununu, respectively, while sending Democrat Joe Biden to the White House. Voters in Maine, who backed Biden’s presidential bid, also reelected Republican Senator Susan Collins.
In 2016, there was no split-ticket voting in Senate races and the presidential contest. But there were five states that backed Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaign and also voted for a Republican governor or backed Trump while electing a Democratic governor
The states that voted for GOP governors included Vermont and New Hampshire, which voted for Scott and Sununu, respectively. The states that elected Democratic governors included Montana, which reelected Stephen Bullock, North Carolina, which flipped the governor’s office with the election of Roy Cooper, and West Virginia, which elected Jim Justice. Justice, who was a registered Republican before running for governor, ran as a Democrat and switched his affiliation back to the GOP seven months after taking office.
In 2012, six states split their tickets in eight races. Montana and Missouri elected Democrats to the governor’s office and the Senate but backed Republican Mitt Romney for president. Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer, Montana Senator Jon Tester, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon and Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill were all reelected.
Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker fended off a recall attempt in 2012, while the state backed Democratic President Barack Obama’s reelection bid.
Democratic Senator Joe Donnelly of Indiana was also reelected in 2012 while Democrat Heidi Heitkamp won North Dakota’s Senate race. Both states went to Romney in the presidential election. Republican Senator Dean Heller of Nevada won reelection in 2012, the same year that his state voted for Obama.
Ticket-splitting has also been observed in midterm elections, when the presidency is not up for grabs.
In 2022, there were six states that voted for a senator of one party and a governor of another. The states that elected a Democratic senator and Republican governor included Vermont, New Hampshire, Georgia and Nevada. The states that elected a Republican senator and Democratic governor included Kansas and Wisconsin.