The forthcoming article “Evaluating (in)experience in congressional elections” by Rachel Porter and Sarah A. Treul is summarized by the author below.
Candidates for U.S. Congress with a history of holding elective office (as city councilors, state legislators, mayors, etc.) are thought to have a sizeable electoral advantage over candidates lacking an elected background. Having run and won office before, experienced candidates have an established campaign infrastructure and network of donors they can draw on from their campaign’s outset. Experienced candidates also benefit from their public service reputation because voters attribute desirable traits like honesty, integrity, and competence to candidates with an elected background. Because experienced candidates systematically beat amateurs in elections, prior elected experience has become the standard indicator for challenger “quality” in congressional research.
Our paper asks whether experienced candidates still possess an electoral “edge” over amateurs. To do this, we compiled data on the political backgrounds, personal characteristics, and campaign fundraising for all candidates who appeared on the ballot for the U.S. House of Representatives between 1980 and 2020. We uncover a surprising finding: candidates without prior elected experience are entering the U.S. House today at rates not seen since the widespread adoption of primaries. From the early 1980s to mid-2010s, three-quarters of newly elected House members possessed elected experience; conversely, just half of freshmen members elected from 2016 to 2020 held prior office.
We attribute this decline in the proportion of experienced candidates entering Congress to electoral losses. Experienced candidates today are more often failing to gain their party’s nomination in safely partisan open seats and, instead, are losing to amateurs who go on to win uncompetitive general elections. We investigate why experienced candidates are losing more often and show that, in modern elections, amateurs increasingly possess the kinds of electoral benefits that have traditionally advantaged experienced candidates. In particular, we find that amateurs compose the majority of top campaign fundraisers today. We also find that amateurs now possess the kinds of valence characteristics that give candidates an advantage in congressional elections. Among Republicans, we find that candidates are advantaged if they are political “outsiders” with no experience in politics—elected or otherwise. Among Democrats, we find that candidates are advantaged if they are female or non-white. Notably, the vast majority of female and non-white Democrats running and winning today lack elected experience.
Our findings offer a reconsideration of long-held theories regarding candidate success in congressional elections. Our work aligns with trends documented within American and comparative politics toward growing public dissatisfaction with politicians and anti-establishment sentiment among voters. Lastly, this article raises important questions about the implications of electing political amateurs to Congress.
About the Author(s): Rachel Porter is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame and Sarah A. Treul is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Their research “Evaluating (in)experience in congressional elections” is now available in Early View and will appear in a forthcoming issue of the American Journal of Political Science.
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