EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In Focus 2018: Campaign Evaluations in West Virginia, Illinois, and Nevada DATE PRESENTED TO: PRESENTED BY: May 14, 2019 Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation The Public Affairs and Media Research Department and The Social Data Collaboratory NORC | IN FOCUS 2018: CAMPAIGN EVALUATIONS IN WEST VIRGINIA, ILLINOIS, AND NEVADA Table of Contents Overview of Study Objectives and Approach ......................................................................... 4 Campaign Monitoring and Survey Research ....................................................................... 5 Twitter Analysis ................................................................................................................... 6 Key Findings ............................................................................................................................. 7 Survey and Campaign Monitoring: Summary of Findings ..................................................... 9 Research Question 1 ............................................................................................... 10 Similarities across states ....................................................................................10 Differences across states ...................................................................................11 West Virginia ..............................................................................................11 Illinois .........................................................................................................11 Nevada .......................................................................................................12 Research Question 2 ............................................................................................... 12 Similarities across states ....................................................................................12 Differences across states ...................................................................................15 West Virginia ..............................................................................................15 Illinois .........................................................................................................16 Nevada .......................................................................................................16 Research Question 3 ............................................................................................... 16 Similarities across states ....................................................................................16 Differences across states ...................................................................................17 West Virginia ..............................................................................................17 Illinois .........................................................................................................17 Nevada .......................................................................................................17 Research Question 4 ............................................................................................... 18 Twitter: Summary of Findings ................................................................................................ 19 Twitter: West Virginia Findings .......................................................................................... 19 Twitter: Illinois Findings ..................................................................................................... 20 Twitter: Nevada Findings .................................................................................................. 21 Twitter: Overall Abortion Narrative .................................................................................... 21 Overview of Twitter Data – Abortion Topic – Illinois, Nevada, West Virginia...................... 22 Characterizing Message Source .............................................................................. 25 Amount of Tweets by Source ................................................................................... 25 Average Twitter Activity by Source .......................................................................... 26 Engagement Overall and by State .................................................................................... 27 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | I NORC | IN FOCUS 2018: CAMPAIGN EVALUATIONS IN WEST VIRGINIA, ILLINOIS, AND NEVADA Twitter Messaging Source: Takeaways .................................................................... 27 Twitter: Characterizing Message Sentiment ............................................................. 27 Twitter Message Sentiment: Takeaways .................................................................. 28 Twitter: Sentiment over time ............................................................................................. 28 Twitter Message Sentiment over Time: Takeaways ................................................. 29 Twitter: State-level Trends in Pro-choice Versus Pro-life Sentiment ........................ 30 Twitter Message Sentiment by State over Time: Takeaways ................................... 31 Twitter: Top National Hashtags ................................................................................ 32 Methodology............................................................................................................................ 34 Qualitative Campaign Monitoring ...................................................................................... 34 Collection and Analysis Processes .......................................................................... 34 Campaign and relevant organizations’ websites and Facebook pages ...............35 Campaign and relevant organizations’ emails ....................................................35 Debate transcripts ..............................................................................................36 Political advertisements .....................................................................................36 Campaign, candidate and relevant organization tweets .....................................36 Media coverage .................................................................................................37 Campaign contributions .....................................................................................37 Twitter Analysis ................................................................................................................. 38 Data Collection ........................................................................................................ 38 Comprehensiveness of the keywords.................................................................40 Twitter: Sentiment Classification .............................................................................. 41 Source Coding ...................................................................................................42 Source Sample ..................................................................................................43 Bot Filter ............................................................................................................43 Top terms and hashtags by source ....................................................................44 Identifying West Virginia Amendment 1 Predictive Terms ........................................ 44 State-Level Surveys .......................................................................................................... 44 AmeriSpeak Sample ................................................................................................ 44 TargetSmart Sample ................................................................................................ 44 Field Period, Respondent Screening and Weighting ................................................ 47 Analysis ................................................................................................................... 49 Voter Validation ....................................................................................................... 49 Appendix ................................................................................................................................. 50 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | II NORC | IN FOCUS 2018: CAMPAIGN EVALUATIONS IN WEST VIRGINIA, ILLINOIS, AND NEVADA List of Exhibits Percentage of candidates’ campaign content that was related to abortion .................................. 9 Considerable inconsistency among voters in party identification and abortion attitudes ............ 10 Republican pro-choice voters were more likely to cross party lines than Democratic pro-life voters ........................................................................................................................................ 11 Abortion ranked lower on the issue priority list and was more important for Democrats in Nevada and Illinois .................................................................................................................... 13 Almost no difference between pro-choice and pro-life voters in candidate personality traits they value ......................................................................................................................................... 14 Abortion was a higher priority for pro-life than pro-choice voters in West Virginia and Illinois .... 15 No difference between pro-choice and pro-life voters in campaign engagement ....................... 18 Weekly volume of abortion-related tweets in the