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United States House election in Vermont, 2020 (August 11 Democratic primary)

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Vermont's At-Large Congressional District
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Democratic primary
Republican primary
General election
Election details
Filing deadline: May 28, 2020
Primary: August 11, 2020
General: November 3, 2020
Pre-election incumbent:
Peter Welch (D)
How to vote
Poll times: Open between 5 a.m. to 10 a.m.; close at 7 p.m.
Voting in Vermont
Race ratings
Cook Political Report: Solid Democratic
Inside Elections: Solid Democratic
Sabato's Crystal Ball: Safe Democratic
Ballotpedia analysis
U.S. Senate battlegrounds
U.S. House battlegrounds
Federal and state primary competitiveness
Ballotpedia's Election Analysis Hub, 2020
See also
Vermont's At-Large Congressional District
At-large
Vermont elections, 2020
U.S. Congress elections, 2020
U.S. Senate elections, 2020
U.S. House elections, 2020


The 2020 U.S. House of Representatives elections in Vermont took place on November 3, 2020. Voters elected one candidate to serve in the U.S. House from the state's at-large congressional district. This page focuses on the Democratic primary that took place in Vermont on August 11, 2020.

Click here for more information about the Republican primary.

Candidate filing deadline Primary election General election
May 28, 2020
August 11, 2020
November 3, 2020


Heading into the election the incumbent was Democrat Peter Welch, who was first elected in 2006.

A primary election is an election in which registered voters select a candidate that they believe should be a political party's candidate for elected office to run in the general election. They are also used to choose convention delegates and party leaders. Primaries are state-level and local-level elections that take place prior to a general election. Vermont utilizes an open primary system, in which registered voters do not have to be members of a party to vote in that party's primary.[1][2]

For information about which offices are nominated via primary election, see this article.

Election procedure changes in 2020

See also: Changes to election dates, procedures, and administration in response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, 2020

Ballotpedia provided comprehensive coverage of how election dates and procedures changed in 2020. While the majority of changes occurred as a result of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, some changes occurred for other reasons.

Vermont modified its primary election process as follows:

  • Candidate filing procedures: The candidate petition signature gathering requirements were suspended for the primary election.
  • Voting procedures: Mail-in ballots request forms sent to all registered voters in the primary election.

For a full timeline about election modifications made in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, click here.


Candidates and election results

At-large district

Democratic primary election

Democratic primary for U.S. House Vermont At-large District

Candidate
%
Votes
✔
Image of Peter Welch
Peter Welch
 
95.5
 
101,566
Silhouette Placeholder Image.png
Submit photo
Ralph Corbo
 
4.3
 
4,599
 Other/Write-in votes
 
0.2
 
237

Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source

Total votes: 106,402
(100.00% precincts reporting)
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.

Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

Pivot Counties

See also: Pivot Counties by state

One of 14 Vermont counties—7.14 percent—is a Pivot County. Pivot Counties are counties that voted for Barack Obama (D) in 2008 and 2012 and for Donald Trump (R) in 2016. Altogether, the nation had 206 Pivot Counties, with most being concentrated in upper midwestern and northeastern states.

Counties won by Trump in 2016 and Obama in 2012 and 2008
County Trump margin of victory in 2016 Obama margin of victory in 2012 Obama margin of victory in 2008
Essex County, Vermont 16.65% 13.40% 14.48%

In the 2016 presidential election, Hillary Clinton (D) won Vermont with 56.7 percent of the vote. Donald Trump (R) received 30.3 percent. In presidential elections between 1900 and 2016, Vermont cast votes for the winning presidential candidate 60.0 percent of the time. In that same time frame, Vermont supported Republican candidates for president more often than Democratic candidates, 70.0 to 26.7 percent. The state, however, favored Democrats in every election between between 2000 and 2016.

Presidential results by legislative district

The following table details results of the 2012 and 2016 presidential elections by state House districts in Vermont. Click [show] to expand the table. The "Obama," "Romney," "Clinton," and "Trump" columns describe the percent of the vote each presidential candidate received in the district. The "2012 Margin" and "2016 Margin" columns describe the margin of victory between the two presidential candidates in those years. The "Party Control" column notes which party held that seat heading into the 2018 general election. Data on the results of the 2012 and 2016 presidential elections broken down by state legislative districts was compiled by Daily Kos.[3][4]

In 2012, Barack Obama (D) won all 104 state House districts in Vermont with an average margin of victory of 35.6 points. In 2016, Hillary Clinton (D) won 92 out of 104 state House districts in Vermont with an average margin of victory of 29.4 points. Clinton won 27 districts controlled by Republicans heading into the 2018 elections.
In 2016, Donald Trump (R) won 12 out of 104 state House districts in Vermont with an average margin of victory of 6.1 points.

District analysis

See also: The Cook Political Report's Partisan Voter Index
See also: FiveThirtyEight's elasticity scores

The 2017 Cook Partisan Voter Index for this district is D+15, meaning that in the previous two presidential elections, this district's results were 15 percentage points more Democratic than the national average. This made Vermont's At-Large Congressional District the 89th most Democratic nationally.[5]

FiveThirtyEight's September 2018 elasticity score for states and congressional districts measured "how sensitive it is to changes in the national political environment." This district's elasticity score was 1.12. This means that for every 1 point the national political mood moved toward a party, the district was expected to move 1.12 points toward that party.[6]

Campaign finance

The chart below contains data from financial reports submitted to the Federal Election Commission.

Name Party Receipts* Disbursements** Cash on hand Date
Peter Welch Democratic Party $852,094 $869,591 $2,107,741 As of December 31, 2020
Ralph Corbo Democratic Party $0 $0 $0 Data not available***

Source: Federal Elections Commission, "Campaign finance data," 2020. This product uses the openFEC API but is not endorsed or certified by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

* According to the FEC, "Receipts are anything of value (money, goods, services or property) received by a political committee."
** According to the FEC, a disbursement "is a purchase, payment, distribution, loan, advance, deposit or gift of money or anything of value to influence a federal election," plus other kinds of payments not made to influence a federal election.
*** Candidate either did not report any receipts or disbursements to the FEC, or Ballotpedia did not find an FEC candidate ID.


General election race ratings

See also: Race rating definitions and methods

Ballotpedia provides race ratings from four outlets: The Cook Political Report, Inside Elections, Sabato's Crystal Ball, and DDHQ/The Hill. Each race rating indicates if one party is perceived to have an advantage in the race and, if so, the degree of advantage:

  • Safe and Solid ratings indicate that one party has a clear edge and the race is not competitive.
  • Likely ratings indicate that one party has a clear edge, but an upset is possible.
  • Lean ratings indicate that one party has a small edge, but the race is competitive.[7]
  • Toss-up ratings indicate that neither party has an advantage.

Race ratings are informed by a number of factors, including polling, candidate quality, and election result history in the race's district or state.[8][9][10]

Race ratings: Vermont's At-large Congressional District election, 2020
Race trackerRace ratings
November 3, 2020October 27, 2020October 20, 2020October 13, 2020
The Cook Political ReportSolid DemocraticSolid DemocraticSolid DemocraticSolid Democratic
Inside Elections with Nathan L. GonzalesSolid DemocraticSolid DemocraticSolid DemocraticSolid Democratic
Larry J. Sabato's Crystal BallSafe DemocraticSafe DemocraticSafe DemocraticSafe Democratic
Note: Ballotpedia updates external race ratings every week throughout the election season.

See also

Footnotes

  1. ↑ NCSL,"State Primary Election Types," accessed October 4, 2024
  2. ↑ Vermont Secretary of State,"Party Organization," accessed October 4, 2024
  3. ↑ Daily Kos, "Daily Kos Elections' statewide election results by congressional and legislative districts," July 9, 2013
  4. ↑ Daily Kos, "Daily Kos Elections' 2016 presidential results for congressional and legislative districts," February 6, 2017
  5. ↑ Cook Political Report, "Introducing the 2017 Cook Political Report Partisan Voter Index," April 7, 2017
  6. ↑ FiveThirtyEight, "Election Update: The Most (And Least) Elastic States And Districts," September 6, 2018
  7. ↑ Inside Elections also uses Tilt ratings to indicate an even smaller advantage and greater competitiveness.
  8. ↑ Amee LaTour, "Email correspondence with Nathan Gonzalez," April 19, 2018
  9. ↑ Amee LaTour, "Email correspondence with Kyle Kondik," April 19, 2018
  10. ↑ Amee LaTour, "Email correspondence with Charlie Cook," April 22, 2018


Vermont's current delegation to the United States Congress
Senators
Bernie Sanders (I)
Peter Welch (D)
Representatives
Democratic Party (2)
Independent (1)


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