======================================================================================================================= DOCUMENTATION FOR 2026 GENERAL ELECTION TURNOUT RATES Version: 0.1 Date: 11/1/2026 Author: Michael McDonald, Professor of Political Science, University of Florida These data are released under an Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ ======================================================================================================================= ============ VARIABLES ============ STATE ======= Long state name. STATE_ABV ======= State two-letter postal abbreviation. TOTAL_BALLOTS_COUNTED ======= TBD SOURCE ======= Source for total ballots counted. Note that links may not persist. TBD VAP ======= Voting-age population. Residential population age 18 and older. Source: Census Bureau's National and State Population Estimates, Vintage 2025 (nc-est2025-syasexn.xlsx national; sc-est2025-alldata6.csv state), extrapolated to Nov. 1, 2026. NONCITIZEN_PCT ======= Percent non-citizen. Source: Non-citizen VAP estimates from the 2025 1-Year American Community Survey (table B05003). INELIGIBLE_PRISON ======= Ineligible felons in prison. A '0' or Null denotes a state either does not disenfranchise felony prisoners or has no felony prisoners (this is true for DC). Starting in 2010, the Bureau of Justice Statistics began reporting noncitizen prison populations and voting-age populations. I subtract these populations from the prison statistics. California, Oregon, and Rhode Island suppress their noncitizen prisoner counts; for these three states I substitute the state's own ACS noncitizen-VAP percentage as a proxy. Source for prison statistics: Year-end 2023 DOJ prison report, available at: https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/prisoners-2023-statistical-tables Source for state felon disenfranchisement laws: National Conference of State Legislatures. See: https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/felon-voting-rights INELIGIBLE_PROBATION ======= Ineligible felons who are on probation. A '0' denotes a state does not disenfranchise felons on probation. Source for probation statistics: Year-end 2024 DOJ probation and parole report, available at: https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/probation-and-parole-united-states-2024 METHODOLOGY CHANGE from the 2024 file: this version uses BJS's actual state-level felony-probation counts (Appendix Table 7, "Adults on felony probation, by jurisdiction, 2024") directly, rather than applying a flat national adjustment (e.g., a 2022-based DOJ estimate used through the 2024 v0.4 file). State-level felony probation figures are now reported directly by BJS, so a national adjustment is no longer needed. Source for state felon disenfranchisement laws: National Conference of State Legislatures. See: https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/felon-voting-rights MISSOURI LAW CHANGE (2026): Missouri's HB 1871 (signed July 13, 2026; effective Aug. 28, 2026) restores voting rights to most people on probation or parole, excluding only those serving probation/parole for murder, sex offenses, child endangerment, assault, incest, or election-related crimes. Per Michael's instruction (2026-10-31), Since I cannot differentiate the number of qualifying felons, Missouri's INELIGIBLE_PROBATION and INELIGIBLE_PAROLE are both coded as 0 for this file (same convention as every other non-disenfranchising state), rather than using a modeled remaining ~20% exclusion. INELIGIBLE_PAROLE ======= Ineligible felons who are on parole. A '0' denotes a state does not disenfranchise felons on parole. Maine has no parole system (abolished); coded as 0. Source for parole statistics: Year-end 2024 DOJ probation and parole report, available at: https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/probation-and-parole-united-states-2024 Source for state felon disenfranchisement laws: National Conference of State Legislatures. See: https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/felon-voting-rights INELIGIBLE_FELONS_TOTAL ======= Total number of ineligible felons, the sum of INELIGIBLE_PRISON + INELIGIBLE_PROBATION + INELIGIBLE_PAROLE Notes: - I do not have a reliable method of estimating the number of felons who are subjected to some form of post-correctional disenfranchisement, so I choose not to make this adjustment. - For the national (United States) row only, I add the number of prisoners, felony probationers, and parolees in federal custody/supervision (not attributable to any one state) to the respective national totals, net of federal noncitizen prisoners for INELIGIBLE_PRISON. This is an expansion of the 2024 methodology, which added federal prisoners only; federal probation and parole counts are now added to the national total the same way (per Michael, 2026-10-31). ELIGIBLE_OVERSEAS ======= Eligible overseas citizens, including overseas citizen civilians and military stationed abroad. 2,435,187 total: 1) Non-military civilians: 2,242,429, from Federal Voting Assistance Program's 2024 Overseas Citizen Population Analysis (OCPA) Technical Report - FVAP's actual 2024 estimate used for 2026, available at: https://www.fvap.gov/uploads/FVAP/Reports/2024_OCPA-Technical-Report.pdf This supersedes the figure used in the 2024 file ("2.8 million as of 2022, extrapolated to 3.1 million for 2024"): the 2024 OCPA's own historical table shows the 2022 OCVAP at 2,210,950, not 2.8 million, so FVAP appears to have revised its entire 2010-2024 series under this report's model - the older citation is superseded, not just stale. 2) Military: 192,758 active-duty and Guard/Reserve personnel stationed abroad as of December 2025 (Defense Manpower Data Center data, via USAFacts), replacing the 2024 file's 225,175 figure (a June 2024 DoD report). Excludes the 28,841 DoD civilians in that same December 2025 release - those should already be captured by the FVAP civilian model above, consistent with the 2024 file's own reasoning for adding military separately (host- country citizen counts tend to undercount on-base military personnel, not DoD civilian employees). Notes: - I do not have a reliable method of apportioning eligible overseas voters to the states, so I choose not to estimate state-level overseas eligible populations. VEP ======= Voting-eligible population. For state VEP estimates use the following calculation: VAP*(1-NONCITIZEN_PCT) - INELIGIBLE_FELONS_TOTAL. For national VEP estimates use the following calculation: VAP*(1-NONCITIZEN_PCT) - INELIGIBLE_FELONS_TOTAL + OVERSEAS_ELIGIBLE VEP_TURNOUT_RATE ======= Turnout rate for those eligible to vote. Calculated as TOTAL_BALLOTS_COUNTED/VEP TBD VAP_TURNOUT_RATE ======= Turnout rate for those of voting-age. Calculated as TOTAL_BALLOTS_COUNTED/VAP Note: - The VEP turnout rate is the preferred turnout rate. I provide VAP turnout rates for some stakeholders, such as pollsters, who use VAP turnout rates. TBD