Working Paper: NBER ID: w28849
Authors: Thomas Fujiwara; Karsten Müller; Carlo Schwarz
Abstract: We study how social media affects election outcomes in the United States. We use variation in the number of Twitter users across counties induced by early adopters at the 2007 South by Southwest (SXSW) festival, a key event in Twitter's rise to popularity. We show that this variation is unrelated to observable county characteristics and electoral outcomes before the launch of Twitter. Our results indicate that Twitter lowered the Republican vote share in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, but had limited effects on Congress elections and previous presidential elections. Evidence from survey data, primary elections, and a text analysis of millions of tweets suggests that Twitter's relatively liberal content may have persuaded voters with moderate views to vote against Donald Trump.
Keywords: Social Media; Elections; Political Polarization
JEL Codes: D72
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Twitter adoption (D16) | Republican vote share (D72) |
| 10% increase in Twitter users (F69) | decrease in Republican vote share (K16) |
| Twitter users (D16) | electoral performance of candidates (D79) |
| Political content on Twitter (D72) | persuading moderate voters against Trump (D72) |