Oregon Voter Records
Individual-level data on all citizens who are registered to vote in the State of Oregon. Voter files include registration status, voting activity, as well as geographic information.
All citizens of the state of Oregon who have either voted or registered to vote for a statewide election
Access
Individual-level, identified voter record data are available to the public upon request. Those who wish to access these data must submit this electronic form to the Elections Division within the Office of the Oregon Secretary of State, or they may contact any county elections official. Requests for a hard copy of a less than statewide voter list must be made with the county election officials for each county included in the desired cohort.
Applicants must clarify whether they are requesting only voter registration data or if they would also like voting history data. Requestors must clarify the preferred delivery method (either digitally downloaded via Secure File Transfer Protocol or dropbox site, or put onto a DVD) and confirm that the information delivered will not be used for commercial purposes as detailed in ORS 247.995.
While approval from an Institutional Review Board (IRB) is not required by the state to receive identified data, if researchers expect to link voter records with external data sets, they should confirm IRB requirements with those collaborating data providers. Researchers can direct additional questions to [email protected].
Timeline for Access
The Elections Division is required to acknowledge all data requests within five business days, and deliver completed data requests as soon as possible, but no later than 10 business days after acknowledgment. The timeline for delivery of custom data requests varies and is typically dependent upon the complexity of the request. The Elections Division will inform the requestor of an estimated completion date when unable to complete a request within ten days.
Lag Time
Voter registration reports are updated at the beginning of each month. Voter history reports are typically available 45 days after each statewide election.
The Elections Division recommends that data requestors contact their office prior to requesting data from a recent election to confirm data availability.
Cost
Oregon voter lists are available at a rate of $500. Voter lists for populations smaller than the entire state are available for a setup fee of $25 plus $0.025 per every 100 records.
Linking
Researchers may use the identifiers included in the voter list to link the data to external data sets.
Identifiers Available for Linking
- Address
- Date of birth
- District information
- First and last name
- Middle name
- Residential address
Data Contents
Oregon voter lists includes information regarding registration status, voting activity, voting precinct name, as well as name and address of all citizens who are registered to vote for a statewide election in the state of Oregon. These records do not disclose for which candidates or referenda the individual chose to vote.
Data are delivered in eleven .txt files. Five of these files separate citizens into congressional districts and detail voter registration data. An additional five, also separated by congressional district, detail voting history in all statewide elections since 2006. The final .txt file categorizes all districts by voting precinct and split.
Partial List of Variables
Voter ID, first name, middle name, last name, birth date, party code, phone number, county, residential address(es), absentee type, precinct name, precinct election result.
J-PAL Randomized Evaluations Using this Data Set
Unknown.
Other Research Using this Data Set
Southwell, Prischilla L. and Justin Burchett. 2000. “The Effect of All-Mail Elections on Voter Turnout” American Politics Quarterly. 29(1): 72-80. doi: 10.1177/1532673X00028001004.
Other Documentation
Baicker, Katherine and Amy Finkelstein. 2015. “Oregon Health Insurance Experiment Analysis Plan: Evidence from Voting Data” National Bureau of Economic Research.