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Candidates Flunk 20-Year Study of Political Courage

2012 October 29

PROJECT VOTE SMART HEADQUARTERS (October 30, 2012) – A  20-year study of over 15,000 congressional candidates and their willingness to answer questions on the major issues facing the nation finds some states' candidates consistently performing worse than others, no matter when, how, or by whom they were asked.


Beginning in 1992, and as part of a collaboration with 200 news organizations and prominent leaders of both major parties, Vote Smart's Political Courage Test has pressed each candidate to answer a series of issue questions known to be at the top of the public's mind and most likely to come up in the next legislative session (view the 2012 Political Courage Test, Congressional Edition).


The study is based on the number of U.S. House and Senate candidates willing to state their positions through the Political Courage Test over the course of 11 election cycles (1992-2012); see below for the best and worst performing states:


Top 5

% of Candidates Showing Political Courage, '92 - '12

Bottom 5

% of Candidates Showing Political Courage, '92 - '12

1. Montana

73%

50. Wisconsin

35.925%

2. Maine

71%

49. New York

35.932%

3. Idaho

65%

48. Georgia

36%

4. Wyoming

59%

47. Virginia

37.1%

5. Alaska

58%

46. Florida

37.4%

View all Political Courage Test results for both the 1992-2012 study and for the 2012 election season.

This election year marks a record low for candidate return rates as only twenty-three percent (23%) of Congressional candidates nationwide were willing to tell citizens where they ...

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