Abstract
Confusing ballots muddle the connection between voter intentions and votes, diminishing the ability of elections to facilitate representation in political institutions. This motivates our examination of the 2018 midterm election in Florida, where the ballot used in Broward County yielded an abnormally high number of undervotes in Florida’s United States Senate race. We offer cross-sectional and temporal analyses that eliminate explanations for Broward’s Senate undervote that do not turn on ballot design. Respectively, these analyses compare Broward County and its precincts to other counties and their precincts and compare elections in 2016 with those in 2018. Our purview also extends beyond Florida to states that had Senate and gubernatorial elections in 2018. We generate counterfactual estimates of Senate vote totals had Broward County used a conventional ballot in 2018, and our counterfactual results lie in statistical purgatory. They show neither that the Broward County ballot was pivotal to the Senate election outcome nor rule out this possibility.