Will Your Elected Officials in Congress Accept the Results of the Election?
We are in the final days of a momentous presidential election between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Do you know whether your elected officials will accept the outcome?
WIRED reached out to every single senator and member of the US Congress asking whether they would accept the results of the election as called by the Associated Press. Why the AP? Because in the absence of a national election authority, calls made by the AP—a nonprofit cooperative—have long been accepted as authoritative. We wanted something politically neutral, particularly because some local and state-level officials have indicated that they may not certify the results.
You can look up your zip code or state in the search bar below to find your congressional representative and senator, as well as their response to our question about whether they will accept the AP’s results. In some instances, your zip code may not match your current congressional district, as district boundaries can change over time.
We organized the legislators’ responses into three categories: those who will accept the results of the elections as reported by the AP, those who won’t, and those who have not responded. This is a living document, and we will continue to update it with responses from representatives as we continue to receive them. When possible, we are also including the full responses from lawmakers to add further context to their responses. For instance, some lawmakers may say that they will accept the results when states certify but not based on the AP call.
A note is attached to the results of all lawmakers who signed the “Unity Commitment” in September, vowing to certify the results after “all legal means” to challenge the outcome “have been exhausted.” Additionally, the results indicate if a lawmaker previously declared a commitment “to certifying the election results” as part of a USA Today poll conducted in mid-October.
It’s the first presidential election since the January 6, 2021, insurrection, when Trump supporters stormed the Capitol and baselessly claimed the election had been stolen.
In the interceding years, election denial has gone from being the purview of fringe conspiracists to a staple of major figures on the American right. Trump has already indicated plans to challenge election results this year, and hundreds of Republican candidates for office have cast doubt on them as well. Senator JD Vance of Ohio, the Republican vice presidential candidate, has said that he would not have certified the 2020 election unless states had sent alternative pro-Trump electors.
Election officials across the country have delayed or refused the certification of state and local election results. Conspiracy theories about the results of the 2024 election have already flooded the internet, as election denial groups, the Trump campaign, and people such as billionaire and X owner Elon Musk have spread falsehoods about election fraud.
In the face of the proven willingness of Trump and his allies to attempt to seize power after losing an election, a statement from elected officials that they will accept the results of the election as declared by a neutral arbiter is critical information for voters preparing to cast their ballots.
Dell Cameron, Vittoria Elliott, Leah Feiger, David Gilbert, Makena Kelly, and Dhruv Mehrotra contributed to this project.
