Starting next week, we’ll begin a series on political streaming. We’ll dive into how it’s bought, best practices and common pitfalls, and what technology is available to political buyers.
If you have topics you’d like us to cover, reply and let me know.
Before we move to streaming, let’s see what campaigns are buying on TV during their Primary Campaigns.
When are the 2026 Primaries?
2026 Primary season starts on 3/3 with Arkansas, North Carolina, and Texas and concludes with Delaware on 9/15.
How many people vote in Primaries?
30% of Americans have voted in at least 1 of the last 4 Primary elections, including Presidential.
Primaries on both sides of the aisle see very low turnout.
Election Year | GOP Turnout | Democrat Turnout | Total Turnout |
|---|---|---|---|
2018 | 9% | 10% | 19% |
2020 | 9% | 14% | 13% |
2022 | 10% | 12% | 22% |
2024 | 8% | 8% | 16% |
In the single highest year, 22% of the 18+ population voted in Primary elections.
How do Primary voters consume media?
Let’s take a look at the 19% of Primary voters who have voted in at least 2 of the last 4 Primary elections for either party.
65% watch some TV
43% are reachable on Cable
72% watch some Streaming
What TV networks do Primary voters watch?
Primary voters across both parties look more alike than I’d expect.
The chart below shows average weekly reach among voters who participated in at least 2 of the last 4 Primaries. An index of 100 means a network reaches this group at the same rate as the overall 18+ population. Higher than 100 means over-indexing.
There are partisan skews:
Fox News over-indexes with Republicans
CNN and MSNBC over-index with Democrats
Makes sense, but the bigger story is reach.
ESPN and broadcast networks reach more Primary Voters week-to-week than partisan cable news, regardless of party.
What networks do campaigns buy on TV to reach Primary Voters?
We analyzed spot data from the 2024 non-Presidential Primaries across both parties to see where campaigns actually placed their TV dollars.
Democrats
53% of spots ran on broadcast, which aligns with the networks that deliver the highest weekly reach.
But buying was highly fragmented: 22% of Democratic spots were spread across the bottom 154 networks, many with minimal reach.
Republicans
63% of spots ran on broadcast, and buying was far more concentrated.
Fox News Channel dominated: 23% of all Republican spots ran on FNC despite only reaching 8% of Republican Primary voters week-to-week.
What does this mean for political buyers?
In Primaries, campaigns aren’t competing against the other party.
That means multiple campaigns are chasing the same small pool of voters in crowded fields, often with similar messages and limited time to break through.
In that environment, efficiency matters more than scale.
The campaigns that win are the ones that:
Reach more of the right voters where they consume media
And avoid wasting impressions on low-impact placements
Following the status quo doesn’t create an advantage.
Buyers shouldn’t optimize based on what other campaigns are buying. They should use actual audience data to understand where Primary Voters are consuming content and buy against real reach.