The Partisan Impact on Local Government Dissemination of COVID-19 Information: Assessing US County Government Websites

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Abstract

This study explores the relationship between local government dissemination of COVID-19 information and partisanship. The unit of analysis is all official county government websites in the United States. In particular, we investigate if there is a correlation between the overall partisanship of a county and whether a county government's website (1) mentions COVID-19 and (2) provides safety instructions concerning COVID-19. We hypothesize that mass partisanship will impact the probability that a county government's website provides information related to the coronavirus. We find that a larger share of Democratic voters in a county is associated with an increase in the probability that a county government's website mentions COVID-19 and provides safety instructions for its residents. The results hold even after controlling for population density, internet subscriptions and COVID-19 cases and deaths. The finding indicates that citizens' access to information, even on matters of public health, are partially a consequence of partisanship.

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APA

Hansen, M. A., Johansson, I., Sadowski, K., Blaszcynski, J., & Meyer, S. (2021). The Partisan Impact on Local Government Dissemination of COVID-19 Information: Assessing US County Government Websites. Canadian Journal of Political Science, 54(1), 150–162. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008423920000918

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