Data dictionary: Candidate survey responses

The candidate survey responses come from Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection questionnaire: https://ballotpedia.org/Survey.

There are a few required questions and some optional questions. The required questions are:

• Who are you? Tell us about yourself.

• Please list below 3 key messages of your campaign. What are the main points you want voters to remember about you and your candidacy?

• What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?

The survey questions are reviewed annually and may be adjusted.

column name	description
candidate_id	Ballotpedia's Candidate ID, as described in the Candidates data set
election_year	Numeric race year, i.e. "2026"
state	The state in which the candidate is running (postal abbreviation), i.e. "AL"
candidate_name	Name of the candidate
office_name	Name of the office sought
question	Survey question text
response	Candidate's response to the question
response_date	Date response was received (YYYY-MM-DD). Note that due to our review process, there is some delay between this date and the date on which the response appears in the file.