Harvard Kennedy School Shorenstein Center

Reported Voting Issues: Jackson County, Oregon

About this Report

This report tracks self-reports of voting-related issues including misleading election messages, intimidation, and voter registration problems to help identify areas that may need a closer look. It is part of the broader 2026 Voting Information Trends Research Initiative, which examines how Americans access voting information and understand key election-related topics ahead of the 2026 U.S. elections.

We include counties where at least 50 people responded to our survey. Of 250 such counties, Jackson County ranked 199th highest in reports during this survey period. Findings reflect 67 respondents from Jackson County, Oregon, surveyed between August 23 and October 26, 2026.

Important Note: This is not a nationally or locally representative sample. Respondents are recruited online, and counties rated higher risk by the Voting Rights Lab are oversampled. Figures are unweighted and reflect only those who responded, not the broader county population. Findings should be interpreted as signals that warrant further attention or verification, rather than as representative estimates or rankings of election administration, election integrity, or the prevalence of voting problems among county residents.

Monitored election problems

ProblemCounts when a respondent reports they…Time window
Registration challenge noticeGot a notice that their voter registration was challenged or canceled, or that they were removed from the rolls.Past month
Conflicting registration informationGot conflicting information about their voter registration.Past week or month
Discouraged from registeringSomeone tried to discourage them from registering or staying registered.Past day, week or month
Misleading calls or textsGot a text, email, message, call or robocall about the 2026 election that felt misleading, coercive or unusual.Past day, week or month
Intimidation or harassmentExperienced or witnessed harassment or intimidation connected with voting or elections.2026 election cycle
Trouble with a voting taskHad trouble registering, checking their registration, or requesting, returning or tracking a mail ballot.2026 election

Table of Contents

Select a name to go to that section.

SectionWhat it shows
Summary of FindingsShare of Jackson County respondents reporting each problem, compared with the Oregon and national rates
Week by weekWeekly shares for the three problems asked about in the past day or week
Who reported a problemShares by gender, age, household income, race/ethnicity, education and party
Follow-up detailFollow-up answers for each problem reported by more than 10 people
Oregon overviewThe same measures for all respondents in Oregon, for comparison
National overviewThe same measures for all respondents nationally, for comparison
About the surveyWhat the survey monitors, how counties are ranked, and limits of the data

Summary of Findings

22.4% of Jackson County respondents (15 of 67) reported at least one of six election problems, compared with 26.5% nationally. No single problem is higher than the national rate by more than the margin of error. Statewide, 26.7% of Oregon respondents (292 of 1,093) reported at least one problem; the chart shows Jackson County, Oregon and national rates side by side. Jackson County respondents make up 6.1% of all Oregon respondents (67 of 1,093) and 0.1% of all respondents nationally (67 of 56,077).

Share reporting each problem, Jackson County, Oregon

Figure 1. Share of Jackson County, Oregon respondents reporting each problem, with the Oregon and national shares, Aug 23–Oct 26, 2026. Jackson County n = 67; Oregon n = 1,093 (including Jackson County, 6% of the state's respondents); national n = 56,077. Margin of error for the county share reporting any problem: ±10.0 percentage points, so the county figure is within the margin of error of the national rate. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Week by week

Weekly share reporting each problem, Jackson County, Oregon

Figure 2. Weekly share of Jackson County, Oregon respondents reporting each problem (teal line with circles), with Oregon statewide (red line with squares, including Jackson County) and the national share (black dashed line). The shaded band is the 95% confidence interval for the national share, which is the range the weekly figure could vary based on the sample size alone. Hollow points are weeks with fewer than 10 Jackson County respondents. Weeks start Monday; only problems asked about in the past day or week are shown (conflicting registration information: past week), each person counted once per week. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Weekly groups in Jackson County are small (1 to 24 people), and who answered these questions changes from week to week, so treat week-to-week movement as a signal to watch, not a finding. From Aug 23–Oct 12 to Oct 13–Oct 26, the share of Jackson County respondents reporting any of these three problems went from 3.4% to 11.1% (59 and 9 people): too few people in one of the periods to tell.

Who reported a problem

Among groups of 15 or more people, reports were most common among people aged 45 to 64 (35.0%) and least common among people 65 and over (5.0%), against 22.4% overall. Reports fell with income. Groups this small can swing a lot with one or two answers.

GroupReportedShare
All respondents15 of 6722.4%
Gender
Female11 of 4723.4%
Male4 of 2020.0%
Age
18 to 242 of 3–
25 to 445 of 2420.8%
45 to 647 of 2035.0%
65 and over1 of 205.0%
Household income
Under 25K5 of 2025.0%
25k to under 50k4 of 2020.0%
50K to under 75K1 of 137.7%
75K to under 100K2 of 7–
100K and over3 of 7–
GroupReportedShare
Race/ethnicity
White or Caucasian14 of 6222.6%
Black or African American1 of 3–
Other0 of 2–
Hispanic or Latino2 of 2–
Native American or Alaska Native0 of 2–
Pacific Islander or Native Hawaiian0 of 1–
Education
High School Graduate6 of 1931.6%
Some College3 of 2313.0%
College Degree6 of 2128.6%
Graduate Degree0 of 4–
Party
Democrat1 of 166.2%
Republican7 of 2035.0%
Independent/Other7 of 3122.6%

Share reporting at least one of the six problems, by group, Jackson County, Oregon, Aug 23–Oct 26, 2026. Race/ethnicity is select-all-that-apply, so one person can appear in more than one group. Shares are shown for groups of 10 or more people. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Follow-up detail

Follow-up detail is shown for each problem reported by more than 10 people. Not shown: registration challenge notices (0 people), conflicting registration information (no follow-up question), being discouraged from registering (1 person), misleading calls or texts (7 people), intimidation or harassment (8 people) and trouble with a voting task (3 people).

Oregon Overview

August 23 to October 26, 2026. 1,093 respondents across Oregon, including people whose county is not on file.

26.7% of Oregon respondents (292 of 1093) reported at least one of six election problems, compared with 26.5% nationally. Of the monitored problems, intimidation or harassment (11.4% vs. 7.7% nationally) is higher than the national rate by more than the margin of error.

Share reporting each problem, Oregon

Figure 3. Share of Oregon respondents reporting each problem, with the national share, Aug 23–Oct 26, 2026. Oregon n = 1093; national n = 56,077. Margin of error for the state share reporting any problem: ±2.6 percentage points, so the state figure is within the margin of error of the national rate. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Oregon: Week by week

Weekly share reporting each problem, Oregon

Figure 4. Weekly share of Oregon respondents reporting each problem (red line), with the national share (black dashed line). The shaded band is the 95% confidence interval for the national share, which is the range the weekly figure could vary based on the sample size alone. Hollow points are weeks with fewer than 10 Oregon respondents. Weeks start Monday; only problems asked about in the past day or week are shown (conflicting registration information: past week), each person counted once per week. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Weekly groups in Oregon are small (1 to 349 people), and who answered these questions changes from week to week, so treat week-to-week movement as a signal to watch, not a finding.

Oregon: Who reported a problem

Among groups of 30 or more people, reports were most common among people aged 18 to 24 (55.4%) and least common among people without a high school diploma (12.8%), against 26.7% overall. Reports fell with age. By race and ethnicity, reports were most common among Hispanic or Latino respondents (40.4%, 46 of 114), 2.1 times the rate among Native American or Alaska Native respondents (19.6%, 10 of 51), a difference larger than the margin of error; Black or African American respondents (30.0%) and White or Caucasian respondents (25.9%) fell in between.

GroupReportedShare
All respondents292 of 109326.7%
Gender
Female162 of 65024.9%
Male130 of 44329.3%
Age
18 to 2431 of 5655.4%
25 to 44138 of 43132.0%
45 to 6488 of 38023.2%
65 and over35 of 22615.5%
Household income
Under 25K74 of 31323.6%
25k to under 50k72 of 28325.4%
50K to under 75K44 of 19322.8%
75K to under 100K40 of 12831.2%
100K and over57 of 16734.1%
GroupReportedShare
Race/ethnicity
White or Caucasian247 of 95325.9%
Hispanic or Latino46 of 11440.4%
Native American or Alaska Native10 of 5119.6%
Black or African American15 of 5030.0%
Asian or Asian American8 of 2828.6%
Other3 of 1421.4%
Pacific Islander or Native Hawaiian6 of 1346.2%
Education
Some High School or Less5 of 3912.8%
High School Graduate64 of 27323.4%
Some College95 of 34827.3%
College Degree84 of 30827.3%
Graduate Degree44 of 12535.2%
Party
Democrat99 of 36727.0%
Republican95 of 32629.1%
Independent/Other98 of 40024.5%

Share reporting at least one of the six problems, by group, Oregon, Aug 23–Oct 26, 2026. Race/ethnicity is select-all-that-apply, so one person can appear in more than one group. Shares are shown for groups of 10 or more people. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Oregon: Follow-up detail

Follow-up detail is shown for each problem reported by more than 10 people. Not shown: conflicting registration information (no follow-up question).

Registration notices: who sent the notice

Election office35% (12)
A private group or organization35% (12)
News or social media32% (11)
A political party or campaign26% (9)
Not sure12% (4)
Other6% (2)

Share of the 34 people asked.

Trouble with a voting task, by task

Trouble registering3% (36)
Trouble checking registration3% (30)
Trouble requesting a mail ballot3% (29)
Trouble tracking a ballot2% (18)
Trouble returning a mail ballot1% (13)

Share of the 1102 people asked.

Discouraged from registering: who discouraged them

A political party or campaign42% (17)
A private group or organization35% (14)
News or social media28% (11)
Election office22% (9)
Other20% (8)
Not sure8% (3)

Share of the 40 people asked.

National Overview

August 23 to October 26, 2026. 56,077 respondents who answered all six questions.

26.5% of respondents (14,861 of 56,077) reported at least one of six election problems. The most common were misleading calls or texts (15.7%) and intimidation or harassment (7.7%); the least common was registration challenge notices (2.5%).

Share of respondents reporting each problem, national

Figure 5. Share of respondents reporting each problem, national, Aug 23–Oct 26, 2026. Each person counted once; bases vary slightly by question (56,077 to 56,446). Margin of error for the national share reporting any problem: ±0.4 percentage points. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

National: Week by week

Weekly share reporting each problem, national

Figure 6. Weekly share of respondents reporting each problem, national. The shaded band is the 95% confidence interval for the national share, which is the range the weekly figure could vary based on the sample size alone. Weeks start Monday; only problems asked about in the past day or week are shown (conflicting registration information: past week), each person counted once per week, so weekly rates are lower than full-period rates. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

Misleading calls or texts went from 6.8% in the week of Aug 31 to 11.8% in the week of Oct 19; being discouraged from registering went from 1.9% in the week of Aug 31 to 2.0% in the week of Oct 19; conflicting registration information went from 2.0% in the week of Aug 31 to 2.1% in the week of Oct 19. Weeks have 2,874 to 16,019 respondents (the first, partial week 388), so the margin of error is narrow except in that first week. From Aug 23–Oct 12 to Oct 13–Oct 26, the share of respondents reporting any of these three problems went from 10.4% to 13.9% (44,992 and 16,011 people): a rise larger than the margin of error.

National: Who reported a problem

Among groups of 200 or more people, reports were most common among people aged 18 to 24 (42.5%) and least common among people 65 and over (19.0%), against 26.5% overall. Reports rose with income and education, and fell with age. By race and ethnicity, reports were most common among Hispanic or Latino respondents (33.6%, 1628 of 4850), 8 points higher than White or Caucasian respondents (25.1%, 10421 of 41451), a difference larger than the margin of error; Asian or Asian American respondents (30.5%), Black or African American respondents (30.2%), Other respondents (30.1%), Pacific Islander or Native Hawaiian respondents (29.3%) and Native American or Alaska Native respondents (29.0%) fell in between.

GroupPeopleShare
All respondents56,07726.5%
Gender
Female32,59424.6%
Male23,48329.1%
Age
18 to 243,00042.5%
25 to 4420,21632.0%
45 to 6421,42623.0%
65 and over11,43519.0%
Household income
Under 25K14,92422.3%
25k to under 50k15,84024.7%
50K to under 75K10,77127.8%
75K to under 100K6,12430.5%
100K and over7,82832.6%
GroupPeopleShare
Race/ethnicity
White or Caucasian41,45125.1%
Black or African American9,96630.2%
Hispanic or Latino4,85033.6%
Native American or Alaska Native1,86929.0%
Asian or Asian American1,64830.5%
Other47830.1%
Pacific Islander or Native Hawaiian31429.3%
Education
Some High School or Less2,60519.1%
High School Graduate17,57423.2%
Some College14,40425.8%
College Degree16,72430.0%
Graduate Degree4,77032.7%
Party
Democrat20,12929.2%
Republican17,07326.4%
Independent/Other18,81423.6%

Share reporting at least one of the six problems, by group, national. Race/ethnicity is select-all-that-apply, so one person can appear in more than one group. Source: CHIP50 survey data.

National: Follow-up detail

Follow-up detail for respondents nationwide who reported each problem. Not shown: conflicting registration information (no follow-up question).

Registration notices: who sent the notice

Election office46% (647)
A political party or campaign28% (394)
News or social media22% (308)
A private group or organization21% (299)
Not sure14% (191)
Other3% (45)

Share of the 1,401 people asked.

Trouble with a voting task, by task

Trouble registering3% (1,789)
Trouble checking registration3% (1,689)
Trouble requesting a mail ballot2% (1,041)
Trouble tracking a ballot2% (1,039)
Trouble returning a mail ballot1% (656)

Share of all 56,446 respondents asked.

Discouraged from registering: who discouraged them

News or social media35% (749)
A political party or campaign32% (684)
A private group or organization27% (584)
Election office25% (544)
Other10% (210)
Not sure10% (206)

Share of the 2,161 people asked.

About the survey

The 2026 Voting Information Trends research Initiative tracks how people get voting information and monitors possible election-related problems reported at the county level. We focus on issues respondents say they have personally experienced or observed, including misleading election communications, intimidation, voter registration problems, and difficulties completing voting-related tasks. The goal is to identify signals that may warrant closer attention.

We survey about 1,000 U.S. adults each day through an online, nonprobability sample covering all 50 states and Washington, D.C. State-level quotas are used for race, ethnicity, age, and gender. We also collect additional responses from selected counties identified as higher risk by the Voting Rights Lab (VRL), whose 2026 risk index considers factors including electoral competitiveness, election laws and procedures, litigation, and concerns involving state and local election actors.

How to read this report

Counties with at least 50 respondents are ranked by the share of unique respondents reporting at least one monitored problem during the data-collection period. We also report results for individual problems, weekly trends, demographic groups, and when sample sizes allow, additional follow-up detail.

Weekly trends are shown only for questions that ask about experiences in the past day or week, and each respondent is counted once per week. Figures include a 95% margin of error based on sample size. We describe a county as higher than the national rate only when the difference is larger than that margin.

When a respondent selects a problem but then states in an optional written follow-up that nothing actually happened, we recode the response as not reporting the problem. These contradictions are identified using a large language model (LLM) assisted coding and reviewed by a member of the research team.

About the data

These results are signals, not estimates of prevalence. The survey is not nationally or locally representative, and results should not be used to estimate how common a problem is in the country or in any county. Figures are unweighted and describe the people who responded. Unlike individual reports found on social media, these responses come from a standardized survey using the same questions and time periods across respondents, allowing us to compare patterns across places and against a national benchmark.

The purpose of the survey is to identify issues that may warrant independent investigation or verification. Election officials, journalists, and other organizations can then assess those reports and respond when appropriate.

Because the data are self-reported, a response does not by itself verify that the reported problem occurred. Respondents may also interpret questions differently from researchers. For example, some reports of “misleading calls or texts” describe campaign messages rather than false voting information, and some registration notices may come from campaigns or advocacy organizations rather than election offices. These findings should therefore be treated as signals of where to look more closely, not counts of verified incidents.

Use of AI in this report

The research team wrote and reviewed the “About the survey” section. The summaries of the results are filled in automatically from templates built with AI. All numbers come directly from the survey data. Automated text can contain errors, so readers should check the summaries against the tables and charts.