Associate, Elections Data & Analytics

The Cook Political Report•Arlington, VA

2d•Onsite

About The Position

The Cook Political Report is seeking an Associate, Elections Data & Analytics to join its editorial team. The role combines data and journalism, maintaining and analyzing candidate, race, and election data that supports the outlet’s nonpartisan ratings and analysis, and turning that data into clear visualizations for readers. The position calls for strong data skills as well as excellent writing and communication skills. The Associate reports to Managing Editor Carrie Dann. It offers someone early in their career hands-on experience in political data, analytics, and visualization, along with mentoring by experienced experts. This is not a remote role; the job is based in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area (DMV). Applicants who are not based in the Washington, D.C. area should include their location status and plans in their cover letter.

Requirements

1–2 years of relevant experience, including internships, in data analysis, research, journalism, or a related field.
Strong writing and communication skills.
Proficiency with R and advanced spreadsheet skills in Excel or Google Sheets.
Experience with Datawrapper or similar data visualization tools.
Familiarity with CMS platforms; Drupal experience is a plus.
Strong attention to detail and comfort making judgment calls on data classification and updates.
Interest in emerging AI tools and how they can improve data and editorial workflows.
Interest in U.S. politics and elections, with a demonstrated commitment to nonpartisan, accuracy-first analysis.
Bachelor’s degree in political science, data science, statistics, journalism, or a related field, or equivalent experience.

Nice To Haves

Experience working with election or campaign finance datasets, such as FEC, Census, or voter file data.
Basic familiarity with mapping or GIS tools.
Prior experience in a newsroom or research environment.

Responsibilities

Maintain and update candidate profiles, polling, and election data across House, Senate, gubernatorial, and presidential contests, using sound judgment to reconcile ambiguous or conflicting information.
Build charts, maps, and interactive graphics in Datawrapper for the newsletter, website, and social media, including on tight turnarounds around election nights and primaries.
Enter and quality-check new data as it becomes available, including FEC filings, election results, and candidate announcements, and flag discrepancies to editors as needed.
Use R and spreadsheets to clean, organize, and analyze data supporting editorial research and trend analysis.
Write brief campaign summaries for race pages as requested.
Collaborate with editors and analysts across the House, Senate, Governor, and Presidential teams to support their data and research needs.
Maintain data integrity and consistency across the CMS (Drupal) and related spreadsheets and databases.
Explore and pilot AI tools to improve data workflows and stay current on emerging AI and data tools relevant to political data journalism.
Provide support for the Cook Political Report newsletter and content publishing as needed.