Partisanship versus principles: A study of voter response to intra-party corruption allegations

Corruption undermines political and economic progress, yet corrupt politicians frequently win elections. While prior research explores voter attributes and institutional factors in corruption voting, the role of party responses remains underexamined, despite the ubiquity of party response “in the real world”. Using a survey experiment of 3,531 U.S. voters, we find that voter sanctioning of corrupt politicians increases significantly when their own party condemns the corruption, a pattern observed across Republicans and Democrats. Extreme partisanship amplifies this effect. Alternative party responses—such as party non-response, support for the corrupt politician, or condemnation by the opposition—have weaker effects on voter behavior. These findings indicate that voters rely heavily on party cues when processing corruption allegations. Parties’ public stances on co-partisan corruption thus play a critical role in shaping voter accountability, offering insights into how political rhetoric influences electoral outcomes in cases of corruption.