9 Types of Race-Specific Research Campaign Teams Need

Campaign research changes with the office. A U.S. House file and a school board file do not pull from the same filing system, and they do not both have a vote record. The OppIntell homepage puts that split on one screen. Under Opposition research by race type, it shows nine cards, in this order: House, Senate, Governors, Mayors, Executive, Statewide Executive, State Legislature, Local, and Judicial. This listicle is those nine types. The wider field manual is The Complete Guide to Evidence-Backed Opposition Research for Campaigns at /blog/the-complete-guide-to-evidence-backed-opposition-research-for-campaigns.

Three companion pages sit beside this one. The build order for a sourced file is /blog/how-to-build-a-citation-backed-candidate-research-dossier. The check before a sentence enters a memo is /blog/how-to-verify-political-claims-before-they-reach-a-campaign-memo. The comparison of a platform with a spreadsheet is /blog/campaign-research-platform-vs-spreadsheets-which-workflow-holds-up. All four pages use the public standard already printed on the site. They do not add a customer, a traffic figure, or a ranking.

What stays the same across all nine

The opposition-research page says House, Senate, governor, mayor, legislature, judicial, and local contests draw on different mixes of the same records. The homepage adds Executive and Statewide Executive to that browse list. The working file is still identity and office, votes where a voting record exists, public statements, finance filings, financial disclosures, donor lines taken from those filings, and court records that match the person. Every claim the campaign intends to repeat carries a source.

A federal candidate's money is often in Federal Election Commission filings. A mayor's filing is often at the city or county. A legislator's vote record exists only if they have served. An empty section is the correct result when the person has no record of that type. The methodology page says every research record begins with a public source: FEC filings for candidate committees, principal campaign committees, independent expenditures, and Super PAC reports; Secretary of State candidate filings from 47 states; and county-level registrations from the four county adapters in production.

The nine cards are a browsing layout. Each one shows a live count, and this page does not add those counts together. The canonical coverage sentence, dated 2026-10-03, is 24,000 U.S. political candidates in the public candidate-research index, all parties, federal, state, and local, deduplicated and index-gated. The homepage counter on 2026-10-05 read 24,130. An Other bucket on the race page holds records that do not yet fit a standard public category. Other is not one of the nine cards.

A card on /races opens a state-and-race hub chosen from current counts. Product pages use /house, /senate, /state for governors, /mayor, /executive, /statewide-executive, /state-legislature, /local, and /judicial. State pages live at /states.

House

The homepage House card is subtitled Representatives. Its description is candidate research across U.S. House and state lower-chamber races. The House race page repeats that scope: U.S. House and state lower-chamber campaigns, with a count of states that have House candidates.

A House state page includes candidates whose race type is house. It also includes state-legislature records whose office title reads as a lower chamber, such as state representative, assembly, delegate, or house, and it leaves out titles that read as senate or senator. A federal House filing is often an FEC report: receipts, disbursements, debts, and the current amended totals. A state lower-chamber filing is often a state disclosure, and that person may never appear in an FEC report. A vote line belongs only when a legislative record exists for that person and that bill. A first-time candidate has an empty vote section. The card names the office family. It does not promise a floor vote on every profile.

Senate

The homepage Senate card is subtitled Senators. Its description is research profiles on Senate candidates and senators by party. The Senate race page says candidate research across Senate races, organized by state and party. This card is its own race family. It is not the State Legislature card, and it is not the state upper-chamber list below.

For a Senate candidate who files with the FEC, the finance section cites the committee report that is current after amendments. The opposition-research page says amended reports replace earlier totals. A donor line documents a disclosed transaction. It does not, by itself, document a private promise. A vote line belongs when a voting record exists for that person and that question. A challenger who has never served has no such record, and the section stays empty. Public statements stay stored as the words that were said, with the date and the place. A newspaper summary stays labeled as someone else's description.

Governors

The homepage Governors card is subtitled Statewide. Its description is governor candidate research, including Republican and Democratic fields. The governor race page says governor candidate research with party coverage for each tracked state. The product path for this family is /state, then the state, then the candidate.

A governor's campaign money is often in a state disclosure system rather than an FEC candidate report. The opposition-research page says a state or local candidate may never appear in an FEC report. Personal financial disclosures, where the office requires them, are a different form from the committee report, with income, assets, and liabilities in ranges set by the filing rules. Keep that form in its own section. A sitting governor can have an executive record. A challenger who has never held the office does not inherit one. The vote section stays empty unless a legislative record exists from some other service.

Mayors

The homepage Mayors card is subtitled Citywide. Its description is mayor candidate research across citywide campaigns and municipal fields. The mayor race page organizes that research by state and party.

The opposition-research page says a mayor's filing is often at the city or county. That disclosure, matched to this committee, is the finance section. An FEC report is the wrong default. A citywide race can still have a court record, a public statement, and a financial disclosure when those documents exist and match the identity block. A shared surname is not a match. The public example of a race-and-state hub is California mayor candidates at /races/california/mayor. That page lists a field. Opening one name starts the dossier.

A mayor is not the whole Local card. Local covers county, municipal, and school board offices. A council member, a county row office, or a school board seat stays on Local unless the record is actually a mayor.

Executive

The homepage Executive card is subtitled National. Its description is presidential and national executive candidate research. The executive race page says that research comes from the canonical candidate universe, and it counts jurisdictions with executive candidates rather than states alone. The product path is /executive. A state slice uses /executive/jurisdiction/{state}.

A presidential committee is often an FEC filing, so the finance section can cite receipts, disbursements, debts, and the report that is current. This card is not Governors and it is not Statewide Executive. The identity rule is the same: legal name, office, jurisdiction, cycle, and a disambiguator when another person shares the surname. The methodology page deduplicates on legal name, jurisdiction, office, and filing identifiers, with a reliability score when two sources disagree. A vote line still requires a legislative record. Leave it empty when there is none.

Statewide Executive

The homepage Statewide Executive card is subtitled AG, SOS, Treasurer. Its description is statewide executive races beyond governor. The race page names attorney general, secretary of state, treasurer, and other statewide executive contests, and it counts states with those candidates. The product path is /statewide-executive.

These are state offices. Candidate filings and campaign-finance reports usually live in a state system. Citing a federal committee for a state treasurer mixes the forms the opposition-research page says to keep apart. The card still asks the same questions. Who is the person on the state filing? Which disclosure is current? Is there a vote record from prior legislative service, or is that section empty? Does a court record match this person? The card names the office family. It does not fill the sections.

State Legislature

The homepage State Legislature card is subtitled State chambers. Its description is state legislative candidate research across tracked legislatures. The public race label in the site config is State Legislature. The product race page for this same race type uses a narrower title, State Senate Races, and the subtitle state upper-chamber candidate research by state and party. Both labels are in the product. They are not two databases.

The split with House is an office-title rule. State-legislature records whose titles match assembly, delegate, house, or representative, and do not match senate or senator, are included on House state pages. State Senate pages keep the senate and senator titles and leave the lower chamber off that list. Write the office title from the filing on the first page, so a house memo and a senate memo do not trade profiles.

Finance for these candidates is usually a state disclosure. A vote line exists only after service, and only for the questions that person voted on. A first-time legislative candidate has filings and, where they exist, statements. The blank vote section is the verified result.

Local

The homepage Local card is subtitled County, city, school. Its description is county, municipal, and school board candidate coverage. The local race page says county, municipal, and school board candidate research across tracked jurisdictions.

This is the widest office mix of the nine, and the one most likely to be absent from a federal filing. The methodology page's county intake is four county adapters in production. That is not a claim that every county is covered. A local finance record, when it exists, is often a city, county, or school-district disclosure. Cite the report that matches this committee. Do not borrow an FEC total from a different race the same person once ran.

School board, county commission, and city council candidates often have no congressional roll-call record. Minutes or a board vote belong when the document names this person and this question. Court records belong when they match the identity block. Common names repeat inside one county, so a city or a filing identifier belongs on the first page.

Judicial

The homepage Judicial card is subtitled Courts. Its description is judicial candidate research by state and party. The judicial race page says judicial candidate research organized by state and party.

A judicial candidate is a person running for a court office. That is different from a court record about a candidate for some other office. The opposition-research page lists matching court records as a section any file can have. On this card, the office itself is the court seat, so the identity block should name the court and the jurisdiction from the filing. Campaign money, where judicial candidates file it, follows that office's state or local rule. Do not assume an FEC committee.

A judicial candidate may have no legislative roll-call vote. Opinions, dockets, and retention records belong when they are public documents about this person. A case that only shares a name stays out. Where the record supports a fact, state it and cite it. Where the record only opens a question, the methodology page's posture language applies: may, could, would examine, and appears consistent with.

Use the hub, then open one person

Start at /races or /states. Each category on the races index goes to a live state-and-race hub chosen from current counts. A hub such as /races/california/mayor lists a field. Pick one person, then build the sourced file at /blog/how-to-build-a-citation-backed-candidate-research-dossier. Before a line reaches a memo, the person has to match and the cited document has to still contain the language.

A spreadsheet or the research platform holds up when the columns match the office in front of you: legal name, office title, jurisdiction, cycle, the filing identifier, the source URL, the source type, the date read, and a note when an amendment replaces the total. A House FEC report and a school-board disclosure do not share a default money column. The public site does not publish a spreadsheet error rate, and this list does not add one.

TrackerOps mobile, media intelligence, war room mode, narrative intelligence, and the analyst workbench stay under the homepage's in-build labels. The nine cards are the public race taxonomy. The candidate universe, the methodology page, and the opposition-research page are what this list treats as published now.