Conditional Congressional communication: how elite speech varies across medium

Abstract Elected representatives have more means of public-facing communication at their disposal than ever before. Several studies examine how use individual mediums, but we lack a baseline understanding legislators’ relative patterns across platforms. Using novel data set the four most widely used forms written, constituent-facing (press releases, e-newsletters, Facebook posts, and Twitter tweets) by members US House Representatives in 114th (2015–2017), 115th (2017–2019), 116th (2019–2021) Congresses, generate communicate mediums. Our analyses show that institutional, legislator, district characteristics correspond with differential These findings underscore why medium choice matters, clarifying researcher's mediums might amplify voices certain legislators dampen those others. In addition, they provide guidance to other researchers on select medium(s) best different research aims.