Political party definition
Political parties nominate candidates and work to win elections based on a shared set of political goals.
A political party is a group of people who share political goals and work together to win elections. A party chooses candidates, and its name appears next to theirs on the ballot. In federal elections, parties compete for the offices of president, US senator, and US representative.
For most of US history, there have been two major political parties: the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. Each party has a “platform”: the positions it takes on a set of issues.
While these two parties have dominated the national political scene, minor parties have also fielded candidates and won offices.
What is a third political party?
A third political party is any party other than the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. Those two parties hold all 435 US House seats and 98 of the 100 US Senate seats in the 119th Congress, which began in 2025.
Federal law puts parties into three categories, based on how their candidate did in the last presidential election. A major party is one whose candidate won 25% or more of the popular vote. A minor party is one whose candidate won at least 5% but less than 25%. Federal law considers every other party a “new party.”
A party’s category determines how much public money its presidential nominee can receive.
What are the functions of political parties?
Political parties recruit candidates and fund their campaigns. Party committees raise money and spend it to help candidates win elections.
Each party has a national committee and state committees. The national committee runs the party's day-to-day operations at the national level, and a state committee does the same in its state.
In the US House and the US Senate, the members of each party meet separately and elect their own leader. The party holding more seats is the majority party, and its leader becomes the majority leader.
Keep exploring
- How red or blue is your state? - In the last ten elections, 41 states voted for the same party eight times or more.
- What are the current swing states, and how have they changed over time? - Five states were won by less than 3 percentage points in the 2024 presidential election.
- Tracking 2024 election contributions and spending - A majority of funding for the 2024 election — over 65%, or nearly $5.6 billion — comes from political action committees, also known as PACs.
- Who’s funding the 2024 election? - Over 75% of the funds raised for the 2024 election have come from political action committees (PACs) and party committees, which then redistribute the funds to different campaigns.
