Fifty-four thousand deaths, zero electoral impact

The February 2023 earthquake in Turkiye resulted in 54,000 fatalities and over $100 billion in economic losses. We examine whether this catastrophic event influenced incumbent-party support in the subsequent election. In contrast with previous researchers, we find no significant effect on voter turnout or the incumbent party’s vote share, even after accounting for population displacement and infrastructure damage. We argue that this null effect is due to several factors: effective electoral management policies that reduced voting costs despite significant population displacement; a compressed timeline between disaster and elections, which constrained politically motivated aid distribution; extreme political polarization, which led the public to filter their interpretation of the disaster response through partisan lenses; different information flows in state-controlled media and social media; and offsetting electoral responses across regions. Our results offer valuable insights for policy makers, political scientists, and economists studying the political consequences of natural disasters.