United States House of Representatives elections in Massachusetts, 2012

	2014 → ;
	; ; 2012 U.S. House Elections in Massachusetts
	Primary Date ; September 6, 2012
	Partisan breakdown • Candidates
	Massachusetts District Pages District 1 • District 2 • District 3 • District 4 • District 5 • District 6 • District 7 • District 8 • District 9
	Other House Elections
	Alabama • Alaska • Arizona • Arkansas • California • Colorado • Connecticut • Delaware • Florida • Georgia • Hawaii • Idaho • Illinois • Indiana • Iowa • Kansas • Kentucky • Louisiana • Maine • Maryland • Massachusetts • Michigan • Minnesota • Mississippi • Missouri • Montana • Nebraska • Nevada • New Hampshire • New Jersey • New Mexico • New York • North Carolina • North Dakota • Ohio • Oklahoma • Oregon • Pennsylvania • Rhode Island • South Carolina • South Dakota • Tennessee • Texas • Utah • Vermont • Virginia • Washington • West Virginia • Wisconsin • Wyoming
	2012 U.S. Senate Elections

The 2012 U.S. House of Representatives elections in Massachusetts took place on November 6, 2012. Voters elected nine candidates to serve in the U.S. House, one from each of the state's nine congressional districts.

Candidate Filing Deadline	Primary Election	General Election
June 5, 2012	September 6, 2012	November 6, 2012

Primary: Massachusetts has a partially closed primary system, in which the selection of a party's candidates in an election was limited to registered party members. In Massachusetts, however, independent voters may select which party's primary to vote in.

Voter registration: Voters were required to register to vote in the primary by August 17. For the general election, the voter registration deadline was October 17.^[1]

See also: Massachusetts elections, 2012

According to the New York Times race ratings in October 2012, one of the nine districts was considered to be in play, District 6.^[2]

The Center for Voting and Democracy (Fairvote) projected that Democrats would win eight districts. It did not make a projection for the remaining seat.^[3]

Primary competitiveness

See also: National contested primary average during the 2012 U.S. congressional elections

Massachusetts tied with Kentucky, Maine, Delaware, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, and West Virginia for having the 22nd most competitive congressional primaries in 2012, with 50% of major party primaries having been contested (9 out of 18). The national average was 54.31%.

Eight U.S. House incumbents sought re-election in Massachusetts in 2012. 3 of those 8 (37.5%) faced a primary challenger. Nationwide, 200 out of the 386 incumbents seeking re-election faced a primary challenger (51.81%).

Partisan breakdown

Heading into the November 6 election, the Democratic Party held all 10 Congressional seats from Massachusetts. However, the state lost one seat after the 2010 census and elected 9 representatives.

Members of the U.S. House from Massachusetts -- Partisan Breakdown
Party		As of November 2012	After the 2012 Election
	Democratic Party	10	9
	Republican Party	0	0
Total		10	9

Incumbents

Heading into the 2012 election, the incumbents for the 10 congressional districts were:

Name	Party	District
Barney Frank	Democratic	4
Bill Keating	Democratic	10
Ed Markey	Democratic	7
Jim McGovern	Democratic	3
John Olver	Democratic	1
John Tierney	Democratic	6
Michael Capuano	Democratic	8
Niki Tsongas	Democratic	5
Richard Neal	Democratic	2
Stephen Lynch	Democratic	9

Margin of victory for winners

There were a total of 9 seats up for election in 2012 in Massachusetts. The following table shows the margin of victory for each district winner, which is calculated by examining the percentage difference between the top-two vote getters. If the race was uncontested, the margin of victory is listed as 100%.

District	Winner	Margin of Victory	Total Vote	Top Opponent
Massachusetts, District 1	Richard Neal	76.6%	336,555	All Others
Massachusetts, District 2	Jim McGovern	74.5%	342,736	All Others
Massachusetts, District 3	Niki Tsongas	30.7%	335,111	Jon Golnik
Massachusetts, District 4	Joseph Kennedy III	24.5%	373,114	Sean Bielat
Massachusetts, District 5	Ed Markey	47.9%	364,201	Tom Tierney
Massachusetts, District 6	John Tierney	1.1%	389,852	Richard Tisei
Massachusetts, District 7	Michael Capuano	59.5%	285,134	Karla Romero
Massachusetts, District 8	Stephen Lynch	48.9%	371,694	Joe Selvaggi
Massachusetts, District 9	William Keating	24.9%	385,799	Christopher Sheldon

General election candidates

District	General Election Candidates	Incumbent	2012 Winner	Partisan Switch?
1st	Richard Neal	John Olver	Richard Neal	No
2nd	Jim McGovern	Richard Neal	Jim McGovern	No
3rd	Niki Tsongas Jon Golnik	Jim McGovern	Niki Tsongas	No
4th	Joseph Kennedy III Sean Bielat David Rosa	Barney Frank	Joseph Kennedy III	No
5th	Ed Markey Tom Tierney	Niki Tsongas	Ed Markey	No
6th	John Tierney Richard Tisei Daniel Fishman	John Tierney	John Tierney	No
7th	Michael Capuano Karla Romero	Ed Markey	Michael Capuano	No
8th	Stephen Lynch Joe Selvaggi	Michael Capuano	Stephen Lynch	No
9th	William Keating Christopher Sheldon Daniel Botelho	Stephen Lynch	William Keating	No
10th	District Removed in Redistricting	Bill Keating	N/A	N/A

Candidates

Note: Election results were added on election night as races were called. Vote totals were added after official election results had been certified. Click here for more information about Ballotpedia's election coverage plan. Please contact us about errors in this list.