The board

The board represents a player's political operation for the month in Career Mode. It decides which activities the player is engaged in, what each activity costs, the group of voters it puts the player in front of, and the line the player carries into that group. It runs every month, for every role except the presidency, and works as a budget rather than a fixed set of slots.

The sections

The catalogue holds 90 activities. The Ground covers door knocking, town halls and other public venues, the church circuit, and community associations. The Press covers local television and radio, podcasts, opinion pieces in state and national papers, and national television bookings. The Party covers precinct, county and state party work. The Money covers fundraising, described at Money in Career Mode. Two further sections, the Profile and the Trade, are currently hidden from the board, and an activity engaged in one of them before it was hidden is dropped rather than continuing to run. The Race appears on the campaign's own board while a contest is under way.

Action points and pips

Every activity costs one, two or three action points, shown against the month's total budget at the top of the board; a chip the player cannot afford is greyed out. If a running schedule's budget shrinks, activities are dropped from the end of the schedule until it fits again. Ground activities can also be run at one, two or three pips: each extra pip costs the activity's points again, and gives it a stronger effect and another chance of producing an event that month.

The rooms

Every ground, press and party activity puts the player in front of a specific group of voters, drawn from the current era's cast and written for that particular setting: a door-knocking evening is not written the same way as an appearance on the evening news. A group is dominated by the voters it is written for, but a small share of every other voter is also present. Press and party groups are built differently: a newspaper's readers form its own ideological bloc, a party evening reaches only the player's own side, and a campaign activity's group is drawn from the district's actual mix of voters.

The line

Most activities the player runs carry a line of the player's own words, written into the activity and submitted at any time; a lightbulb icon can suggest lines written in the voice of the player's own side. Media and party activities carry no line, so they spread the player's name without changing anyone's opinion. No feedback appears when a line is submitted. Instead, every voter in the game's current cast judges it, and the verdict is reported in that month's debrief as named reactions, worst first. The same words used in two different activities are judged separately each time, because the setting is treated as part of what is being judged. A line is also judged afresh from October 2001, and again from October 2002, because the aftermath of the 11 September attacks changes how people respond.

Press and breaks

A press activity's odds of a placement rise as the player's recognition rises, and the odds shown on the chip update automatically. Some national television bookings only open up once the player's national recognition passes a certain point; until then, the greyed-out row states that nobody in New York is returning the player's calls. Each activity the player is engaged in also has a monthly chance of producing a break, an event stemming from that activity, and this chance also rises with recognition or standing. Running an activity at extra pips increases its chance of a break. At most one break happens in a month; while the player holds a desk, only media activities can produce one.

Gates

A greyed-out chip explains what it is waiting on: a level of recognition, a job that grants access to a courthouse or newsroom, a record of past service, a later year, a live campaign, or standing with the party. Aside from these conditions, there are no other requirements gating press or ground activities.