Data Engineer (Cycle)

AMERICA VOTES; Washington (District of Columbia); Hybrid; USD 85,000 - 100,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

100% employee medical, dental, vision insurance

Paid time off including Federal holidays

Parental leave

Personal professional development funds

Job summary

AMERICA VOTES is seeking a full-time Data Engineer for the 2026 cycle in Washington, DC. This hybrid role involves building and maintaining data infrastructure and pipelines. The ideal candidate should possess strong SQL, Python skills, and a background in political data.

The position offers a salary range between $85,000 - $100,000, with a comprehensive benefits package including medical, dental, vision insurance, and generous paid time off. Candidates of diverse backgrounds are strongly encouraged to apply.

Qualifications

• Strong SQL skills: comfortable writing queries and scripts to clean, transform, and analyze data.
• Experience working in a cloud data warehouse.
• Working experience with Python or a similar language.
• Previous experience working on a political campaign or similar environment.
• A self-starter mindset: able to onboard quickly.
• Service-oriented approach prioritizing collaboration.

Responsibilities

• Write and maintain SQL and dbt models for data transformation.
• Make additions to GCP pipelines that load data into BigQuery.
• Collaborate with data staff to build tables and tools.
• Contribute to data strategy conversations.

Skills

Strong SQL skills

Experience in cloud data warehouse

Working experience with Python

Experience using Git

Service-oriented approach to data work

Strong interpersonal skills

Tools

BigQuery

dbt

GCP tooling

Job description

Position Description

America Votes is looking for a full-time Data Engineer for the 2026 cycle. This person will build and maintain the pipelines, models, and infrastructure that power data work across the progressive movement. This hybrid role sits at the intersection of data engineering and analytics engineering: you will write Python to move data in and out of our warehouse, write SQL and dbt models to transform it into something usable, and collaborate closely with other engineers, national analysts, and state data staff who depend on the tools you build.

The ideal candidate has worked in progressive political data and has taken on data engineering type projects in past roles (even if they didn't come with a data engineer title). You should have solid fundamentals: strong SQL, comfort with Python, and familiarity with modern data stack and cloud database environments. The 2026 cycle moves fast, and we're looking for someone who can hit the ground running, ask the right questions, and isn't afraid to dive into messy projects.

This is a 2026 cycle hire role that reports to the National Director of Engineering and Product and is contracted to end Dec 31, 2026.

Responsibilities

• SQL and dbt development: Write and maintain SQL and dbt models that transform data in our warehouse, adding new models, refactoring existing code, writing tests, and improving documentation.
• Pipeline Engineering: Make additions to GCP pipelines that load data into our BigQuery warehouse and send data out of BigQuery to other platforms.
• Supporting Staff: Collaborate with national and state data staff to build tables, pipelines, and tools that help our team do their jobs more effectively.
• Internal Leadership: Contribute to data strategy conversations, including the adoption of new tools, shared data standards, and engineering best practices.
• Other duties as assigned.

Qualifications

Must Haves

• Strong SQL skills: comfortable writing queries and scripts to clean, transform, and analyze data. Committed to writing clean, readable, well-documented code.
• Experience working in a cloud data warehouse (BigQuery, Redshift, Snowflake) or other cloud infrastructure.
• Working experience with Python or a similar object‑oriented language, especially for data transformation, scripting, or working with APIs.
• Experience using Git and other command line tools.
• Previous experience working on a political campaign or similar environment, especially in a data role, or other settings that required ramping up and delivering under time pressure.
• A self‑starter mindset: able to onboard quickly, ask the right questions, and jump into ambiguous problems without waiting for a perfect spec.
• A service‑oriented approach to data work that prioritizes collaboration, supporting staff and partners, and building products that center and advance racial equity.
• Strong interpersonal skills and a professional approach to communicating with team members, partners, and vendors.

Nice to Haves

• Experience using dbt to transform data, including using dbt Cloud.
• Experience working with APIs to move data between systems.
• Experience with the suite of GCP tooling – we mainly use Cloud Build Jobs, Workflows, and Virtual Machines.
• Understanding of unit testing, CI/CD, containerization, and other software engineering best practices.
• Familiarity with voter file or voter contact data from tools like NGP/VAN.

Hiring Process

1. Hiring Manager Resume Review
2. Initial Hiring Manager Interview (30 min)
3. Technical Assessment (done on own time, no more than 4 hours)
4. Final Interview with Hiring Manager and Data Team Leadership (45 minutes)
5. Reference Check

How you'll ramp

• 30 days: Get an overview of our data stack and our dbt project, key Python and SQL scripts in our codebase, and how data flows in and out of our warehouse. Ship your first meaningful contribution, whether an adhoc upload or a new dbt model with tests and documentation.
• 45 days: Take ownership of a small project or recurring workflow end-to-end, scoping it, building it, and getting it reviewed and merged, and start picking up tickets from the queue.
• 60 days: Operate independently on day-to-day work and assigned tickets, with help from the team.

Location

This is a remote position, with a sight preference for someone based in DC. Some travel and reasonable access to an airport is required. America Votes has offices located in DC and CO, FL, GA, MI, MN, NC, NH, NM, NV, OH, PA, and WI.

Compensation

The salary for this position will be between $85,000 - $100,000 and depend upon the applicant's experience. America Votes offers a competitive benefits package covering 100% of employee medical, dental and vision insurance premiums, life insurance, long term disability coverage, monthly cell phone reimbursement, personal professional development funds, parental leave, and 401(K) after four months of continuous service with the organization. America Votes provides a generous paid time off policy with paid vacation, unlimited sick and safe leave, paid personal days, at least 10 Federal paid holidays including Juneteenth, as well as paid organizational time off from at least December 23 to January 1. This position ends on December 31, 2026.

America Votes is an equal opportunity employer committed to a diverse, inclusive and equitable workplace. America Votes does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, national or ethnic origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, veteran status or any other protected category under local, state or federal law. People of color, LGBTQ candidates, individuals with disabilities, and neurodivergent individuals are strongly encouraged to apply.