This article lists the various background character deaths that occur in The Purge: Election Year.
- The film opens with a flashback of the 2022 Purge. A Purger has taken a young Charlene Roan and her entire family captive, and forces her mother to choose which of them will be allowed to survive whilst murdering all of the others. As a main character of the film, Charlie survives and the deaths of her parents and brother is what motivates her to run for President in 2040. The slaughter of her family is not shown.
- When the 2040 Purge begins, Laney Rucker takes to the streets of Washington in a customized ambulance to offer triage to Purge victims. At a crosswalk, a man steps up to her driver's seat window whispering "Purge" repeatedly. He is suddenly killed when an off-screen Purger shoots a crossbow bolt through his head.
- A group of Purgers have set up a medieval-style guillotine in the street and use it to behead a man.
- A shot of the Lincoln Memorial shows a dozen dead bodies lying on the steps. Some of the bodies have been set on fire and the letters P-U-R-G-E have been written on the pillars in blood.
- Laney's ambulance stops on a street corner when a woman calls for help. She states that she had shot her husband by mistake. The wounded husband is still breathing when Laney arrives, but is never seen again following this scene, so it is unclear if he survives or not.
- Kimmy and her friends arrive outside of Joe Dixon's deli. Kimmy is covered in blood, stating to Joe that she had murdered her parents earlier that night.
- After Eric and Couper sabotage the surveillance system for Senator Roan's house, a group of mercenaries led by Earl Danzinger make their move to assassinate the Senator.
- Three guards stood outside the front door are sniped by an unseen marksman.
- After no one responds to his radio check call, Leo Barnes checks the surveillance and discovers the earlier footage has been looped. He reactivates the cameras to find that all of the snipers and guards he had posted are dead.
- Three guards watching a TV screen in the lounge are shot dead by Danzinger's men.
- After getting outside the house, Leo and Roan encounter two of Danzinger's assassins. Leo fights them and kills them both with a push-knife.
- Leo uses his phone to trigger a bomb inside the portable computer left behind in the house, killing Couper, Eric and a number of Danzinger's men.
- Roan spots a remote-controlled drone following her and Leo. Leo turns around and shoots the drone down with his handgun.
- Roan and Leo are ambushed by a trio of Purgers who are playing possum. Soon, the three are no longer just playing dead as Leo shoots each one of them.
- A group of Russian "murder tourists" dressed in all-American costumes gang up on Leo and Roan. Before they can kill the pair, all eight of them are gunned down by Joe and Marcos.
- Laney's ambulance picks up Rondo, a young Purger who was injured. Outside the ambulance, several dead bodies lay in the road.
- Laney drives her ambulance up to the front of Joe's deli, running over Kimmy and her friend before coming to a stop. Kimmy's friend is crushed to death but Kimmy herself survives until she is shot by Laney.
- The two members of Kimmy's gang who were cutting through the front shutters of the deli are shot dead by Laney.
- As Laney's ambulance drives past a park, Senator Roan looks out the window. A group of Purgers wearing wedding dresses are dancing around a tree from which six dead bodies are hanging from the branches.
- After removing a trace bullet from his shoulder, Leo leaves the projectile near an overpass for Danzinger's team to find. Two mercenaries arrive to find the bullet, but are then ambushed and killed by a gang of Purgers.
- After Leo and Senator Roan leave the Safe Zone, they pass by a woman sitting on a bench. The woman is singing softly as she stares at a dead body burning at her feet.
- At the Church of Our Lady of Sorrow, the New Founding Fathers of America initiate their Purge Mass. Selected to be Purged first is a man called Lawrence, a life-long drug addict. As Lawrence sobs and struggles in his bindings, Harmon James repeatedly stabs him to death while the congregation of the country's wealthy and powerful look on and smile.
- As Leo enters the church, he sneaks up on a Secret Service guard and stabs him in the back.
- The church erupts into chaos as Marcos shoots Caleb Warrens before he can Purge Senator Roan.
- Marcos, Joe, Leo and Laney start firing into the congregation, killing an unknown number of participants.
- Many of the Mass participants run away while others raise weapons and return fire, but fail to land any hits and are gunned down themselves.
- After the surviving congregation have all fled the cathedral, a dozen Secret Service agents enter. They are all ambushed and killed by Dante Bishop's group, who entered from another passage.
- As Dante searches the underground parking lot for a vehicle, two of his men are gunned down by Danzinger's mercenaries.
- Two mercenaries are hiding between a wall and a parked car. Dante hotwires a car and rams it into the car that the mercs are using as cover, crushing them against the wall.
- Roan unties one of the captives that the NFFA congregation were planning to sacrifice. He immediately tries to run away, but Harmon James opens the door and shoots the man with a shotgun.
- Another man is shot by James before his shotgun clicks empty.