1988 United States presidential election in Idaho

none June 2025 September 2023 1988 United States presidential election 1988 United States presidential election in Idaho Idaho presidential no 1984 United States presidential election in Idaho 1984 1992 United States presidential election in Idaho 1992 November 8, 1988 x200px File:VP George Bush crop.jpg George H. W. Bush Republican Party (United States) Texas Dan Quayle 4 253,881 62.08% File:Dukakis campaign portrait 3x4.jpg Michael Dukakis Democratic Party (United States) Massachusetts Lloyd Bentsen 0 147,272 36.01% 1988 United States presidential election in Idaho results map by county.svg 200px County results Bush #f2b3be 40–50% #e27f90 50–60% #cc2f4a 60–70% #d40000 70–80% #aa0000 80–90% Dukakis #b9d7ff 40–50% #86b6f2 50–60% #4389e3 60–70% President Ronald Reagan Republican Party (United States) George H. W. Bush Republican Party (United States) The 1988 United States presidential election in Idaho took place on November 8, 1988. All 50 states and the District of Columbia, were part of the 1988 United States presidential election. State voters chose four electors to the Electoral College, which selected the president and vice president. Idaho was won by incumbent United States Vice President George H. W. Bush of Texas, who was running against Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis. Bush ran with Indiana Senator Dan Quayle as vice president, and Dukakis ran with Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen. The election was very partisan for Idaho, with over 98% of the electorate voting for either the Democratic or Republican parties, and only four parties appearing on the ballot.https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=1988&fips=16&f=1&off=0&elect=0 1988 Presidential General Election Results - Idaho Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections 2017-12-29 All but one county gave either Dukakis or Bush an outright majority; the exception was Bonner County, which gave Bush a very narrow plurality. Bush's best county was Madison County, which gave him 84.87% of its vote—Bush's second-strongest county performance in the nation after the famous Unionist Republican bastion of Jackson County in Kentucky.Dave Leip’s U.S. Election Atlas; 1988 Presidential Election Statistics Dukakis' best county was Shoshone County, where he received 60.49% of the vote. Idaho weighed in for this election as 18% more Republican than the national average and with 62.08% of the popular vote. As a result, Idaho became the third-most Republican state in the nation, behind Utah and New Hampshire.https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/stats.php?year=1988&f=1&off=0&elect=0 1988 Presidential Election Statistics Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections 2018-03-05 Bush won Idaho by a powerful 26.1% margin; his 62.1% vote share made it his third-best state in the nation, after Utah and New Hampshire. The Mountain West as a whole had begun trending Republican from 1952 on, after having been a swing region that was critical to Democratic victories when they did occur between 1896 and 1948.Paulson Arthur C. https://books.google.com/books?id=53rmOMcKGZ8C&dq=%22the+interior+west+and+the+northeast+quadrant%22&pg=PA13 Realignment and Party Revival: Understanding American Electoral Politics at the Turn of the Twenty-first Century 2000 Greenwood Publishing Group 978-0-275-96865-6 en However, the realignment was particularly pronounced in Idaho; in 1964, a mere 16 years after having backed Truman over Dewey, Idaho came within less than 2% of voting for Barry Goldwater, far closer than any other state in the region apart from Goldwater's native Arizona and indeed far closer than any other Johnson state anywhere apart from Florida. In 1988, an election influenced by the 1980s farm crisis, several Mountain States (most notably Colorado and Montana) were shakier than usual in their support for the Republican ticket, but Idaho remained not only in the Republican column, but far more Republican than the nation overall. Bush dominated almost all of rural Idaho, and also scored strong wins in the population centers of Ada County (Boise), Canyon County (Nampa), Bonneville County (Idaho Falls), and Twin Falls County (Twin Falls), in all of which he exceeded 60% of the vote. He also won, albeit less powerfully, the other two of Idaho's six largest counties, Bannock (Pocatello) and Kootenai (Coeur d'Alene). However, Dukakis did manage to carry a cluster of counties in North Idaho, centered on the Silver Valley, a region historically dominated by mining. Bush became the first Republican to win the White House without carrying Latah County since William McKinley in 1896. 2020 11 As of the 2024 presidential election, this is the last election in which Blaine County voted for a Republican presidential candidate.Sullivan, Robert David; ‘How the Red and Blue Map Evolved Over the Past Century’; America Magazine in The National Catholic Review; June 29, 2016 Results 1988 United States presidential election in IdahoPartyCandidateVotesPercentageElectoral votes Republican George H. W. Bush 253,881 62.08% 4 Democratic Michael Dukakis 147,272 36.01% 0 Libertarian Ron Paul 5,313 1.30% 0 Independent Lenora Fulani 2,502 0.61% 0 Totals 408,968 100.00% 4 Results by county County George H.W. BushRepublican Michael DukakisDemocratic Ronald PaulLibertarian Leonora FulaniIndependent Margin Total votes cast # % # % # % # % # % Ada 54,951 62.92% 30,525 34.95% 1,289 1.48% 569 0.65% 24,426 27.97% 87,334 Adams 1,107 61.53% 643 35.74% 34 1.89% 15 0.83% 464 25.79% 1,799 Bannock 14,986 52.40% 13,074 45.71% 373 1.30% 168 0.59% 1,912 6.69% 28,601 Bear Lake 2,084 69.93% 867 29.09% 16 0.54% 13 0.44% 1,217 40.84% 2,980 Benewah 1,650 50.96% 1,518 46.88% 41 1.27% 29 0.90% 132 4.08% 3,238 Bingham 10,131 68.89% 4,346 29.55% 143 0.97% 85 0.58% 5,785 39.34% 14,705 Blaine 3,130 54.39% 2,498 43.41% 86 1.49% 41 0.71% 632 10.98% 5,755 Boise 1,044 61.05% 620 36.26% 31 1.81% 15 0.88% 424 24.79% 1,710 Bonner 5,721 49.94% 5,555 48.49% 125 1.09% 54 0.47% 166 1.45% 11,455 Bonneville 22,613 75.01% 7,032 23.33% 354 1.17% 148 0.49% 15,581 51.68% 30,147 Boundary 1,800 56.21% 1,336 41.72% 34 1.06% 32 1.00% 464 14.49% 3,202 Butte 899 62.26% 521 36.08% 18 1.25% 6 0.42% 378 26.18% 1,444 Camas 288 65.90% 136 31.12% 9 2.06% 4 0.92% 152 34.78% 437 Canyon 21,426 66.14% 10,207 31.51% 597 1.84% 166 0.51% 11,219 34.63% 32,396 Caribou 2,239 71.22% 867 27.58% 28 0.89% 10 0.32% 1,372 43.64% 3,144 Cassia 5,345 73.34% 1,833 25.15% 59 0.81% 51 0.70% 3,512 48.19% 7,288 Clark 281 66.75% 133 31.59% 2 0.48% 5 1.19% 148 35.16% 421 Clearwater 1,659 45.87% 1,861 51.45% 48 1.33% 49 1.35% -202 -5.58% 3,617 Custer 1,253 66.09% 616 32.49% 17 0.90% 10 0.53% 637 33.60% 1,896 Elmore 3,756 63.46% 2,078 35.11% 61 1.03% 24 0.41% 1,678 28.35% 5,919 Franklin 2,992 77.29% 806 20.82% 42 1.08% 31 0.80% 2,186 56.47% 3,871 Fremont 3,401 73.11% 1,178 25.32% 50 1.07% 23 0.49% 2,223 47.79% 4,652 Gem 2,926 56.90% 2,064 40.14% 111 2.16% 41 0.80% 862 16.76% 5,142 Gooding 2,908 59.64% 1,872 38.39% 60 1.23% 36 0.74% 1,036 21.25% 4,876 Idaho 3,541 60.31% 2,198 37.44% 98 1.67% 34 0.58% 1,343 22.87% 5,871 Jefferson 5,295 79.64% 1,198 18.02% 126 1.90% 30 0.45% 4,097 61.62% 6,649 Jerome 3,830 64.32% 1,985 33.33% 102 1.71% 38 0.64% 1,845 30.99% 5,955 Kootenai 15,093 55.63% 11,621 42.83% 249 0.92% 167 0.62% 3,472 12.80% 27,130 Latah 6,367 48.47% 6,544 49.82% 134 1.02% 91 0.69% -177 -1.35% 13,136 Lemhi 2,378 66.24% 1,157 32.23% 42 1.69% 13 0.52% 1,221 34.01% 3,590 Lewis 786 48.76% 807 50.06% 12 0.74% 7 0.43% -21 -1.30% 1,612 Lincoln 918 60.20% 574 37.64% 22 1.44% 11 0.72% 344 22.56% 1,525 Madison 6,197 84.87% 1,009 13.82% 72 0.99% 24 0.33% 5,188 71.05% 7,302 Minidoka 4,623 65.73% 2,290 32.56% 75 1.07% 45 0.64% 2,333 33.17% 7,033 Nez Perce 7,027 46.78% 7,754 51.62% 137 0.91% 102 0.68% -727 -4.84% 15,020 Oneida 1,269 70.11% 508 28.07% 30 1.66% 3 0.17% 761 42.04% 1,810 Owyhee 1,707 64.81% 848 32.19% 61 2.32% 18 0.68% 859 32.62% 2,634 Payette 3,786 65.17% 1,900 32.71% 79 1.36% 44 0.76% 1,886 32.46% 5,809 Power 1,838 61.66% 1,095 36.73% 28 0.94% 20 0.67% 743 24.93% 2,981 Shoshone 2,134 38.20% 3,379 60.49% 36 0.64% 37 0.66% -1,245 -22.29% 5,586 Teton 982 64.31% 531 34.77% 8 0.52% 6 0.39% 451 29.54% 1,527 Twin Falls 13,243 63.87% 7,078 34.14% 263 1.27% 150 0.72% 6,165 29.73% 20,734 Valley 1,897 59.37% 1,251 39.15% 29 0.91% 18 0.56% 646 20.22% 3,195 Washington 2,380 61.98% 1,359 35.39% 82 2.14% 19 0.49% 1,021 26.59% 3,840Totals253,88162.08%147,27236.01%5,3131.30%2,5020.61%106,60926.07%408,968 Counties that flipped from Republican to Democratic Clearwater Lewis Latah Nez Perce Shoshone See also United States presidential elections in Idaho Presidency of George H. W. Bush References Idaho 1988 Category:1988 Idaho elections