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| Turnout | 80.0% (of registered voters)[1] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 County Results
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The1988 United States presidential election in Nevada took place on November 8, 1988. All 50 states andthe District of Columbia, were part of the1988 United States presidential election. State voters chose four electors to theElectoral College, which selected thepresident andvice president.
Nevada was won by incumbent United StatesVice PresidentGeorge H. W. Bush ofTexas, who was running againstMassachusetts GovernorMichael Dukakis. Bush ran withIndianaSenatorDan Quayle as vice president, and Dukakis ran withTexas SenatorLloyd Bentsen. Bush carried Nevada with 58.86% of the vote, while Dukakis received 37.92%, a victory margin of 20.94%.
Bush carried Nevada by a landslide margin of 21%, making the state 13.2% more Republican than the nation overall. He carried every county in the state, and both of Nevada's largest counties –Clark andWashoe – weighed in as more Republican than the nation. Only in one county, then-traditionally DemocraticWhite Pine County, did Bush underperform his national vote share, and then only slightly. This was also the only county in which Dukakis cracked 40%, although in no county did he overperform his national vote share (with 'no candidate' garnering 4.9% of the vote in White Pine County).
TheMountain West had begun trending Republican in1952;[2] in that election, Eisenhower overperformed in Nevada as he did in the rest of the region, after it had unanimously voted for Truman in1948. However, Nevada, along with New Mexico in the Mountain West, voted for Kennedy in1960, and was competitive in1976.1980 marked a watershed in Nevada's Republican turn, as it voted 25.9% more Republican than the nation, the most to the right Nevada had voted since statehood. Nevada remained a strong 15.7% more Republican than the nation amid Reagan's national1984 landslide, and remained more Republican than the nation by double digits in 1988. This was at the same time as some other Mountain West states, such asColorado andMontana, wavered in the strength of their traditional Republicanism, amid the 1980s farm crisis.
Nevada, which had been a bellwether state for most of the 20th century (having voted for the winner of every election between its third vote forBryan in1908 and its vote forFord in1976), returned to being closer to the national median in1992, asBill Clinton, the national winner, narrowly carried it. It remained narrowly to the right of the country in both of Clinton's wins, butGeorge W. Bush only narrowly carried it in his own two victories in2000 and2004. The election was rathermulti-partisan, with more than 3% of the state voting for third parties or for Nevada's "None of These Candidates" option.[3]
Nevada weighed in for this election as about 13% moreRepublican than the national average. This would be the third time in a row that Republicans swept every county in the state – however, it would become the last time (as of 2024) any presidential candidate did so, as this was the last election in whichClark County, the most populated county in Nevada and home toLas Vegas, was won by a Republican presidential candidate.[4]
| 1988 United States presidential election in Nevada[1] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Votes | Percentage | Electoral votes | |
| Republican | George H. W. Bush | 206,040 | 58.86% | 4 | |
| Democratic | Michael Dukakis | 132,738 | 37.92% | 0 | |
| None of These Candidates | 6,934 | 1.98% | 0 | ||
| Libertarian | Ron Paul | 3,520 | 1.01% | 0 | |
| New Alliance | Lenora Fulani | 835 | 0.24% | 0 | |
| Totals | 350,067 | 100.0% | 4 | ||
| County | George H.W. Bush Republican | Michael Dukakis Democratic | None of These Candidates | Ron Paul Libertarian | Leonora Fulani New Alliance | Margin | Total votes cast[1] | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | ||
| Carson City | 9,701 | 63.44% | 5,088 | 33.27% | 276 | 1.80% | 195 | 1.28% | 31 | 0.20% | 4,613 | 30.17% | 15,291 |
| Churchill | 4,578 | 72.86% | 1,481 | 23.57% | 155 | 2.47% | 49 | 0.78% | 20 | 0.32% | 3,097 | 49.29% | 6,283 |
| Clark | 108,110 | 56.37% | 78,359 | 40.86% | 3,400 | 1.77% | 1,535 | 0.80% | 375 | 0.20% | 29,751 | 15.51% | 191,779 |
| Douglas | 7,074 | 67.02% | 3,107 | 29.44% | 214 | 2.03% | 135 | 1.28% | 25 | 0.24% | 3,967 | 37.58% | 10,555 |
| Elko | 5,722 | 68.35% | 2,310 | 27.59% | 220 | 2.63% | 96 | 1.15% | 24 | 0.29% | 3,412 | 40.76% | 8,372 |
| Esmeralda | 380 | 68.84% | 143 | 25.91% | 16 | 2.90% | 11 | 1.99% | 2 | 0.36% | 237 | 42.93% | 552 |
| Eureka | 413 | 70.96% | 151 | 25.95% | 11 | 1.89% | 7 | 1.20% | 0 | 0.00% | 262 | 45.01% | 582 |
| Humboldt | 2,378 | 66.50% | 1,024 | 28.64% | 87 | 2.43% | 65 | 1.82% | 22 | 0.62% | 1,354 | 37.86% | 3,576 |
| Lander | 1,214 | 70.83% | 439 | 25.61% | 35 | 2.04% | 21 | 1.23% | 5 | 0.29% | 775 | 45.22% | 1,714 |
| Lincoln | 1,035 | 66.18% | 466 | 29.80% | 45 | 2.88% | 9 | 0.58% | 9 | 0.58% | 569 | 36.38% | 1,564 |
| Lyon | 4,390 | 62.83% | 2,301 | 32.93% | 171 | 2.45% | 103 | 1.47% | 22 | 0.31% | 2,089 | 29.90% | 6,987 |
| Mineral | 1,480 | 56.88% | 978 | 37.59% | 101 | 3.88% | 20 | 0.77% | 23 | 0.88% | 502 | 19.29% | 2,602 |
| Nye | 3,619 | 64.59% | 1,748 | 31.20% | 143 | 2.55% | 78 | 1.39% | 15 | 0.27% | 1,871 | 33.39% | 5,603 |
| Pershing | 867 | 62.11% | 458 | 32.81% | 48 | 3.44% | 17 | 1.22% | 6 | 0.43% | 409 | 29.30% | 1,396 |
| Storey | 651 | 56.36% | 432 | 37.40% | 46 | 3.98% | 22 | 1.90% | 4 | 0.35% | 219 | 18.96% | 1,155 |
| Washoe | 52,654 | 59.34% | 32,902 | 37.08% | 1,803 | 2.03% | 1,137 | 1.28% | 232 | 0.26% | 19,752 | 22.26% | 88,728 |
| White Pine | 1,774 | 53.31% | 1,351 | 40.59% | 163 | 4.90% | 20 | 0.60% | 20 | 0.60% | 423 | 12.72% | 3,328 |
| Bullfrog[a] | 0 | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0 | N/A | 0 |
| Totals | 206,040 | 58.86% | 132,738 | 37.92% | 6,934 | 1.98% | 3,520 | 1.01% | 835 | 0.24% | 73,302 | 20.94% | 350,067 |
State and district results of the1988 U.S. presidential election | ||
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