1996 United States presidential election in Texas

← 1992 November 5, 1996 2000 →
Turnout	53.24% (of registered voters) 40.97% (of voting age population)[1]
Nominee Bob Dole Bill Clinton Ross Perot Party Republican Democratic Independent Alliance Reform Home state Kansas Arkansas Texas Running mate Jack Kemp Al Gore James Campbell[a] Electoral vote 32 0 0 Popular vote 2,736,167 2,459,683 378,537 Percentage 48.76% 43.83% 6.75%
County results Dole   40–50%   50–60%   60–70%   70–80% Clinton   40–50%   50–60%   60–70%   70–80%   80–90%
President before election Bill Clinton Democratic Elected President Bill Clinton Democratic

The1996 United States presidential election in Texas took place on November 5, 1996. All fifty states, andthe District of Columbia, took part in the1996 United States presidential election. State voters chose 32 electors to theElectoral College, which selected the president and vice president.

Texas was won byKansasSenatorBob Dole, who was running against incumbent PresidentBill Clinton ofArkansas. Clinton ran a second time with incumbent Vice PresidentAl Gore as his running mate, and Dole ran with formerNew York RepresentativeJack Kemp. Texas provided both two of the nation's three most Republican counties –High Plains-basedOchiltree in its north andGlasscock in the central plains – and its most Democratic county in rock-ribbedTejanoStarr County at the opposite end of the state.^[2]

Texas weighed in for this election 13% moreRepublican than the national average. With its 32 electoral votes, Texas was Dole's biggest electoral college prize. The presidential election of 1996 was a verymulti-partisan election for Texas, with more than 7% of the electorate voting forthird-party candidates. In his second bid for the presidency,Ross Perot led the newly reformedReform Party to gain over 6% of the votes in his home state of Texas, and to pull in support nationally as the most popular third-party candidate to run for United States presidency in recent times.Loving County, Texas was one of two counties nationwide in which Ross Perot came in second place, ahead of one of the two major-party nominees, in 1996, the other beingArthur County,Nebraska.

The political realignment of the rural United States in the 21st century, aided by Texas GovernorGeorge W. Bush being the Republican nominee in the2000 and2004 presidential elections, resulted in the state's rural areas--including in traditional Democratic strongholds likeEast Texas--growing dramatically more Republican after this election. Primarily due to Clinton's rural appeal, this would be the last election in which rural Texas played a factor in the close margin, as almost all of these counties switched from Democratic to Republican beginning in2000.

• Angelina
• Briscoe
• Clay
• Coleman
• Concho
• Crockett
• Franklin
• Freestone
• Hardin
• Hays
• Henderson
• Hill
• Houston
• Jack
• Lamar
• Liberty
• Madison
• McCulloch
• Mills
• Montague
• Polk
• San Jacinto
• Throckmorton
• Upshur

• Grayson
• Irion
• Loving
• Somervell

• Atascosa
• Karnes
• Pecos
• Ward

Despite losing the state, Clinton won 16 of 30 congressional districts, including three which elected Republicans, while Dole won the other 14, including four which elected Democrats.^[3]

As of the2024 presidential election^[update], this is the last time a Democratic presidential candidate won the following counties:Hudspeth,Pecos,Terrell,Ward,Swisher,Hall,Cottle,Hardeman,Foard,Baylor,Knox,Haskell,Stonewall,Kent,Dickens,Crosby,Jones,Fisher,Nolan,Mitchell,Menard,Comanche,Palo Pinto,Bastrop,Caldwell,Nueces,San Patricio,Refugio,Bee,Karnes,Atascosa,Burleson,Milam,Falls,Limestone,Navarro,Waller,Grimes,Galveston,Trinity,Orange,Jasper,Tyler,Sabine,San Augustine,Shelby,Panola,Harrison,Marion,Cass,Bowie,Camp,Titus,Red River,Rains,Hopkins,Delta, andFannin.^[4] The 58 counties who have not voted for a Democrat since 1996 are the most from one state in this election -- an election already defined by being the end of white rural Southern support for the Democrats writ large -- and the most from one state since 1976 (alsoTexas, with 73).

This would also be the last election until 2016 in which the margin of victory for a Republican in Texas would be in the single digits, the most recent one when the Republican candidate's vote percentage was held to only a plurality, and the most recent where the margin of victory was less than 5 points. This is also the last time a Democrat won a county in the Texas Panhandle. Clinton became the first ever Democrat to win the White House without carryingAngelina,Briscoe County, Texas,Clay,Concho,Franklin,Freestone,Hardin,Hays,Henderson,Hill,Houston,Liberty,McCulloch,Montague,Polk,Throckmorton, orUpshur Counties, as well as the first to do so without carryingMadison County sinceJames Buchanan in1856, the first to do so without carryingSan Jacinto County sinceGrover Cleveland in1892, and the first to do so without carryingColeman,Crockett,Jack, orMills Counties sinceJohn F. Kennedy in1960. This was the first election that a Democrat was elected twice without ever carrying the state.

• United States presidential elections in Texas
• Presidency of Bill Clinton

• 1996 United States presidential election by state
• United States presidential elections in Texas
• 1996 Texas elections

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