1980 United States presidential election in Mississippi

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Nominee Ronald Reagan Jimmy Carter Party Republican Democratic Home state California Georgia Running mate George H. W. Bush Walter Mondale Electoral vote 7 0 Popular vote 441,089 429,281 Percentage 49.42% 48.09%

County results Congressional district results Reagan   40–50%   50–60%   60–70% Carter   40–50%   50–60%   60–70%   70–80% Tie   40–50%

President before election Jimmy Carter Democratic Elected President Ronald Reagan Republican

The1980 United States presidential election in Mississippi took place on November 4, 1980. All fifty states andThe District of Columbia were part of the1980 United States presidential election.Mississippi voters chose seven electors to theElectoral College, who voted forpresident andvice president.

Mississippi was won, fairly consistently with predictions, by Reagan with a slim margin of 1.33 points.^[1] However, in future elections, the state would become a Republican stronghold, and no Democratic presidential candidate has carried the state sinceJimmy Carter in the prior election. As of the2024 presidential election^[update], this is the last election in whichWinston County,Tippah County,Itawamba County,Union County,Prentiss County,Pontotoc County,Lee County,Lafayette County,Attala County,Monroe County,Madison County,Calhoun County,Tate County,Marion County,Leake County,Grenada County, andFranklin County voted for the Democratic candidate, as well as the last time thatClarke County was not carried by the Republican candidate;^[2] as Reagan and Carter ended up in a tie in Clarke County.

This is the last presidential election in which Mississippi voted more Democratic than the nation at large. At the time it was the election with the largest number of votes in Mississippi history.^[3] This is the second-closest election in Mississippi after1848 and the only time that a Republican has won Mississippi by a margin of less than 5 points. This was also the seventh election in a row in which Mississippi voted for a different party than the previous election.

Both major party candidates targeted the state,^[4] with GovernorWilliam F. Winter giving incumbent president and Democratic candidateJimmy Carter extensive support — support that had not been given to a Democratic nominee sinceAdlai Stevenson II during the 1950s.^[5] Mississippi, alongsideAlabama,Florida andTexas, was a key state in Reagan’s plan to win the presidency by eating into Carter’s 1976 Southern support,^[6] especially as Carter’sBaptist identity held less weight than it had in 1976.^[7]

Philadelphia, notorious for the 1964 murder of three civil rights workers, was where Reagan began his campaign with a proclamation of “states’ rights” frequently compared withGeorge Wallace’s 1968 campaign,^[8] which had won over five-eighths of Mississippi’s total vote and over four-fifths of the white vote.^[9] Late in September, the state would be the target of simultaneous campaigning by Jimmy Carter’s mother Lilian, and simultaneously by Republican nominee, CaliforniaGovernorRonald Reagan.^[10] Later in the campaign, however, Governor Winter issued a severe criticism of Reagan’s campaign for failing to debate agricultural policy.^[11]

Among white voters, 62% supported Reagan while 35% supported Carter.^[12][13]

• Black, Earl;Black, Merle (1992).The Vital South: How Presidents Are Elected.Harvard University Press.ISBN 0674941306.

• 1980 United States presidential election by state
• United States presidential elections in Mississippi
• 1980 Mississippi elections

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