Projection: Bush
Electoral Votes: 34
2000 Winner: Bush +21.3
Composite Margin: Bush +22.7
Current Category: Strong Bush
Probability of Bush Win: 100%
Best Bush: 65-35
Best Kerry: 43-57
Trend: Republican +22.1
Safe: Yes
Can other candidate win? Don’t mess with Texas
National Popular Vote for other candidate to win: Kerry +23
Best Weekly Polling Result for Bush: +24
Best Weekly Polling Result for Kerry: -27
In 1988, Michael Dukakis – governor of Massachusetts and boss of Lt. Gov. Kerry – in an effort to repeat the success of the Kennedy/Johnson ticket, added Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen – who beat Bush 41 for his Senate seat – in the hope of picking up Texas’ electoral votes. It didn’t work. In fact, Dukakis won no southern states (unless you count West Virginia). John Kerry didn’t make that mistake, probably because Texas doesn’t have a Democratic Senator today.
Texans were more supportive of the Democrat than the nation in 1960, 1964, 1968 and 1976, but has become more pro-Republican ever since. It gave the first President Bush a margin of victory over Dukakis that was 5 points greater than his win nationally, and then 9 points more against Clinton, 13 more to Dole and 22 more to Dubya. It won’t change this year, and may even be larger.
For an explanation of this data, click here.
For regular updates to the Composite State by State Margins, click here.
For regular updates to the Election Simulation, click here.
Note that the map on this page may not be updated as regularly.
