It's hard to imagine now, but crime was one of the 3 biggest issues in the 1988 campaign. White suburban voters were terrified of black on white crime, and Willie Horton's vicious rape of a white woman in Maryland while her husband watched, swung the state to Bush. Even then, he won Maryland by just 2.9%.
Bush beat Dukakis in the popular vote by 7.8%, which is a bit higher than Obama 2008, but he got 426 electoral votes due to close victories in California, Illinois, Pennsylvania. Crime swung all those states to Bush. But in the rural farm areas that are not affected by crime, Dukakis outperformed his national numbers. He won Iowa by 10 points, won Minnesota and Wisconsin, lost Missouri by less than 4 points, and South Dakota by about 6 points.
You think Bush won PA because of crime?
