Weirdest Presidental Election Result by state since 1960

[E-Dawg]

States in bold are ones where I truly do not understand how the said result happened, and I would appreciate someone trying to explain.

Arizona: 1996 (randomly voted Democratic despite being solidly Republican before and after)

Arkansas: 1980 (voted Reagan in insane 30 point R swing despite being Carter's 2nd best state in 1976, none of the rest of the South swung by this much!)

California: 1972: (voted 11 points more Dem than the nation as a whole despite being solidly a solidly Republican state and being the home state for Nixon, never able to understand this anomaly)

Hawaii: 1976 (2 points away from voting for Ford despite being a solidly Democrat state, how did this happen?)

Indiana: randomly voted for Obama despite being extremely Republican before and after.

Lousiana: 1996 (voted for Clinton by a huge 12 point margin, far more Democratic than rest of South outside of Arkansas, why?

Maine: 2016 (Huge Swing to Trump, going from solidly D to one that Trump almost won. I don't understand how Trump would be a better fit than past Republicans.)

Massachusettes: 1980 (voted for Reagan despite 6 usually less Democratic states staying loyal to Carter)

Michigan: 2016 (thanks WWC)

Minnesota: 2016 (Trump almost won this solidly Democratic state by dominating among WWC voters)

Mississippi: 1980 (Swung only 3 points more R from 1976 despite far greater swings among the rest of the South. I don't understand why Mississippi stayed so stubborn.)

Montana: 2008 (how did Obama get within 2 points here? I get Clinton 1992 due to Perot, but I don't get this)

Nevada: 2008 (Obama won by 12 points, massively overperforming in what has otherwise been a swing state since 1992)

New Hampshire: 1996 (Clinton won by 10 points in a state than barely voted for him in 1992 and was extremely Republican before that)

New York: 2016 (How did Trump improve over every Republican performance since 1988 upstate?!)

Ohio: 2016 (Trump massively overperformed here)

Oklahoma: 1960 (Massively swung to Nixon, becoming one of his best states, despite being a Democratic-leaning state before this election)

Pennslyvania: 1984 (Much more Democratic compared to the nation than state usually was)

Rhode Island: 1972 (Voted far more Republican than MA although the two states usually vote very similarly.)

South Carolina: 1968 (Only Deep South state not to vote Wallace)

Tennesee: 1988 (Why did Bush improve over Reagan?!)

Texas: 1968 (Only Southern state to vote Democratic, Humphrey did far better in white vote than rest of South, guess they were that loyal to LBJ)

Utah: 2016 (Insane 3rd Party performance by McMullin)

Virginia: 1976 (Only Southern state to resist Carter)

Washington: 1968 (Not sure why state voted for Humphrey, since it was otherwise reliably Republican between 1952 and 1984)

West Virginia: 1972 (How did the state vote MORE Republican than the nation?! It was heavily Dem, heavily union, and didn't have the racial issues the South did at the time.)

Wisconsin: 2016 (thanks WWC)

Edit: Removed Bold from results that I now understand due to several helpful responses.

[Real Texan Politics]

I'm guessing upstate NY because of WWC. It's almost like the same environment as Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Only reason NY didn't go to Trump though is NYC.

[MT Treasurer]

New Mexico: 2004 (Bush managed to win that has been a strongly Dem state since 1992 due to overperformance among Hispanics.)

New Mexico was by no means solidly Democratic in 2004. In fact, it was still a very good bellwether state at that time, even voting slightly more Republican than the nation in 1996/2000.

[brucejoel99]

Florida 2000 must surely qualify as "weird," given 537 votes, a butterfly ballot, & literal Supreme Court intervention.

[Hope For A New Era]

Minnesota: 2016 (Trump almost won this solidly Democratic state by dominating among WWC voters)

Wrong. He almost won because third-party candidates pulled much more support from Clinton than they did from Trump. He did not do as well among WWC here as he did in WI/MI/PA.

Maine: 2016 (Huge Swing to Trump, going from solidly D to one that Trump almost won. I don't understand how Trump would be a better fit than past Republicans.)

This one is the big WWC swing.

[E-Dawg]

New Mexico: 2004 (Bush managed to win that has been a strongly Dem state since 1992 due to overperformance among Hispanics.)

New Mexico was by no means solidly Democratic in 2004. In fact, it was still a very good bellwether state at that time, even voting slightly more Republican than the nation in 1996/2000.

I stand corrected on this, I removed it from the list. I see how that Bush's performance was not in fact an overperformance, and I apologize for making that bad assumption. I also removed Oregon 2000 because I made a similar bad assumption there.

Florida 2000 must surely qualify as "weird," given 537 votes, a butterfly ballot, & literal Supreme Court intervention.

When I say "weird" I am referring to a candidate doing better or worse than what would be expected. Although Florida's results were very weird and disputed legally, it has consistently been a swing state and neither Bush nor Gore massively overperformed in that election.

Minnesota: 2016 (Trump almost won this solidly Democratic state by dominating among WWC voters)

Wrong. He almost won because third-party candidates pulled much more support from Clinton than they did from Trump. He did not do as well among WWC here as he did in WI/MI/PA.

Comparing the Minnesota county results to previous elections, Trump won almost all of the rural white counties that were previously Democratic and greatly increased Republican percentages outside of the urban cores. Trump clearly gained WWC voters in rural Minnesota that the Republicans didn't have in previous elections, even if the percentage was lower than in the other rust belt states.

[Orwell]

I'm guessing upstate NY because of WWC. It's almost like the same environment as Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Only reason NY didn't go to Trump though is NYC.

Eh we don't really know what would have happened if you remove all of NYC and long island Clinton actually still wins New York albeit narrowly. If you remove NYC alone Trump wins NY by 17k votes, but that would likely lead to a much more contested election by Clinton in the Empire state.

[Calthrina950]

I'm guessing upstate NY because of WWC. It's almost like the same environment as Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Only reason NY didn't go to Trump though is NYC.

Eh we don't really know what would have happened if you remove all of NYC and long island Clinton actually still wins New York albeit narrowly. If you remove NYC alone Trump wins NY by 17k votes, but that would likely lead to a much more contested election by Clinton in the Empire state.

This has to be incorrect. I know that if New York City alone were removed, Clinton would have still won the state by 10,000 votes. If the suburbs had been removed also, I'm pretty certain New York would have gone to Trump.

[Mr. Smith]

States in bold are ones where I truly do not understand how the said result happened, and I would appreciate someone trying to explain.

Arizona: 1996 (randomly voted Democratic despite being solidly Republican before and after)

Arkansas: 1980 (voted Reagan in insane 30 point R swing despite being Carter's 2nd best state in 1976, none of the rest of the South swung by this much!)

California: 1972: (voted 11 points more Dem than the nation as a whole despite being solidly a solidly Republican state and being the home state for Nixon, never able to understand this anomaly)

Hawaii: 1976 (2 points away from voting for Ford despite being a solidly Democrat state, how did this happen?)

Indiana: randomly voted for Obama despite being extremely Republican before and after.

Lousiana: 1996 (voted for Clinton by a huge 12 point margin, far more Democratic than rest of South outside of Arkansas, why?

Maine: 2016 (Huge Swing to Trump, going from solidly D to one that Trump almost won. I don't understand how Trump would be a better fit than past Republicans.)

Massachusettes: 1980 (voted for Reagan despite 6 usually less Democratic states staying loyal to Carter)

Michigan: 2016 (thanks WWC)

Minnesota: 2016 (Trump almost won this solidly Democratic state by dominating among WWC voters)

Mississippi: 1980 (Swung only 3 points more R from 1976 despite far greater swings among the rest of the South. I don't understand why Mississippi stayed so stubborn.)

Montana: 2008 (how did Obama get within 2 points here? I get Clinton 1992 due to Perot, but I don't get this)

Nevada: 2008 (Obama won by 12 points, massively overperforming in what has otherwise been a swing state since 1992)

New Hampshire: 1996 (Clinton won by 10 points in a state than barely voted for him in 1992 and was extremely Republican before that)

New York: 2016 (How did Trump improve over every Republican performance since 1988 upstate?!)

Ohio: 2016 (Trump massively overperformed here)

Oklahoma: 1960 (Massively swung to Nixon, becoming one of his best states, despite being a Democratic-leaning state before this election)

Pennslyvania: 1984 (Much more Democratic compared to the nation than state usually was)

Rhode Island: 1972 (Voted far more Republican than MA although the two states usually vote very similarly.)

South Carolina: 1968 (Only Deep South state not to vote Wallace)

Tennesee: 1988 (Why did Bush improve over Reagan?!)

Texas: 1968 (Only Southern state to vote Democratic, Humphrey did far better in white vote than rest of South, guess they were that loyal to LBJ)

Utah: 2016 (Insane 3rd Party performance by McMullin)

Virginia: 1976 (Only Southern state to resist Carter)

Washington: 1968 (Not sure why state voted for Humphrey, since it was otherwise reliably Republican between 1952 and 1984)

West Virginia: 1972 (How did the state vote MORE Republican than the nation?! It was heavily Dem, heavily union, and didn't have the racial issues the South did at the time.)

Wisconsin: 2016 (thanks WWC)

1. Clinton campaigned to insane amounts to get that result. The bigger question is why Colorado was still lost, or why Nevada was farther right.

2. Nah, The entire South moved a lot towards Reagan, with pretty much the exceptions of Georgia and...Mississippi...why Mississippi barely moved is the better question.

3. Lean R, not solidly so. Carter was a hilariously terrible fit, and Dukakis failed badly enough nationwide to lose what should've been an easy flip. Nixon needed absentee ballots to flip his way in the close ones. The state used the lead D-first, and JFK was declared the winner on that.

4. Hawaii voted to the right of Alaska in 1972, it's pretty obvious that the state wasn't truly Solid D until Reagan...also Carter was a terrible fit.

5. Obama campaign-bombed the state, the better question is why Missouri didn't flip too. I still don't get that one.

6. Okay that one I don't get

7. WWC resentments, if Trump were doing respectably, I suspect he'd flip the state.

8. Anderson ate up the vote, now why the state didn't become a Reagan-Mondale state...that is a stumper.

9. Black turnout seriously dove.

10. 3rd parties...also Al Gore didn't do much better.

11. Not sure with this one

12. Anti-incumbent sentiment and yuge recession, I suspect if it were Pence running for re-election and not Trump, Biden would be far closer

13. NH cemented itself as a swing state by this point, and has generally been close to the pop vote since...why it screwed the country over in 2000 is a better question.

14. Native son performance.

15. The entire Midwest was overly favorable to Trump that year

 i'm stopping there.

[DINGO Joe]

VA wasn't particularly surprising.  Ford was a good fit for NoVa and Richmond was really hardcore rightwing at the time.

[E-Dawg]

States in bold are ones where I truly do not understand how the said result happened, and I would appreciate someone trying to explain.

Arizona: 1996 (randomly voted Democratic despite being solidly Republican before and after)

Arkansas: 1980 (voted Reagan in insane 30 point R swing despite being Carter's 2nd best state in 1976, none of the rest of the South swung by this much!)

California: 1972: (voted 11 points more Dem than the nation as a whole despite being solidly a solidly Republican state and being the home state for Nixon, never able to understand this anomaly)

Hawaii: 1976 (2 points away from voting for Ford despite being a solidly Democrat state, how did this happen?)

Indiana: randomly voted for Obama despite being extremely Republican before and after.

Lousiana: 1996 (voted for Clinton by a huge 12 point margin, far more Democratic than rest of South outside of Arkansas, why?

Maine: 2016 (Huge Swing to Trump, going from solidly D to one that Trump almost won. I don't understand how Trump would be a better fit than past Republicans.)

Massachusettes: 1980 (voted for Reagan despite 6 usually less Democratic states staying loyal to Carter)

Michigan: 2016 (thanks WWC)

Minnesota: 2016 (Trump almost won this solidly Democratic state by dominating among WWC voters)

Mississippi: 1980 (Swung only 3 points more R from 1976 despite far greater swings among the rest of the South. I don't understand why Mississippi stayed so stubborn.)

Montana: 2008 (how did Obama get within 2 points here? I get Clinton 1992 due to Perot, but I don't get this)

Nevada: 2008 (Obama won by 12 points, massively overperforming in what has otherwise been a swing state since 1992)

New Hampshire: 1996 (Clinton won by 10 points in a state than barely voted for him in 1992 and was extremely Republican before that)

New York: 2016 (How did Trump improve over every Republican performance since 1988 upstate?!)

Ohio: 2016 (Trump massively overperformed here)

Oklahoma: 1960 (Massively swung to Nixon, becoming one of his best states, despite being a Democratic-leaning state before this election)

Pennslyvania: 1984 (Much more Democratic compared to the nation than state usually was)

Rhode Island: 1972 (Voted far more Republican than MA although the two states usually vote very similarly.)

South Carolina: 1968 (Only Deep South state not to vote Wallace)

Tennesee: 1988 (Why did Bush improve over Reagan?!)

Texas: 1968 (Only Southern state to vote Democratic, Humphrey did far better in white vote than rest of South, guess they were that loyal to LBJ)

Utah: 2016 (Insane 3rd Party performance by McMullin)

Virginia: 1976 (Only Southern state to resist Carter)

Washington: 1968 (Not sure why state voted for Humphrey, since it was otherwise reliably Republican between 1952 and 1984)

West Virginia: 1972 (How did the state vote MORE Republican than the nation?! It was heavily Dem, heavily union, and didn't have the racial issues the South did at the time.)

Wisconsin: 2016 (thanks WWC)

1. Clinton campaigned to insane amounts to get that result. The bigger question is why Colorado was still lost, or why Nevada was farther right.

2. Nah, The entire South moved a lot towards Reagan, with pretty much the exceptions of Georgia and...Mississippi...why Mississippi barely moved is the better question.

3. Lean R, not solidly so. Carter was a hilariously terrible fit, and Dukakis failed badly enough nationwide to lose what should've been an easy flip. Nixon needed absentee ballots to flip his way in the close ones. The state used the lead D-first, and JFK was declared the winner on that.

4. Hawaii voted to the right of Alaska in 1972, it's pretty obvious that the state wasn't truly Solid D until Reagan...also Carter was a terrible fit.

5. Obama campaign-bombed the state, the better question is why Missouri didn't flip too. I still don't get that one.

6. Okay that one I don't get

7. WWC resentments, if Trump were doing respectably, I suspect he'd flip the state.

8. Anderson ate up the vote, now why the state didn't become a Reagan-Mondale state...that is a stumper.

9. Black turnout seriously dove.

10. 3rd parties...also Al Gore didn't do much better.

11. Not sure with this one

12. Anti-incumbent sentiment and yuge recession, I suspect if it were Pence running for re-election and not Trump, Biden would be far closer

13. NH cemented itself as a swing state by this point, and has generally been close to the pop vote since...why it screwed the country over in 2000 is a better question.

14. Native son performance.

15. The entire Midwest was overly favorable to Trump that year

 i'm stopping there.

Arizona: Agreed.

Arkansas: Arkansas moved far more towards Reagan than any other Southern state, so I still find that result very odd.

California: Fair points. It still doesn't change how odd 1972 was, since in every other election from 1960-1980 California was more Republican than the nation, so Nixon's weak performance is still a mystery to me.

Hawaii: Hawaii was far more Dem than the nation and 1964 and 1968, but you are correct that it was slightly more Republican in 1972, and as I pointed out almost voted for Ford in 1976. Weird how the state went from being strongly D in the 60s to lean D in the 70s to strong D again after.

Indiana: Agreed.

Lousiana: Yeah, don't get it.

Maine: Yeah, that makes sense.

Mass: Agreed on Anderson.

Michigan: Correct, in addition to the WWC gains.

Minnesota: True, but the county map in 2016 clearly shows that Trump massively gained in rural areas throughout the state, so that was a factor.

Mississippi: Yeah, Mississippi voting almost the same as Arkansas in 1980 despite Arkansas being 30 points more D in 1976 is one of the great electoral mysteries.

Montana: Yeah, Montana is very elastic, so I guess the recession was enough to make it close.

New Hampshire: In 1992 New Hampshire still voted far more R than the country as a whole, so I find it amazing how much Clinton improved.

New York: Eh, NYC was Trump's home, and he barely improved there. I don't know why Trump would have a home state effect upstate and not in the city he lived in. It sounds like upstate NY was simply another victim of the WWC swing, just like the rust belt and Maine.

Ohio: Agreed.

Thanks for the analysis!

[Calthrina950]

For 1964, I think Florida's result is certainly interesting, although I understand the reasons for why it occurred. The state swung 5.32% compared to 1960, one of the weakest swings in the 1964 election. However, the change at the county level was much more dramatic. Here is the county map for 1960:

Kennedy, as you can see, dominated in the arch-segregationist (and heavily black) Florida Panhandle; 1960, in fact, was the last time that the now solidly Republican counties of Escambia, Clay, Okaloosa, and Santa Rosa voted Democratic. Kennedy also won Miami-Dade County, Monroe County (which never voted Republican before Nixon's 1972 landslide), Hillsborough County, Leon County, and Duval County.

Nixon, however, won the state thanks to his dominant performance in Central Florida (he received more than 60% of the vote in Brevard, Osceola, and Seminole Counties, and broke 70% in Orange and Lake Counties), the remainder of SE Florida (he won both Palm Beach and Broward, the former with more than 60%), Pinellas County (also >60% Nixon), and SW Florida (where he swept Lee, Charlotte, Collier, and Manatee Counties with more than 60% and exceeded 70% in Sarasota County). Nixon also won Alachua County. Overall, Nixon won Florida by 3%; it's surprising, given his strength in these three disparate regions, that he didn't carry it by more.

And here is the county map for 1964:

As one can see, the Florida Panhandle, obviously because of civil rights, swung heavily to Goldwater, who swept most of the region. Several counties where Kennedy had gotten more than 60% or 70% gave Goldwater similar percentages. Goldwater also flipped Duval and Leon Counties, both of which had backed Kennedy four years previously. In the remainder of the state, however, there were dramatic swings towards Johnson. Goldwater held Orange, Lake, Osceola, and Seminole Counties in Central Florida, but did significantly worse than Nixon in all of them. Johnson flipped Volusia, Brevard, and St. Lucie Counties.

Johnson won Alachua County and improved over Kennedy in Hillsborough County, while flipping Pasco and Pinellas Counties (Hernando County shifted to Goldwater). Goldwater held most of the counties in SW Florida, but did significantly worse than Nixon (as in Central Florida), and Charlotte County flipped to Johnson (the last Democrat to win it). In SE Florida, Goldwater held Palm Beach and Broward Counties, but did worse than Nixon, while Johnson significantly improved upon Kennedy's performance in Miami-Dade County and held his ground in Monroe County. Johnson also did manage to hold several of the rural counties in Central Florida which Kennedy had carried, although doing significantly worse than him in most of them.

Overall, Johnson won Florida because of two different voter constituencies, which outweighed the segregationist whites who moved to Goldwater. Northern transplants and retirees, scared by Goldwater's Social Security plans, shifted to him, and he was helped by black voters (I recall reading a Time article from shortly after the election, which states that one black precinct in Jacksonville gave Johnson 97% of the vote). Black turnout and registration increased significantly from 1960 to 1964, and Johnson would not have won the state without them (Florida and Virginia are the two Johnson states where Goldwater almost certainly won white voters).

[Calthrina950]

^And adding to the above, I did a quick calculation of Florida's results in 1964 without Miami-Dade County:

Barry M. Goldwater (R-Arizona)/William E. Miller (R-New York): 788,461 (51.60%)
Lyndon B. Johnson (D-Texas)/Hubert H. Humphrey (D-Minnesota): 739,599 (48.40%)

Goldwater would have won Florida by 3.20% if you subtracted Miami-Dade County from the state's results. So Johnson's improvement over Kennedy there (he got 64.01%, compared to Kennedy's 57.65%), seems to have been the most significant factor in allowing him to carry the state, despite the heavy losses in the Florida Panhandle. Interestingly enough, no Democrat since Johnson has managed to match or surpass his share of the vote in Miami-Dade (Hillary Clinton came the closest with 63.22% in 2016). Obama (whose performance in Miami-Dade, in 2012, was the best for a Democrat since Johnson, later surpassed by Clinton) also would have lost Florida without Miami-Dade.

[Hope For A New Era]

5. Obama campaign-bombed the state, the better question is why Missouri didn't flip too. I still don't get that one.

St. Charles County saved McCain in the state. Even now it's still a strongly R-leaning swing county, despite the fact that on paper it looks like it should be realigning at Atlanta-speed.
Galloway won it in 2018 by literally 34 votes.

I have to wonder if the very stark racial divides of St. Louis play a role here (as in Milwaukee).

Tennesee: 1988 (Why did Bush improve over Reagan?!)

I guess just a continuation of the southern realignment?

Utah: 2016 (Insane 3rd Party performance by McMullin)

Mormons are apparently the only Republicans who can resist Trumpism + McMullin is a perfect fit for the state.

Utah has some really odd voting behaviors sometimes. It's the only place in the country that is simultaneously very religious and very educated, and that combination can produce some interesting results.

[Alcibiades]

California 1972: McGovern was very popular among the anti-war/student/hippy crowd, and improved among them compared to Humphrey. Obviously nowhere near enough to win the state, but enough, in combination with the traditional New Deal Democratic constituency in the NE to make it more Dem than the nation. As mentioned before, CA was more Lean R than Solid R.

Hawaii 1976: Due to its militarily perilous fur-flung location, Hawaii has a strong pro-incumbent lean, especially back then when it was a relatively new state and far less set in its voting patterns.

Maine 2016: Same reason Trump did well in the Midwest (WWC support).

Massachusetts 1980: Anderson had one of his best performances here, mostly taking vites from Carter.

Mississippi 1980: Very inelastic, racially polarised state, less likely to swing with the nation. But even that might not be all of the story.

Montana 2008: Obama made a play for the state as part of his 50-state strategy. It was the kind of elastic, non-Southern mixture of well-educated whites and WWC state that was a decent fit for him. Similar reasons as to why he overperformed in the Dakotas (both rural Western Republican states which elected lots of Democratic senators). In some ways, it’s surprising he won Indiana and not Montana.

Nevada 2008: Hit very hard by the financial crisis.

New York 2016: Upstate is like most of the rural Midwestern areas Trump did very well in.

Oklahoma 1960: One of the staunchest anti-Catholic states, so voted against JFK. Less of an ancestral attachment to the Democrats than some of the anti-Catholic Deep South states.

Pennsylvania 1984: Mondale had a solid base among the WWC voters of SW Pennsylvania, who stayed much more Democratic than the suburban working class Reagan Democrats in places like Macomb County, as they did not benefit from Reaganomics.

Rhode Island 1972: Massachusetts was more college-educated than Rhode Island, which had a more working class flavour. McGovern did much better among the former group than the latter.

South Carolina 1968: Strom Thurmond’s influence; a man very popular among the state’s segregationists who campaigned pretty hard for Nixon. Also, SC was more economically conservative than other Southern states. Humphrey actually did better here than the other Deep South states as black turnout was the highest of any of them.

Texas 1968: LBJ is probably part of it. Also had much more of a liberal tradition than most other Southern states, electing people like Ralph Yarborough.

Utah 2016: Trump alienated a lot of conservative Mormons.

Virginia 1976: The factors that mean Democrats do well there today (most ‘Northern’ of the Southern states, affluent suburbs) worked in Ford’s favour in 1976.

West Virginia 1972: See Rhode Island explanation.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

New Mexico: 2004 (Bush managed to win that has been a strongly Dem state since 1992 due to overperformance among Hispanics.)

New Mexico was by no means solidly Democratic in 2004. In fact, it was still a very good bellwether state at that time, even voting slightly more Republican than the nation in 1996/2000.

NM may have been the best bellwether state in turns of margin until 2008. Ohio seems to be its main competitor there, but boy did Ohio blow 2016.

While NM flipped R in 2004, it voted more R than the nation in 2000 and more D than the nation in 2004.

[DabbingSanta]

Not really sure if any of the early ones were "surprises" at the time, but definitely notable oddities

1960: Nevada, only state in the continental west to vote for JFK

1964: Arizona, Goldwater's home state and only win outside Dixie

1968: Competitiveness of Texas when Nixon/Wallace win rest of South

1972: Massachusetts, only state to vote for McGovern

1976: Virginia, southern Democrat Carter loses to northerner Ford, but still wins election

1980: Rhode Island, random Carter stronghold, won with 10% margin

1984: "Minnesota would have been nice"

1988: Strong performance in farm states by Dukakis, especially Iowa, won with 10% margin

1992: Vermont, realigning election and second time Democrat ever won the state

1996: Florida's huge swing to the left from 1992, only state Clinton picked up other than Arizona.

2000: Florida for obvious reasons

2004: New Mexico surprise

2008: Indiana surprise

2012: I really can't think of any

2016: Michigan

[Chips]

1960: NV
1964: FL
1968: TX
1972: MA
1976: VA
1980: MA
1984: MN
1988: MD
1992: VT
1996: CO
2000: NH
2004: NM
2008: IN
2012: FL
2016: MI

[Arbitrage1980]

I'm guessing upstate NY because of WWC. It's almost like the same environment as Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Only reason NY didn't go to Trump though is NYC.

Correct. If you take out NYC, Hillary would have won NY state by just 0.1%. But NYC Is 40% of the electorate.

Upstate NY is WWC and more GOP friendly than other parts of the northeast. It's also anti-war, and Trump's platform against foreign intervention played well there.

[Arbitrage1980]

1960: NV
1964: FL
1968: TX
1972: MA
1976: VA
1980: MA
1984: MN
1988: MD
1992: VT
1996: CO
2000: NH
2004: NM
2008: IN
2012: FL
2016: MI

1960 NV: guessing Vegas workers and employees put JFK over the top.
1964 FL: lot of segregationists in the state. Goldwater dominated the Panhandle and won Orange and Osceola counties (which were GOP strongholds back then), and the Tampa suburbs. This resulted in LBJ winning it by just 2%.
1968 TX: LBJ's home state, so it helped his VP Humphrey. Also Wallace took some Nixon voters.
1972 MA: McGovern was tailor made for college kids and ultra liberal white progressives, who are overrepresented in Boston.
1976 VA: only Southern state that Carter failed to win. VA was one of the first southern states to start going for the GOP due to the influx of northern white Republicans (similar dynamic as now). They work in government and lobbying and wanted the status quo, distrustful of Carter's outsider status.
1980 MA: John Anderson
1984 MN: Reagan was super popular but came a few thousand votes short of winning it.
1988 MD: Crime. The infamous Willie Horton rape and murder occurred in MD.
1992 VT: the state started moving left during the 2nd term of the Reagan presidency, as it has always been a liberal Republican stronghold. HW Bush's emphasis on crime in 1988 did not resonate with the small rural dominated state.
1996 CO: Clinton only won it in 1992 due to Perot. The state was still a GOP state back then.
2000 NH: Bush only won it due to Nader.
2004 NM: Bush got around 40% of the latino vote nationwide, allowing him to barely win NM by 0.8%.
2008 IN: huge voter turnout from blacks in Gary, students in college towns, and Obama winning Marion County (Indianaopolis) due to suburban whites turning against the GOP in the aftermath of the financial crisis.
2012 FL: Obama did better with Latinos in 2012 than in 2008, and this helped him in southern Florida and Orlando, allowing him to win the state by 0.9%.
2016 MI: Trump won Macomb county by 11% and crushed Hillary in rural parts of the state. Also turnout drop in Detroit.

[Alcibiades]

1960: NV
1964: FL
1968: TX
1972: MA
1976: VA
1980: MA
1984: MN
1988: MD
1992: VT
1996: CO
2000: NH
2004: NM
2008: IN
2012: FL
2016: MI

I would say that New Hampshire, which unlike Vermont which was more Republican than the nation in 84 and 88 (and significantly so), was the much weirder result in 1992.

[Chips]

1960: NV
1964: FL
1968: TX
1972: MA
1976: VA
1980: MA
1984: MN
1988: MD
1992: VT
1996: CO
2000: NH
2004: NM
2008: IN
2012: FL
2016: MI

1960 NV: guessing Vegas workers and employees put JFK over the top.
1964 FL: lot of segregationists in the state. Goldwater dominated the Panhandle and won Orange and Osceola counties (which were GOP strongholds back then), and the Tampa suburbs. This resulted in LBJ winning it by just 2%.
1968 TX: LBJ's home state, so it helped his VP Humphrey. Also Wallace took some Nixon voters.
1972 MA: McGovern was tailor made for college kids and ultra liberal white progressives, who are overrepresented in Boston.
1976 VA: only Southern state that Carter failed to win. VA was one of the first southern states to start going for the GOP due to the influx of northern white Republicans (similar dynamic as now). They work in government and lobbying and wanted the status quo, distrustful of Carter's outsider status.
1980 MA: John Anderson
1984 MN: Reagan was super popular but came a few thousand votes short of winning it.
1988 MD: Crime. The infamous Willie Horton rape and murder occurred in MD.
1992 VT: the state started moving left during the 2nd term of the Reagan presidency, as it has always been a liberal Republican stronghold. HW Bush's emphasis on crime in 1988 did not resonate with the small rural dominated state.
1996 CO: Clinton only won it in 1992 due to Perot. The state was still a GOP state back then.
2000 NH: Bush only won it due to Nader.
2004 NM: Bush got around 40% of the latino vote nationwide, allowing him to barely win NM by 0.8%.
2008 IN: huge voter turnout from blacks in Gary, students in college towns, and Obama winning Marion County (Indianaopolis) due to suburban whites turning against the GOP in the aftermath of the financial crisis.
2012 FL: Obama did better with Latinos in 2012 than in 2008, and this helped him in southern Florida and Orlando, allowing him to win the state by 0.9%.
2016 MI: Trump won Macomb county by 11% and crushed Hillary in rural parts of the state. Also turnout drop in Detroit.

1960: Guess that makes sense.
1964: Actually I was surprised about it going Johnson with the results of it's neighbors.
1968: Yeah that makes sense.
1972: Yeah.
1976: Yeah still was kinda shocking to see it go red.
1980: Yeah.
1984: Pretty much.
1988: That's true.
1992: True. NH and ME were both shocking too.
1996: That's true. CO still went to Clinton by the largest margin of the 3 states Dole flipped.
2000: Pretty much this.
2004: True.
2008: Yeah.
2012: I remember polling had Romney as a favorite to win FL for a decent amount of the campaign and I was surprised when Obama was able to win it.
2016: Yeah.

[Calthrina950]

1960: NV
1964: FL
1968: TX
1972: MA
1976: VA
1980: MA
1984: MN
1988: MD
1992: VT
1996: CO
2000: NH
2004: NM
2008: IN
2012: FL
2016: MI

1960 NV: guessing Vegas workers and employees put JFK over the top.
1964 FL: lot of segregationists in the state. Goldwater dominated the Panhandle and won Orange and Osceola counties (which were GOP strongholds back then), and the Tampa suburbs. This resulted in LBJ winning it by just 2%.
1968 TX: LBJ's home state, so it helped his VP Humphrey. Also Wallace took some Nixon voters.
1972 MA: McGovern was tailor made for college kids and ultra liberal white progressives, who are overrepresented in Boston.
1976 VA: only Southern state that Carter failed to win. VA was one of the first southern states to start going for the GOP due to the influx of northern white Republicans (similar dynamic as now). They work in government and lobbying and wanted the status quo, distrustful of Carter's outsider status.
1980 MA: John Anderson
1984 MN: Reagan was super popular but came a few thousand votes short of winning it.
1988 MD: Crime. The infamous Willie Horton rape and murder occurred in MD.
1992 VT: the state started moving left during the 2nd term of the Reagan presidency, as it has always been a liberal Republican stronghold. HW Bush's emphasis on crime in 1988 did not resonate with the small rural dominated state.
1996 CO: Clinton only won it in 1992 due to Perot. The state was still a GOP state back then.
2000 NH: Bush only won it due to Nader.
2004 NM: Bush got around 40% of the latino vote nationwide, allowing him to barely win NM by 0.8%.
2008 IN: huge voter turnout from blacks in Gary, students in college towns, and Obama winning Marion County (Indianaopolis) due to suburban whites turning against the GOP in the aftermath of the financial crisis.
2012 FL: Obama did better with Latinos in 2012 than in 2008, and this helped him in southern Florida and Orlando, allowing him to win the state by 0.9%.
2016 MI: Trump won Macomb county by 11% and crushed Hillary in rural parts of the state. Also turnout drop in Detroit.

1960: Guess that makes sense.
1964: Actually I was surprised about it going Johnson with the results of it's neighbors.
1968: Yeah that makes sense.
1972: Yeah.
1976: Yeah still was kinda shocking to see it go red.
1980: Yeah.
1984: Pretty much.
1988: That's true.
1992: True. NH and ME were both shocking too.
1996: That's true. CO still went to Clinton by the largest margin of the 3 states Dole flipped.
2000: Pretty much this.
2004: True.
2008: Yeah.
2012: I remember polling had Romney as a favorite to win FL for a decent amount of the campaign and I was surprised when Obama was able to win it.
2016: Yeah.

What's even more interesting about the 1964 result in Florida, as I outlined above, is that it was a Nixon-Johnson state (like Virginia, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and Kentucky). As I noted there, black turnout and registration increased significantly there between 1960 and 1964, and Northern retirees/transplants, who had helped push the state to the Republicans during the 1950s, turned to Johnson because of concerns about Goldwater's economic and safety net policies. Of course, in the Deep Southern States, civil rights overrode all else, and black voters were still largely disenfranchised. If they had full voting rights and turned out at normal levels in those states, Johnson probably would have come much closer to winning Georgia, Louisiana, and South Carolina then he did-and Georgia may have gone for him outright.

[catographer]

What’ll be the weirdest 2020 result?

- I think Kansas and Alaska could surprise us (Trump +12 maybe).
- If New Hampshire votes closely to Colorado and Virginia.
- How narrow Biden’s wins in Nevada and New Mexico are.
- If Biden wins Florida or Arizona by 3+ pts.

[Agonized-Statism]

What’ll be the weirdest 2020 result?

- I think Kansas and Alaska could surprise us (Trump +12 maybe).
- If New Hampshire votes closely to Colorado and Virginia.
- How narrow Biden’s wins in Nevada and New Mexico are.
- If Biden wins Florida or Arizona by 3+ pts.

Maybe something having to do with reduced turnout due to the pandemic.