1972 United States presidential election in Texas information
Election in Texas
Main article: 1972 United States presidential election
1972 United States presidential election in Texas
← 1968
November 7, 1972
1976 →
Turnout
66.59% (of registered voters) 44.90% (of voting age population)[1]
Nominee
Richard Nixon
George McGovern
Party
Republican
Democratic
Home state
California
South Dakota
Running mate
Spiro Agnew
Sargent Shriver
Electoral vote
26
0
Popular vote
2,298,896
1,154,291
Percentage
66.20%
33.24%
County Results
Congressional District Results
Nixon
50–60%
60–70%
70–80%
80–90%
McGovern
50–60%
60–70%
80–90%
President before election
Richard Nixon
Republican
Elected President
Richard Nixon
Republican
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Government
v
t
e
The 1972 United States presidential election in Texas was held on November 7, 1972, as part of the 1972 United States presidential election. Incumbent Republican President Richard Nixon overwhelmingly won the state of Texas with 66.20% of the vote,[2] to the Democratic Party candidate George McGovern's 33.24%, thus giving him the state's 26 electoral votes. This result made Texas 9.8% more Republican than the nation-at-large. This was the first time a Republican won the state of Texas since Texas-born Dwight D. Eisenhower won it in 1956, even as Democrat Dolph Briscoe won the gubernatorial election on the same Ballot.
Nixon's win in Texas made him the first ever Republican presidential candidate to break sixty percent of Texas' popular vote in a presidential election, surpassing former President Dwight D. Eisenhower's performance of 55.26% in 1956, and even native son Lyndon B. Johnson's 63.32% in 1964. Nixon is so far the only Republican candidate to break 65% of the state's popular vote. At the county level, 246 of Texas' 254 counties voted for Nixon, all by wide margins except heavily black Robertson County where Nixon won by a single vote. Nixon won 22 of Texas' 24 congressional districts – with the 18th (Harris County) and 20th (Bexar County) constituting the only congressional districts McGovern won anywhere in the former Confederacy. McGovern, however, did not win either county each of these districts were located in.
McGovern's only county wins came from the south Texas region along the U.S.-Mexico border and Cottle County in the northern part of the state, though even his performances here were underwhelming. In fact, in the oldest extant Democratic stronghold in the entire United States,[3] Nixon became the only Republican since Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952 to win Dimmit County and Presidio County, and the only Republican apart from Eisenhower's two victories there to win Hidalgo County and Wilacy County since it was created in 1921. This is also the last election at which Zavala County has voted Republican,[3] though that county did so even in 1960. Duval County, however, gave McGovern over 85 percent of the vote, which was the highest percentage of votes he received in any county nationally.[4] 1972 was the third successive election when Duval proved the most Democratic county in the nation. He was the first Republican to ever carry La Salle, Hidalgo, Jim Wells, Wilacy, Brooks, Cameron, Kenedy, and Nueces counties (all in South Texas), and the first since 1920 to carry Zavala County; and the first since 1928 to carry Dimmit, Frio, Kleberg, and San Patricio counties. He was the first Republican to carry many historically Democratic East Texas counties as well.
Nixon had previously narrowly lost Texas to John F. Kennedy in 1960 and had lost it narrowly again to Hubert Humphrey in 1968. However, as with the rest of the country in 1972, with the exception of Massachusetts and Washington, D.C., Texas voted for the Republican ticket of incumbent Nixon and Agnew.
As of the 2020 presidential election, this is the best Republican election performance in Texas, as well as the last time every single county in the Texas Triangle was won by the Republican candidate. Jefferson County would not vote Republican again until 2016, and La Salle and Jim Wells counties until 2020.
^"Turnout and Voter Registration Figures (1970–current)". www.sos.state.tx.us.
^"1972 Presidential General Election Results – Texas". Retrieved April 13, 2016.
^ abSullivan, Robert David; 'How the Red and Blue Map Evolved Over the Past Century'; America Magazine in The National Catholic Review; June 29, 2016
^Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections; 1972 Presidential Election Statistics
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