United States presidential election in Arizona, 2008

Updated on Jan 05, 2024

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10 0 53.4% 44.9%		1,230,111 1,034,707 Start date November 4, 2008

The 2008 United States presidential election in Arizona took place on November 4, 2008 throughout all 50 states and D.C., which was part of the 2008 United States presidential election. Voters chose 10 representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for President and Vice President.

Arizona was won by Republican nominee John McCain with an 8.5% margin of victory. Prior to the election, 16 of 17 news organizations considered this a state McCain would win, or otherwise considered as a red state. It was the home state of John McCain and has only been carried by a Democrat once since 1948. However, polls taken near Election Day in 2008 showed Democrat Barack Obama closer than expected to winning the state. McCain carried all but four of the state's 15 counties.

Primaries

Arizona Democratic primary, 2008

Arizona Republican primary, 2008

Predictions

There were 17 news organizations who made state by state predictions of the election. Here are their last predictions before election day:

D.C. Political Report: Republican
Cook Political Report: Leaning Republican
Takeaway: Leaning McCain
Election Projection: Leaning McCain
Electoral-vote.com: Leaning Republican
Washington Post: Leaning McCain
Politico: Solid McCain
Real Clear Politics: Toss Up
FiveThirtyEight.com: Solid McCain
CQ Politics: Leaning Republican
New York Times: Solid Republican
CNN: Leaning Republican
NPR: Leaning McCain
MSNBC: Leaning McCain
Fox News: Republican
Associated Press: Republican
Rasmussen Reports: Safe Republican

Polling

Opinion polls taken from February through to October 2008 showed McCain leading Obama by margins of between 1% and 21%. The final RealClearPolitics average gave the state an average of 53.8% for McCain, compared to 45.0% for Obama.

Fundraising

John McCain raised $7,448,622. Barack Obama raised $5,491,056.

Advertising and visits

Obama and his interest groups spent $1,510,900 in the state. McCain and his interest groups spent just $751. The Democratic ticket didn't visit the state. Arizona native John McCain visited the state 5 times in the election campaign.

Analysis

Arizona has long been a Republican-dominated state. It is represented in the Senate by two Republicans (John McCain and Jon Kyl). It has only supported a Democrat for president once in the last 60 years, when Bill Clinton carried it in 1996. In addition, both the Arizona Senate and Arizona House of Representatives are controlled by Republicans. However, the Governor was Democrat Janet Napolitano, and both parties held four House seats each before the election.

Arizona was McCain's home state and gave its 10 electoral votes to its favorite son. However, he won just under 54 percent of the vote. By comparison, he'd been reelected in 2004 with 77 percent of the vote, one of the largest margins of victory for a statewide race in Arizona history. This led to speculation that the race would have been far closer without McCain on the ballot. One major factor is the growing Hispanic vote in the state, a voting bloc that tends to favor the Democrats, although both George W. Bush and John McCain held moderate positions on illegal immigration.

Arizona politics are dominated by Maricopa and Pima counties, home to Phoenix and Tucson respectively. Between them, these two counties cast almost three-fourths of the state's vote and elect a substantial majority of the legislature. Maricopa County, a Republican stronghold since 1948, gave McCain an 11-point victory. This alone was more than enough to make up for Obama's narrow victory in Democratic-leaning Tucson. McCain also did well elsewhere throughout the state, winning the more sparsely populated counties by double-digits.

The election also saw Republicans making gains in the state legislature, as the GOP picked up one seat in the State Senate and three seats in the State House. The Democrats, however, managed to win the open seat in Arizona's 1st congressional district, with former state representative Ann Kirkpatrick cruising to victory over Republican Sydney Hay, giving the Democrats a majority of the state's House seats for the first time in 60 years.

Results

Constitution Party nominee Chuck Baldwin, Boston Tea Party nominee Charles Jay and independent candidate Jonathan Allen were registered write-in candidates in Arizona.

By congressional district

McCain won a majority of the vote in six of Arizona's eight congressional districts, while Obama won two. McCain won two districts (AZ-08 and AZ-05) represented by Democrats (Gabrielle Giffords and Harry Mitchell, respectively), and one other (AZ-01) represented by a Republican at the time but which voted for a Democrat (Ann Kirkpatrick) in the simultaneous U.S. House elections. Both districts Obama carried are represented by Democrats.

Electors

Technically the voters of Arizona cast their ballots for electors: representatives to the Electoral College. Arizona is allocated 10 electors because it has 8 congressional districts and 2 senators. All candidates who appear on the ballot or qualify to receive write-in votes must submit a list of 10 electors, who pledge to vote for their candidate and his or her running mate. Whoever wins the majority of votes in the state is awarded all 10 electoral votes. Their chosen electors then vote for President and Vice President. Although electors are pledged to their candidate and running mate, they are not obligated to vote for them. An elector who votes for someone other than his or her candidate is known as a faithless elector.

The electors of each state and the District of Columbia met on December 15, 2008 to cast their votes for President and Vice President. The Electoral College itself never meets as one body. Instead the electors from each state and the District of Columbia met in their respective capitols.

The following were the members of the Electoral College from the state. All 10 were pledged to John McCain and Sarah Palin: