November 4, 2008 2012 → 8,274,473 5,011,781 Start date February 5, 2008 | 55 0 61.01% 36.95% | |
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The 2008 United States presidential election in California took place on November 4, 2008, in California as part of the 2008 United States presidential election. Voters chose 55 electors, the most out of any of the 50 states, to the Electoral College, who voted for President and Vice President. California was won by Democratic nominee Barack Obama with a 24.1% margin of victory. No Republican has carried the state in a presidential election since 1988.
Contents
Primaries
On February 5, 2008 presidential primaries were held by all parties with ballot access in the state.
Democratic
The 2008 California Democratic primary took place on February 5, 2008, also known as Super Tuesday. California was dubbed the "Big Enchilada" by the media because it offers the most delegates out of any other delegation. Hillary Clinton won the primary.
Process
In the primary, 370 of California's 441 delegates to the Democratic National Convention were selected. The remaining delegates were superdelegates not obligated to vote for any candidate at the convention. Of these delegates, 241 were awarded at the congressional district level, and the remaining 129 were awarded to the statewide winner. Candidates were required to receive at least 15% of either the district or statewide vote to receive any delegates. Registered Democrats and Decline to State voters were eligible to vote.
Polls
The latest six polls were averaged (only counting the latest Zogby poll).
Republican
The California Republican primary, 2008 was held on February 5, 2008, with a total of 173 national delegates at stake.
Process
The delegates represented California at the Republican National Convention. There were three delegates to every congressional district and fourteen bonus delegates. The winner in each of the 53 congressional districts was awarded all of that district's delegates. The statewide winner was awarded 11 of the 14 bonus delegates, with the 3 remaining delegates assigned to party leaders. Voting in the primary was restricted to registered Republican voters.
Polls
Early polls showed Rudy Giuliani in the lead. Polls taken closer to the primary either showed Mitt Romney or John McCain as the favored candidate.
Predictions
There were at least ten news organizations, publications, Web sites, and radio and television shows that made state by state predictions of the election before election day:
Polling
Obama won most opinion polls taken prior to the election. In the final three polls he averaged 59%, while McCain averaged 34%; which is close to the results on election day.
Fundraising
Obama raised a total of $124,325,459 from the state. McCain raised a total of $26,802,024.
Advertising and visits
The Obama campaign spent almost $5,570,641. The McCain campaign spent $1,885,142. Obama visited the state six times. McCain visited the state eight times.
Analysis
California was once a Republican stronghold, supporting Republican candidates in every election from 1952 through 1988, except in 1964. However, since the 1990s, California has become a reliably Democratic state with a diverse ethnic and Hispanic or Latino population and liberal regions such as the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles County. Additionally, several historically Republican areas in the Bay Area swung toward the Democrats as the national party moved more to the right; the brand of Republicanism here was much more moderate than that practiced in the rest of California. The last time the state was won by a Republican candidate was in 1988, when George H. W. Bush narrowly won it. Bill Clinton won it handily in 1992, and the state has not been seriously contested since then.
Obama won by a historic margin, with 61.01% of the votes. The last time the margin was higher in the state was in 1936 when Franklin D. Roosevelt won with 66.95% of the vote.
In San Francisco and Alameda County (which encompass Oakland and Berkeley), four out of five voters backed the Democratic candidate. Elsewhere in the Bay Area, Obama won every county by a three to two margin or greater. In Los Angeles County, Obama won almost 70% of the votes. His combined margin in the Bay Area and Los Angeles County would have been more than enough to carry the state.
Obama also made considerable headway in historically Republican areas of the state. Fresno County, for example, a heavily populated county in the Central Valley, went from giving Bush a 16% margin to a 1% margin for Obama. San Diego County moved from a six-percent margin for Bush to a 10-point margin for Obama—only the second time since World War II that a Democrat has carried this military-dominated county. San Bernardino and Riverside went from double-digit Republican victories to narrow Democratic wins. Ventura County also moved from Republican to Democratic. Orange County, historically one of the most Republican suburban counties in the nation, went from a 21-point margin for Bush to only a 2.5-point margin for McCain.
Voter turnout was also fairly higher in the election. The 79% turnout of registered voters was the highest since the 1976 presidential election.
Results
The following are official results from the California Secretary of State.
By county
The results below are primarily compiled from the final reports available from the Secretary of State. The "others" category also includes write-in votes.
By congressional district
Obama carried 42 congressional districts in California, including all 34 districts held by Democrats and eight districts held by Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Electors
Technically the voters of California cast their ballots for electors: representatives to the Electoral College. California is allocated 55 electors because it has 53 congressional districts and 2 senators. All candidates who appear on the ballot or qualify to receive write-in votes must submit a list of 55 electors, who pledge to vote for their candidate and his or her running mate, to the California Secretary of State. Whoever wins the majority of votes in the state is awarded all 55 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. In California the 55 electors meet in the State Capitol building in Sacramento to cast their ballots.
The following were the members of the Electoral College from California. All were pledged to and voted for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
Failed election reform
There was a proposed ballot proposition in the state to alter the way the state's electors would be distributed among presidential candidates, but the initiative failed to get onto the ballot.