3 0 52.85% 46.51% | 165,415 145,560 Start date November 8, 1988 | |
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The 1988 United States presidential election in South Dakota took place on November 8, 1988. All 50 states and the District of Columbia, were part of the 1988 United States presidential election. South Dakota voters chose 3 electors to the Electoral College, which selected the President and Vice President.
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South Dakota was won by incumbent United States Vice President George H. W. Bush of Texas, who was running against Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis. Bush ran with Indiana Senator Dan Quayle as Vice President, and Dukakis ran with Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen.
South Dakota weighed in for this election as one percent more Democratic than the national average. This is the last of only four elections since statehood when South Dakota has voted more Democratic than the national average, an anomaly probably caused by the persistent crisis in the United States’ farming sector during the decade.
Partisan background
The presidential election of 1988 was a very partisan election for South Dakota, with more than 99% of the electorate voting for either the Republican or the Democratic parties, and only five parties appearing on the ballot. While most counties turned out in this election for Bush, the highly populated centers of Brown County, and Sioux Falls’s Minnehaha County, voted in majority for Dukakis.
Republican victory
Bush won the election in South Dakota with an 8-point margin. While South Dakota tends to lean conservative, the election results in South Dakota are also reflective of a nationwide political reconsolidation of base for the Republican Party, which took place through the 1980s. Through the passage of some very controversial economic programs, spearheaded by then President Ronald Reagan (called, collectively, "Reaganomics"), the mid-to-late 1980s saw a period of economic growth and stability.
Dukakis ran his campaign on a notably socially liberal agenda, and advocated for higher economic regulation and environmental protection. Bush, alternatively, ran on a campaign of continuing the social and economic policies of former President Reagan - which gained him much support with social conservatives and people living in rural areas, who largely associated the Republican Party with the economic growth of the 1980s.