2000 United States presidential election

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54th presidential election
November 7, 2000
			Republican Party
			George W. Bush / Dick Cheney
			electors					271
			be right				50.456.002
									47.9%
			Democratic Party
			Al Gore / Joe Lieberman
			electors					266
			be right				50,999,897
									48.4%
Election results by state
30   Bush / Cheney						20 + DC   Gore / Lieberman
President of the United States
Pre-election Bill Clinton Democratic Party						Elected George W. Bush Republican Party

The 54th election of the President of the United States of America took place on November 7, 2000 . With one of the closest results in US history , George W. Bush was elected 43rd President of the United States.

The vote count in the state of Florida, one of the most competitive swing states , took more than a month. In the end, Bush was there with 537 votes ahead of his Democratic rival Gore. Even after recounts ordered by the court in some constituencies and the supreme court review by the Supreme Court , the election result remained controversial.

Candidates

Democratic Party

Democratic candidates:

• 

  Vice President Al Gore

• 

  Senator Bill Bradley

Under the rules of the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution , incumbent Bill Clinton was not allowed to run again after two terms. In the race for the nomination, the incumbent Vice President Al Gore entered. The only notable contestant was Senator Bill Bradley , a former professional basketball player who had played for the New York Knicks and entered politics in 1978. Especially in the area of health care , the opinions of Gore and Bradley, who called for massive reforms, differed. Although Gore eventually won all the primaries , the debates with Bradley revealed an image problem for him. Gore's sometimes robotic posture and supposedly arrogant charisma as well as his intellectual nature were badly received by voters. These negative aspects of the candidate and the potential next president caused him great problems with the electorate in the television debates against Bush.

Gore later nominated Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut as a candidate for the office of vice president . The Orthodox Jew Lieberman had been the first prominent Democrat to criticize Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky as immoral. Lieberman's warm-hearted appearance was supposed to compensate for Gore's supposed stiffness.

Republican Party

Republican candidates:

• 

  Texas Governor George W. Bush

• 

  Senator John McCain

• 

  Former ECOSOC Ambassador Alan Keyes

• 

  Businessman Steve Forbes

• 

  Senator Orrin Hatch

• 

  Former Secretary of Labor Elizabeth Dole

• 

  Columnist Pat Buchanan

• 

  Former Vice President Dan Quayle

• 

  Former Governor of Tennessee Lamar Alexander

• 

  Senator Robert C. Smith

• 

  Rep. John Kasich

• 

  Businessman Herman Cain

After Bob Dole was clearly defeated in the elections four years earlier, the Republicans now decided on the Texas governor George W. Bush, the son of the former President George Bush . His toughest competitor in the primary was Senator John McCain from Arizona, who, however, had virtually no chance after a significant defeat in the primary in South Carolina . The election campaign between Bush and McCain is considered one of the dirtiest in US history. McCain is said to be the father of an illegitimate black child, his wife Cindy is a drug addict, McCain himself is gay and mentally unstable because of his imprisonment in North Vietnam. All other candidates had given up the race early. When nominating convention in Philadelphia Bush received 2,038 of 2,041 votes.

A search committee chaired by former US Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney was entrusted with the search for a suitable candidate for the vice presidency . This came to the conclusion that no party member was better suited than Cheney himself for the office.

Election result

Due to the legal problems of correct vote counting in Florida, it took more than a month after the election to get a result. When the then mostly Republican Supreme Court finally banned a recount in certain constituencies of Florida (see Bush v. Gore ), the election victory of the Republican candidate was official. George W. Bush won the presidential election with a disputed difference of 537 votes in Florida.

Of the decisive total of 538 electoral votes, George W. Bush was able to win the majority with 271 votes (one vote more than the necessary 270).

Since the majority of the Supreme Court justices were appointed by Republican presidents, the objectivity of the court's decision had been criticized on numerous occasions.

Voting machines

Because of public criticism of the Florida voting machines , the Help America Vote Act was drafted and passed on October 29, 2002. Right at the beginning of his term in office, Florida Governor Charlie Crist campaigned for the elimination of voting computers in Florida.

On May 3, 2007, Florida returned to the classic paper ballot. Parliament unanimously passed a law requiring the use of paper ballot papers. As the 118 MPs justified in their decision, this should enable the votes to be recounted if necessary.

Overall result

Surname	Political party	electors	Total votes
George W. Bush	republican	271	50.461.092
Al Gore	Democrats	266	50.994.086
Ralph Nader	Green	0	2,882,728
Others	-	0	1,066,246

Since the number of electoral votes is not relevant in the USA in presidential elections, but the number of electoral votes, George W. Bush was elected President, although Al Gore had a nationwide vote lead of 532,994 votes. District of Columbia election woman Barbara Lett-Simmons cast a blank ballot paper instead of voting by party line for Gore to protest that the capital's citizens are not represented in the Senate.

Election result by state

WM: number of electoral votes

State	Rep. Votes	Rep. WM	Dem. Votes	The. WM	Green votes	Green World Cup
Alabama	944.409	9	695602		18,349
Alaska	167,398	3	79.004		28,747
Arizona	781.652	8th	685.341		45,645
Arkansas	472.940	6th	422,768		13,421
Colorado	883.745	8th	738.227		91,434
Connecticut	561.094		816.015	8th	64,452
Delaware	137.288		180.068	3	8,307
Florida	2,912,790	25th	2,912,253		97,488
Georgia	1,419,720	13	1,116,230		13,432
Hawaii	137,845		205.286	4th	21,623
Idaho	336.937	4th	138,637		12,292
Illinois	2,019,421		2,589,026	22nd	103,759
Indiana	1,245,836	12	901.980		18,531
Iowa	634.373		638.517	7th	29,374
California	4,567,429		5,861,203	54	418,707
Kansas	622,332	6th	399.276		36,086
Kentucky	872,492	8th	638.898		23,192
Louisiana	927.871	9	792.344		20,473
Maine	286.616		319,951	4th	37,127
Maryland	813.797		1,145,782	10	53,768
Massachusetts	878.502		1,616,487	12	173,564
Michigan	1,953,139		2,170,418	18th	84.165
Minnesota	1,109,659		1,168,266	10	126,696
Mississippi	573.230	7th	404.964		8,126
Missouri	1,189,924	11	1,111,138		38,515
Montana	240.178	3	137.126		24,437
Nebraska	433,862	5	231.780		24,540
Nevada	301,575	4th	279.978		15.008
New Hampshire	273,559	4th	266,348		22,198
New Jersey	1,284,173		1,788,850	15th	94,554
New Mexico	286.417		286.783	5	21,251
new York	2,403,374		4,107,907	33	244.060
North Carolina	1,631,163	14th	1,257,692
North Dakota	174,852	3	95.284		9,497
Ohio	2,351,209	21st	2,186,190		117,857
Oklahoma	744,337	8th	474.276
Oregon	713,577		720.348	7th	77,357
Pennsylvania	2,281,127		2,485,967	23	103.392
Rhode Island	130,555		249.508	4th	25.052
South carolina	786.426	8th	566.039		20,279
South Dakota	190,700	3	118,804
Tennessee	1,061,949	11	981.720		19,781
Texas	3,799,639	32	2,433,746		137.994
Utah	515.096	5	203.053		35,850
Vermont	119,775		149.022	3	20,374
Virginia	1,437,490	13	1,217,290		59,398
Washington	1,108,864		1,247,652	11	103.002
Washington, DC	18,073		171,923	2	10,576
West Virginia	336.475	5	295,497		10,680
Wisconsin	1,237,279		1,242,987	11	94.070
Wyoming	147.947	3	60,481		4,625
total	50.460.110	271	51.003.932	266	2,883,105	0

Web links

Commons : 2000 United States Presidential Election  - Collection of Pictures, Videos, and Audio Files

• Official election statistics (English, pdf, election results per US state)

literature

• Edward Foley: Ballot Battles: The History of Disputed Elections in the United States. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2016, ISBN 978-0-19-023527-7 , pp. 279-305 (= 11. Florida 2000: Avoiding a Return to the Constitutional Brink ).
• Donald Richard Deskins, Hanes Walton, Sherman C. Puckett: Presidential Elections, 1789-2008: County, State, and National Mapping of Election Data. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor 2010, ISBN 978-0-472-11697-3 , pp. 518-527 (= Chapter 56: George W. Bush's Initial Election. ).
• Richard Johnston, Michael G. Hagen, and Kathleen Hall Jamieson: The 2000 Presidential Election and the Foundations of Party Politics . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2004, ISBN 0-521-81389-1 .
• Robert E. Denton, Jr. (Ed.): The 2000 Presidential Campaign: A Communication Perspective . Praeger, Westport (CT) 2002, ISBN 0-275-97107-4 .
• Andrew E. Busch, James W. Ceaser: The Perfect Tie: The True Story of the 2000 Presidential Election . Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham (MD) 2001, 0-7425-0835-8.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Nicolas Richer: Voices of Unreason. In: Der Bund of February 1, 2016, p. 2
2. ↑ Wade Payson-Denney: So, Who Really Won? What the Bush v. Gore Studies Showed. In: CNN.com , October 31, 2015.
3. ↑ Report on Fairvote.org, 2004