Most Impressive statewide landslides

[cope1989]

You've gotta respect a candidate who wins in a landslide, no matter what party they claim. it's just something about that overwhelming victory that puts you in awe of them and makes you wonder how they did it. Here are, in my opinion, some of the most impressive gubernatorial or senatorial landslides in recent history.

2006 Tennessee Governor's race: Just two years after Bush trounced Kerry here, Democratic incumbent Phil Bredesen won reelection with 69% of the vote. His opponent didn't even win a single county. This bucked Tennessee's fast Rep. trend.
Why it's impressive- Like I said, since the Clinton era, Tennessee has been trending R really really fast. It's also impressive that Bredesen won all the staunchly R eastern counties.

2010 Arkansas Governor's Race- Mike Beebe, a democrat, won in a landslide here, despite Blanche Lincoln's crushing defeat. He also won every county in the state.
Why it's impressive-Blanche Lincoln suffered one of the worst defeats of any Senatorial incumbent, and R's picked up several of the state's congressional districts. It appears that a huge number of Arkansas voters split their ticket that year.

2000 Georgia special senate election-This has been the last of the Georgia democrat landslides. Zell Miller won a special senate election by over 20 points.
Why it's impressive- Many think of Zell as a DINO, but 2000 was way before he made his remarks at the 2004 GOP convention. He was very much a democrat then, and while a win isn't unexpected, such a landslide victory isn't.

2010 Arizona Senate election. McCain won his race by 24 points.
Why it's impressive- McCain faced a very serious primary challenger who was leading him in the polls at one point. He came back to win his party's nomination and win BIG. I guess there was no loser aftertaste on him.

2010 Nevada Senate Election- Reid won against Angle by 6 points
Why it's impressive- I know a 6 point win isn't impressive, but the margin by which he beat Sharron Angle is. In the days leading up to the election, Angle had a slight lead in the polls, and practically everybody was predicting an incredibly tight race- one for the record books. Yet Reid came from behind and won comfortably. A landslide in its own right.

2006 California Governor's race- Schwarzennegger got 56% of the vote and won by 18 points.
Why it's impressive- Ok, did anybody really take Ahnold seriously when he first ran in 2003? The idea of a bodybuilder/action star winning any election was laughable at first. To me, his landslide reelection proved even more spectacular and proved his popularity as a politician.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

If you like ticket splitting landslides, you'll love Byrd's 78-20 win in 2000.

[MilesC56]

If you like ticket splitting landslides, you'll love Byrd's 78-20 win in 2000.

I'd also add a few from 2008:

-Baucus winning 73/27

-Johnson winning 62/38

[crypto-fascist superhero]

http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=25&year=1994&f=0&off=5&elect=0

He won the city of Boston and registered Democrats.

[bgwah]

Jackson winning 82-16 in Washington is probably our biggest landslide, at least post-WW2.

here's the map from 1970:

[crypto-fascist superhero]

Not actually a landslide, but pretty astonishingly impressive: http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=36&year=1970&f=0&off=3&elect=0

[crypto-fascist superhero]

http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=1&year=1962&f=0&off=5&elect=0

(Amusing bit of trivia:  F.P. Walls ran as an American Independent Party candidate for congress in the 70s).

[Keystone Phil]

Harris Wofford comfortably beating a popular former Governor and U.S. Attorney General in the 1991 Special U.S. Senate election after trailing by forty - yes, forty - points is impressive.

[RogueBeaver]

I'll nominate Jindal's smashing reelection last year in Louisiana. 67% statewide and winning all 65 parishes, including NOLA. LADP didn't even have their own candidate, just a bunch of private citizens filing as Dems. Biggest gubernatorial win of the 2-party era.

[MilesC56]

I'll nominate Jindal's smashing reelection last year in Louisiana. 67% statewide and winning all 65 parishes, including NOLA. LADP didn't even have their own candidate, just a bunch of private citizens filing as Dems. Biggest gubernatorial win of the 2-party era.

It wasn't very impressive considering he had no real opponent.

[mondale84]

2004 - Schumer's 47 point win

[Vasall des Midas]

Brad Henry's reelection, 2006. 66.5% for a Democrat, and not against a joke opponent, either, but a seven-term congressman.
Why it's hilarious: Check the county map.

[krazen1211]

George W. Bush 1994, 1998.

[asexual trans victimologist]

George W. Bush 1994, 1998.

1994 in particular because he was running against an incumbent who was very popular and widely liked and respected even after she lost. Bush really was masterful then.

[krazen1211]

George W. Bush 1994, 1998.

1994 in particular because he was running against an incumbent who was very popular and widely liked and respected even after she lost. Bush really was masterful then.

He also won by a very large margin given that he was a non-incumbent against a non scandalized incumbent. Especially in what was a Democratic state at the time; the GOP made massive gains in the legislature during his 6 year tenure.

Incumbent governors rarely lose by 8%. The vast bulk are re-elected.

[asexual trans victimologist]

George W. Bush 1994, 1998.

1994 in particular because he was running against an incumbent who was very popular and widely liked and respected even after she lost. Bush really was masterful then.

He also won by a very large margin given that he was a non-incumbent against a non scandalized incumbent. Especially in what was a Democratic state at the time; the GOP made massive gains in the legislature during his 6 year tenure.

Incumbent governors rarely lose by 8%. The vast bulk are re-elected.

I know. As I said the fact that Richards was a popular incumbent is what makes this impressive. Bush was a popular incumbent in 1998 so the only thing that's really impressive there is the sheer scale of his victory.

[JulioMadrid]

Harris Wofford comfortably beating a popular former Governor and U.S. Attorney General in the 1991 Special U.S. Senate election after trailing by forty - yes, forty - points is impressive.

That's really impressive. After trailing by 40 points. LoL. He won by 10 at the ends, so the campaign made him win about 50%! After seeing that, I think no one should give up in the middle of a campaign.

[ModerateCoward]

Not actually a landslide, but pretty astonishingly impressive: http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=36&year=1970&f=0&off=3&elect=0

This is just retarded. A pro-lifer from New York?

[Lloyd Bentsen's Ghost]

George W. Bush 1994, 1998.

1994 in particular because he was running against an incumbent who was very popular and widely liked and respected even after she lost. Bush really was masterful then.

Ann Richards wasn't as widely popular as you think. She wouldn't have gotten elected in 1990 if the Republicans hadn't had Clayton Williams as the nominee (for the uninformed, during the course of the campaign, Williams (1) publicly declared that he hadn't paid income taxes in several years; (2) discussed visiting Mexican brothels as a young man; (3) said women who get raped should "lay back and enjoy it"). Combine that with the fact that the outgoing Republican governor had a scandal of his own that led him not to seek reelection and you have to wonder why Ann barely won by the skin of her teeth.
There was a broad swath of Texans who disliked her because she was pro-choice and liberal on other social issues, even if she was more or less a centrist in terms of fiscal policy. There is a joke that during the 1994 campaign, Richards staffers would put bumper stickers on their cars that said "I'm the Queer Who Ann Sent To Take Away Your Guns" and see if anyone tried to run them off the road.

[Nichlemn]

More of a set of landslides, but the fact Democrats haven't won a single county in a Maine Senate race since 1996 is impressive. It may continue this year (but the corresponding Republican sweep almost surely won't).

Mitch Daniels winning 58% of the vote in Indiana despite having poor approval numbers earlier in his term and Obama carrying the state I find impressive even though it's not that strong a victory relatively speaking.

[nclib]

Wendell Ford of Kentucky winning every county for Senate in 1986, even the ultra-GOP south-central counties (such as Jackson County).

[Nagas]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_gubernatorial_election,_1978

Jerry Brown carried Orange County. Democrats never win Orange County; even LBJ lost to Goldwater there.

[TJ in Wisco]

George Voinovich defeating Eric Fingerhut for the the US Senate from Ohio in 2004. Voinovich had 63.9% of the vote and won every county.

[homelycooking]

George Voinovich defeating Eric Fingerhut for the the US Senate from Ohio in 2004. Voinovich had 63.9% of the vote and won every county.

A big landslide, to be sure, but diminished by the fact that Voinovich's opponent was a guy named "Fingerhut".

[Vazdul (Formerly Chairman of the Communist Party of Ontario)]

Democratic Governor Cecil Andrus won by a 2 to 1 margin, winning all but two counties. In Idaho.

His Republican opponent ran on a platform of Universal Health Care. In Idaho. In 1990.