Maryland has supported the Democratic nominee in each of the last five presidential elections by an average margin of 15.4%. In
1980, it was 1 of only 6 states to vote for Democrat
Jimmy Carter over Republican
Ronald Reagan. It has only supported a Republican six times since
Franklin D. Roosevelt –
1948 and the Republican landslides of
1952,
1956,
1972,
1984 and
1988. Maryland is often among the Democratic nominees' best states. In 1992,
Bill Clinton fared better in Maryland than any other state except his home state of
Arkansas. In
1996, Maryland was Clinton's sixth best, in
2000 Maryland ranked fourth for
Al Gore and in
2004 John Kerry showed his fifth best performance in Maryland. Republican presidential candidates typically win more counties by running up huge margins in western Maryland and the
Eastern Shore. However, they are usually swamped by the heavily Democratic
Baltimore-
Washington, D.C. axis, which casts almost 75% of the state's vote. The state's four largest county-level jurisdictions –
Montgomery,
Prince George's and
Baltimore counties and the City of Baltimore — are strongly Democratic. These areas, which contain 1.5 million voters combined, make it extremely difficult for a Republican to win Maryland. Even in bad years for Democrats, a Republican usually has to run the table in the rest of the state and win either Montgomery, Prince George's or Baltimore counties to have a realistic chance of carrying the state. In 1984, for instance,
Ronald Reagan only carried Maryland by crushing
Walter Mondale in Baltimore County and narrowly winning Montgomery. In 1988,
George H. W. Bush ran up a 42,300-vote margin in Baltimore County over
Michael Dukakis – almost 85% of his statewide margin of 49,800 votes. The 2008 election was no exception.
Barack Obama won the state's 10 electoral votes in 2008 with 61.92% of the vote to
John McCain's 36.47%. Obama carried Montgomery, Prince George's, Baltimore County and Baltimore City with 71.6%, 88.9%, 56.2 and 87.2% of the vote, respectively. Obama's combined 550,000-vote margin in these four areas would have been enough to carry the state. While McCain won more counties, the only large county he won was
Anne Arundel County, home to the state capital,
Annapolis. In this election, Maryland voted 18.17% to the left of the nation at-large. In 2008, Democrats picked up a
U.S. House an open seat in
Maryland's 1st Congressional District as Democrat
Frank M. Kratovil, Jr. defeated Republican
Andy Harris by less than a 1% margin of victory. ==Results==