2000 United States presidential election in Florida
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The 2000 United States presidential election in Florida took place on November 7, 2000, as part of the nationwide presidential election. Florida, a swing state, had a major recount dispute that took center stage in the election. The outcome of the 2000 United States presidential election was not known for more than a month after balloting because of the extended process of counting and recounting Florida's presidential ballots. State results tallied on election night gave 246 electoral votes to Republican nominee Texas Governor George W. Bush and 255 to Democratic nominee Vice President Al Gore, with New Mexico (5), Oregon (7), and Florida (25) too close to call that evening. Gore won New Mexico and Oregon over the following few days, but the result in Florida was decisive, regardless of how those two states had voted. After an intense recount process and the United States Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Gore, Bush won Florida's electoral votes by a margin of only 537 votes out of almost six million cast (0.009%) and, as a result, became the president-elect. The process was extremely divisive and led to calls for electoral reform in Florida. If Gore had been declared the winner, he would have won the election with a total of 292 electoral votes. Post-election analysis has found that Palm Beach County's butterfly ballot misdirected over 2,000 votes from Gore to third-party candidate Pat Buchanan, tipping Florida—and the election—to Bush. The final official Florida count gave the victory to Bush by 537 votes, making it by percentage not only the closest state of the election (New Mexico was decided by 366 votes but has a much smaller population, representing a 0.061% margin), but also the closest of any state in any United States presidential election ever. This was the closest margin in any tipping point state in history, surpassing the record of the 1876 United States presidential election in South Carolina. As of the 2024 presidential election, this is the last election in which the Democratic candidate won Pasco County and Hernando County. It was also the first time the Democratic candidate won Orange County since Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1944. This county, along with Charles County, Maryland, were the only two Gore flipped from the previous election.