2008 United States presidential election in Iowa
Updated: Wikipedia source
The 2008 United States presidential election in Iowa took place on November 4, 2008, as part of the 2008 United States presidential election. Voters chose seven representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president. Iowa was won by the Democratic nominee, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, by a 9.54% margin of victory. Obama took 53.93% of the vote while his Republican opponent, Senator John McCain of Arizona, took 44.39%. Prior to the election, all 16 organizations considered this a state Obama would win, or otherwise considered it a safe blue state. In 2004, Republican George W. Bush very narrowly won Iowa in his reelection bid, although prior to that, the state had gone Democratic for four consecutive presidential elections. A Midwestern state where agriculture plays a critical role in the daily lives of its citizens, Iowa is nevertheless an independent state. However, due to Obama's popularity from the Iowa caucuses, the nationwide backlash against the Bush administration, and the poor state of the economy, the state easily fell into the Democratic column later in the election cycle. Obama's 828,940 votes are the most received by a Democratic presidential candidate in the state's history. As of the 2024 presidential election, this is the last election in which Adams County, Audubon County, Benton County, Carroll County, Crawford County, Delaware County, Emmet County, Franklin County, Greene County, Hamilton County, Hardin County, Iowa County, Kossuth County, Palo Alto County, Warren County, and Winnebago County voted for the Democratic candidate. This was also the last time a majority of Iowa's counties went to the Democratic presidential candidate. Iowa is also one of only three states that backed Obama twice that would go on to vote against his vice president Joe Biden in 2020, the other two being Florida and Ohio.