2008 United States presidential election in Maryland
November 4, 2008
 
Nominee Barack Obama John McCain
Party Democratic Republican
Home state Illinois Arizona
Running mate Joe Biden Sarah Palin
Electoral vote 10 0
Popular vote 1,629,467 959,862
Percentage 61.92% 36.47%
County Results
President before election

George W. Bush
Republican

 Elected President

Barack Obama
Democratic

The 2008 United States presidential election in Maryland took place on November 4, 2008, and was part of the 2008 United States presidential election. Voters chose 10 representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.

Maryland was won by Democratic nominee Barack Obama by a 25.4% margin of victory. Prior to the election, all 17 news organizations considered this a state Obama would win, or otherwise considered as a safe blue state. The Old Line State has voted for the Democratic presidential candidate of every election since 1992. In 2008, Obama easily captured the state's 10 electoral votes in a landslide victory, winning 61.92% of the popular vote to Republican John McCain's 36.47%.

Primaries

Campaign

Predictions

There were 16 news organizations who made state-by-state predictions of the election. Here are their last predictions before election day:

Source Ranking
D.C. Political Report[1] Likely D
Cook Political Report[2] Solid D
The Takeaway[3] Solid D
Electoral-vote.com[4] Solid D
Washington Post[5] Solid D
Politico[6] Solid D
RealClearPolitics[7] Solid D
FiveThirtyEight[5] Solid D
CQ Politics[8] Solid D
The New York Times[9] Solid D
CNN[10] Safe D
NPR[5] Solid D
MSNBC[5] Solid D
Fox News[11] Likely D
Associated Press[12] Likely D
Rasmussen Reports[13] Safe D

Polling

Obama won every single pre-election poll, each by a double-digit margin of victory and at least 51% of the vote. The final 3 polls averaged Obama leading 54% to 38%.[14]

Fundraising

John McCain raised a total of $3,439,120 in the state. Barack Obama raised $19,091,136.[15]

Advertising and visits

Obama spent $257,582 while McCain spent nothing.[16] Both tickets visited the state once.[17]

Analysis

Voting taking place at a Maryland polling station

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.[18]

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

2008 United States presidential election in Maryland[19]
Party Candidate Running mate Votes Percentage Electoral votes
Democratic Barack Obama Joe Biden 1,629,467 61.92% 10
Republican John McCain Sarah Palin 959,862 36.47% 0
Independent Ralph Nader Matt Gonzalez 14,713 0.56% 0
Libertarian Bob Barr Wayne Allyn Root 9,842 0.44% 0
Independent Write-in candidates 9,043 0.34% 0
Green Cynthia McKinney Rosa Clemente 4,747 0.18% 0
Constitution Chuck Baldwin Darrell Castle 3,760 0.14% 0
America's Independent Alan Keyes (write-in) Brian Rohrbough 103 0.00% 0
Unaffiliated Donald Kenneth Allen (write-in) Christopher Borcik 17 0.56% 0
Democratic Blaine Taylor (write-in) n/a 12 0.00% 0
Socialist USA Brian Moore (write-in) Stewart Alexander 10 0.00% 0
Totals 2,631,596 100.00% 10
Voter turnout (Voting age population) 62.4%

Results by county

County Barack Obama
Democratic		 John McCain
Republican		 Various candidates
Other parties		 Margin Total votes cast[20]
#  % #  % #  % #  %
Allegany 10,693 35.95% 18,405 61.88% 644 2.17% -7,712 -25.93% 29,742
Anne Arundel 125,015 48.15% 129,682 49.95% 4,922 1.90% -4,667 -1.80% 259,619
Baltimore 214,151 56.22% 158,714 41.66% 8,073 2.12% 55,437 14.55% 380,938
Baltimore City 214,385 87.16% 28,681 11.66% 2,902 1.18% 185,704 75.50% 245,968
Calvert 20,299 46.07% 23,095 52.42% 663 1.50% -2,796 -6.35% 44,057
Caroline 4,971 37.61% 8,015 60.64% 232 1.76% -3,044 -23.03% 13,218
Carroll 28,060 33.11% 54,503 64.30% 2,197 2.59% -26,443 -31.20% 84,760
Cecil 17,665 41.57% 23,855 56.14% 974 2.29% -6,190 -14.57% 42,494
Charles 43,635 62.22% 25,732 36.69% 760 1.08% 17,903 25.53% 70,127
Dorchester 6,912 45.25% 8,168 53.48% 194 1.27% -1,256 -8.22% 15,274
Frederick 54,013 48.58% 55,170 49.62% 2,003 1.80% -1,157 -1.04% 111,186
Garrett 3,736 29.02% 8,903 69.17% 233 1.81% -5,167 -40.14% 12,872
Harford 48,552 39.38% 71,751 58.19% 2,992 2.43% -23,199 -18.82% 123,295
Howard 87,120 59.99% 55,393 38.14% 2,720 1.87% 31,727 21.85% 145,233
Kent 4,953 49.43% 4,905 48.95% 162 1.62% 48 0.48% 10,020
Montgomery 314,444 71.58% 118,608 27.00% 6,209 1.41% 195,836 44.58% 439,261
Prince George's 332,396 88.87% 38,833 10.38% 2,797 0.75% 293,563 78.49% 374,026
Queen Anne's 8,575 35.66% 15,087 62.74% 383 1.59% -6,512 -27.08% 24,045
Somerset 4,779 48.16% 5,037 50.76% 108 1.09% -258 -2.60% 9,924
St. Mary's 19,023 42.84% 24,705 55.63% 681 1.53% -5,682 -12.79% 44,409
Talbot 9,035 44.45% 10,995 54.09% 298 1.47% -1,960 -9.64% 20,328
Washington 26,245 42.61% 34,169 55.47% 1,186 1.93% -7,924 -12.86% 61,600
Wicomico 19,436 46.44% 21,849 52.20% 569 1.36% -2,413 -5.77% 41,854
Worcester 11,374 41.59% 15,607 57.07% 365 1.33% -4,233 -15.48% 27,346
Totals1,629,46761.92%959,86236.47%42,2671.61%669,60525.44%2,631,596
County Flips:

Counties that flipped from Republican to Democratic

By congressional district

Barack Obama carried 6 of Maryland’s 8 congressional districts. McCain carried two congressional districts, including one that was won by a Democrat.

District Obama McCain Representative
1st 39.81% 58.26% Wayne Gilchrest (110th Congress)
Frank M. Kratovil, Jr. (111th Congress)
2nd 59.84% 38.25% Dutch Ruppersberger
3rd 58.78% 39.23% John Sarbanes
4th 85.06% 14.16% Albert Wynn (110th Congress)
Donna Edwards (111th Congress)
5th 65.44% 33.30% Steny Hoyer
6th 40.19% 57.65% Roscoe Bartlett
7th 78.79% 19.89% Elijah Cummings
8th 73.88% 24.70% Chris Van Hollen

Electors

Technically the voters of Maryland cast their ballots for electors: representatives to the Electoral College. Maryland is allocated 10 electors because it has 8 congressional districts and 2 senators. All candidates who appear on the ballot or qualify to receive write-in votes must submit a list of 10 electors, who pledge to vote for their candidate and his or her running mate. Whoever wins the majority of votes in the state is awarded all 10 electoral votes. Their chosen electors then vote for president and vice president. Although electors are pledged to their candidate and running mate, they are not obligated to vote for them.[21] An elector who votes for someone other than his or her candidate is known as a faithless elector.

The electors of each state and the District of Columbia met on December 15, 2008, to cast their votes for president and vice president. The Electoral College itself never meets as one body. Instead the electors from each state and the District of Columbia met in their respective capitols.

The following were the members of the Electoral College from the state. All 10 were pledged to Barack Obama and Joe Biden:[22]

  1. Gene M. Ransom III
  2. Delores Kelley
  3. Guy Guzzone
  4. Nathaniel Exum
  5. Chris Reynolds
  6. Bobby Fouche
  7. Elizabeth Bobo
  8. Michael Barnes
  9. Susan Lee
  10. Rainier Harvey, Sr.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "D.C.'s Political Report: The complete source for campaign summaries". January 1, 2009. Archived from the original on January 1, 2009. Retrieved August 23, 2021.
  2. ↑ "Presidential". May 5, 2015. Archived from the original on May 5, 2015. Retrieved August 23, 2021.
  3. ↑ "Vote 2008 - The Takeaway - Track the Electoral College vote predictions". April 22, 2009. Archived from the original on April 22, 2009. Retrieved August 23, 2021.
  4. ↑ "Electoral-vote.com: President, Senate, House Updated Daily". electoral-vote.com. Retrieved August 23, 2021.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Based on Takeaway
  6. ↑ "POLITICO's 2008 Swing State Map - POLITICO.com". www.politico.com. Retrieved September 22, 2016.
  7. ↑ "RealClearPolitics - Electoral Map". Archived from the original on June 5, 2008.
  8. ↑ "CQ Presidential Election Maps, 2008". CQ Politics. Archived from the original on June 14, 2009. Retrieved December 20, 2009.
  9. ↑ Nagourney, Adam; Zeleny, Jeff; Carter, Shan (November 4, 2008). "The Electoral Map: Key States". The New York Times. Retrieved May 26, 2010.
  10. ↑ "October – 2008 – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs". CNN. October 31, 2008. Archived from the original on June 19, 2010. Retrieved May 26, 2010.
  11. ↑ "Winning The Electoral College". Fox News. April 27, 2010.
  12. ↑ "roadto270". hosted.ap.org. Retrieved September 22, 2016.
  13. ↑ "Election 2008: Electoral College Update - Rasmussen Reports™". www.rasmussenreports.com. Retrieved September 22, 2016.
  14. ↑ Election 2008 Polls - Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections
  15. ↑ "Presidential Campaign Finance". Archived from the original on March 24, 2009. Retrieved August 20, 2009.
  16. ↑ "Map: Campaign Ad Spending - Election Center 2008 from CNN.com". CNN. Retrieved May 26, 2010.
  17. ↑ "Map: Campaign Candidate Visits - Election Center 2008 from CNN.com". CNN. Retrieved May 26, 2010.
  18. ↑ "Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections". uselectionatlas.org. Retrieved March 31, 2023.
  19. ↑ "Maryland State Board of Elections". Retrieved December 12, 2008.
  20. ↑ Maryland State Board of Elections; 2008 Presidential General Election Official Results President and Vice President of the United States
  21. ↑ "Electoral College". California Secretary of State. Archived from the original on October 30, 2008. Retrieved November 1, 2008.
  22. ↑ "2008 Presidential Electors". elections.maryland.gov. Retrieved May 22, 2021.
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