1984
The 1984 U.S. presidential election was won by Ronald Reagan (Republican) with 525 of 538 electoral votes, defeating Walter Mondale (Democratic). Electoral-vote margin: 512 (525 to 13). Popular-vote margin: 18.2 percentage points. Turnout was 55.2%. The cycle falls in the Cold War Realignment era of American electoral history.
Open the what-if calculator → — flip states and re-count. A toy, not history.
Ronald Reagan and the 1984 map
Reagan won a massive re-election landslide, carrying 49 states with the 'Morning in America' campaign amid robust economic recovery. Walter Mondale, Carter's VP, made history by choosing Geraldine Ferraro as the first female VP nominee of a major party. Mondale's straightforward promise to raise taxes damaged his campaign. Reagan won 525 electoral votes, the most ever won by a candidate in an election with a major-party opponent. Mondale carried only his home state of Minnesota (by 3,761 votes) and DC.
Economic recovery; Reagan Revolution; deficit spending; nuclear arms race
Most electoral votes ever against a major-party opponent (525); first female VP nominee (Ferraro)
This summary was drafted with AI tools and has not yet been checked sentence by sentence. The vote table and the National Archives note on this page come from named sources; where they differ from the summary, rely on them. Tell us about an error.
States · 51 reporting
State results · 1984
- Minnesota Mondale by 3,761 · 0.2 pts
- Massachusetts Reagan by 71,330 · 2.8 pts
- Rhode Island Reagan by 14,974 · 3.6 pts
- Maryland Reagan by 91,983 · 5.5 pts
- Pennsylvania Reagan by 356,192 · 7.4 pts
MichiganReagan won it by 19.0 points; its electoral votes took the total to 283, past the 270 needed.
Line up the states the winner carried from widest margin to narrowest and add up their electoral votes: the tipping point is the state that takes the total past a majority.
Scroll the table sideways for every column.
| State | Electoral votes | Ronald Reagan Rep | Walter Mondale Dem | Also named | Margin | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | 9 EV | 872,849 60.5% | 551,899 38.3% | None | 320,950 22.3 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Alaska | 3 EV | 138,377 66.7% | 62,007 29.9% | David Bergland 6,378 · 3.1% | 76,370 36.8 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Arizona | 7 EV | 681,416 66.4% | 333,854 32.5% | David Bergland 10,585 · 1.0% | 347,562 33.9 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Arkansas | 6 EV | 534,774 60.5% | 338,646 38.3% | None | 196,128 22.2 pts | Reagan Rep |
| California | 47 EV | 5,467,009 57.5% | 3,922,519 41.3% | None | 1,544,490 16.2 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Colorado | 8 EV | 821,817 63.4% | 454,975 35.1% | None | 366,842 28.3 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Connecticut | 8 EV | 890,877 60.7% | 569,597 38.8% | None | 321,280 21.9 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Delaware | 3 EV | 152,190 59.8% | 101,656 39.9% | None | 50,534 19.9 pts | Reagan Rep |
| District of Columbia | 3 EV | 29,009 13.7% | 180,408 85.4% | None | 151,399 71.7 pts | Mondale Dem |
| Florida | 21 EV | 2,730,350 65.3% | 1,448,816 34.7% | None | 1,281,534 30.7 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Georgia | 12 EV | 1,068,722 60.2% | 706,628 39.8% | None | 362,094 20.4 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Hawaii | 4 EV | 185,050 55.1% | 147,154 43.8% | None | 37,896 11.3 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Idaho | 4 EV | 297,523 72.4% | 108,510 26.4% | None | 189,013 46.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Illinois | 24 EV | 2,707,103 56.2% | 2,086,499 43.3% | None | 620,604 12.9 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Indiana | 12 EV | 1,377,230 61.7% | 841,481 37.7% | None | 535,749 24.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Iowa | 8 EV | 703,088 53.3% | 605,620 45.9% | None | 97,468 7.4 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Kansas | 7 EV | 677,296 66.3% | 333,149 32.6% | None | 344,147 33.7 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Kentucky | 9 EV | 821,702 60.0% | 539,539 39.4% | None | 282,163 20.6 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Louisiana | 10 EV | 1,037,299 60.8% | 651,586 38.2% | None | 385,713 22.6 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Maine | 4 EV | 336,500 60.8% | 214,515 38.8% | None | 121,985 22.1 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Maryland | 10 EV | 879,918 52.5% | 787,935 47.0% | None | 91,983 5.5 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Massachusetts | 13 EV | 1,310,936 51.2% | 1,239,606 48.4% | None | 71,330 2.8 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Michigan | 20 EV | 2,251,571 59.2% | 1,529,638 40.2% | None | 721,933 19.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Minnesota | 10 EV | 1,032,603 49.5% | 1,036,364 49.7% | None | 3,761 0.2 pts | Mondale Dem |
| Mississippi | 7 EV | 582,377 61.9% | 352,192 37.4% | None | 230,185 24.5 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Missouri | 11 EV | 1,274,188 60.0% | 848,583 40.0% | None | 425,605 20.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Montana | 4 EV | 232,450 60.5% | 146,742 38.2% | David Bergland 5,185 · 1.3% | 85,708 22.3 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Nebraska | 5 EV | 460,054 70.6% | 187,866 28.8% | None | 272,188 41.7 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Nevada | 4 EV | 188,770 66.8% | 91,655 32.4% | None | 97,115 34.4 pts | Reagan Rep |
| New Hampshire | 4 EV | 267,050 68.7% | 120,347 30.9% | None | 146,703 37.7 pts | Reagan Rep |
| New Jersey | 16 EV | 1,933,630 60.1% | 1,261,323 39.2% | None | 672,307 20.9 pts | Reagan Rep |
| New Mexico | 5 EV | 307,101 59.7% | 201,769 39.2% | None | 105,332 20.5 pts | Reagan Rep |
| New York | 36 EV | 3,664,763 53.8% | 3,119,609 45.8% | None | 545,154 8.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| North Carolina | 13 EV | 1,346,481 61.9% | 824,287 37.9% | None | 522,194 24.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| North Dakota | 3 EV | 200,336 64.8% | 104,429 33.8% | None | 95,907 31.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Ohio | 23 EV | 2,678,559 58.7% | 1,825,440 40.0% | None | 853,119 18.7 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Oklahoma | 8 EV | 861,530 68.6% | 385,080 30.7% | None | 476,450 37.9 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Oregon | 7 EV | 685,700 55.9% | 536,479 43.7% | None | 149,221 12.2 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Pennsylvania | 25 EV | 2,584,323 53.3% | 2,228,131 46.0% | None | 356,192 7.4 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Rhode Island | 4 EV | 212,080 51.7% | 197,106 48.0% | None | 14,974 3.6 pts | Reagan Rep |
| South Carolina | 8 EV | 615,539 63.6% | 344,459 35.6% | None | 271,080 28.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| South Dakota | 3 EV | 200,267 63.0% | 116,113 36.5% | None | 84,154 26.5 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Tennessee | 11 EV | 990,212 57.8% | 711,714 41.6% | None | 278,498 16.3 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Texas | 29 EV | 3,433,428 63.6% | 1,949,276 36.1% | None | 1,484,152 27.5 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Utah | 5 EV | 469,105 74.5% | 155,369 24.7% | None | 313,736 49.8 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Vermont | 3 EV | 135,865 57.9% | 95,730 40.8% | None | 40,135 17.1 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Virginia | 12 EV | 1,337,078 62.3% | 796,250 37.1% | None | 540,828 25.2 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Washington1,2 | 10 EV | 1,051,670 55.8% | 807,3521 42.9% | None | 244,318 13.0 pts | Reagan Rep |
| West Virginia | 6 EV | 405,483 55.1% | 328,125 44.6% | None | 77,358 10.5 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Wisconsin | 11 EV | 1,198,584 54.2% | 995,740 45.0% | None | 202,844 9.2 pts | Reagan Rep |
| Wyoming | 3 EV | 133,241 70.5% | 53,370 28.2% | David Bergland 2,357 · 1.2% | 79,871 42.3 pts | Reagan Rep |
Shares are of each state’s total vote for president. “Not named”: the figures do not give that candidate a line of their own in that state — for example under 1% of the vote, not on the ballot there, or counted on an unnamed line (see the state’s note). Margin is the leader’s lead over the second-placed candidate.
Notes on the figures
- Washington The MIT Election Lab file gives Walter Mondale 798,352 votes; the FEC's official results give 807,352. This site shows the FEC figure.
- Washington The state total (1,883,910) is the FEC's official total; the MIT file's total is 1,874,910. 'Other candidates' is that total minus the figures shown.
SourcesMIT Election Data and Science Lab, U.S. President 1976–2024 ; Federal Election Commission, Federal Elections 84 . How these figures were compiled
Classroom
All 300 packets, free
60 cycles · K-2 through AP · open download.
Browse packets →Read further
Curated picksNixonland
Rick Perlstein
How politics polarized 1965–1972.
Buy on Amazon →Reagan
H. W. Brands
Single-volume Reagan biography.
Buy on Amazon →Recommendations are editorial.
Free, ad-light, no paywall
Built by one person. Tips fund the next 60 elections of editorial.