Reagan only won 50.7% of the popular vote. However because of the electoral college, he "won" the vast majority of states.
Read up on the Electoral College for details on how that works.
this post was submitted on 01 Jul 2026
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The bigger deal was that, for the elections from Nixon's second term to Reagan's second term, there wasn't a major Democratic base in a state which varied differently from the nation. Bill Clinton had a near equivalent percentage of the vote in 1996 yet lost 19 states.
He won by 10% over the next guy. That's a huge margin in our elections
I mean the deal with iran was the cheating part.
You're forgetting the power of real charisma. The only candidate somce that has come close to Reagan levels of rizz is Obama. Just you wait till Harris V Vance in 2028, watching two of the least charismatic people on the planet run a race to wield the power of a dying empire should be fun.
It's gonna be Newsom vs. Donald Trump Jr
Not to mention, he was running against Fritz Mondale, who had far less charisma than even his name conveys.
Which, credit where due, is an impressive accomplishment
He absolutely cheated, his campaign arranged for the hostages to be held in Iran until Reagan was elected president
There was a major collapse of the Democratic Party in 1968 which never really recovered until Obama: Carter got elected because of Watergate, Bill Clinton got elected because of Perot.
And bad as it looks in retrospect, Nixon and Reagan were very popular presidents at the time.
Elections generally tilt one way or the other based on fractions of a percentage of the vote, in fact, a single vote can be the difference.
So, if two candidates are evenly matched, it's possible that a whole state can go one way or the other based on just a few votes.
Note that this is not specific to the USA and I'm in Australia.
As far as "elections" go where there's only one choice, that's not an election but a dictatorship and from where I'm standing, the USA is heading in that direction at a breakneck speed.