The 1980 United States presidential election in Rhode Island took place on November 4, 1980, as part of the 1980 United States presidential election. Voters chose four representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The Democratic Party candidate, incumbentPresidentJimmy Carter, won the state of Rhode Island over former California GovernorRonald Reagan by 43,549 votes, giving him one of just seven victories in the election (other than Rhode Island, Carter also carried Maryland, Minnesota, Hawaii, West Virginia, the District of Columbia and his home state of Georgia). As a result of Rhode Island voting for Carter, it became the only state in New England to vote for a Democratic presidential candidate in 1980.
While Carter was able to win Rhode Island by more than 10%, some of his votes were taken away by the strong third party candidacy of John B. Anderson, a liberal Republican Congressman who ran in 1980 as an independent after failing to win the Republican Party's own presidential nomination. Anderson proved very popular with liberal and moderate voters in New England who viewed Reagan as too far to the right and with normally leaning Democratic voters who were dissatisfied with the policies of the Carter Administration. New England overall would prove to be Anderson's strongest region in the nation, with all six New England states giving double-digit percentages to Anderson. In fact, Rhode Island would ultimately prove to be John Anderson's third strongest state in the nation after neighboring Massachusetts and Vermont, his 14.38% of the vote in the state more than double the 6.61% he got nationwide.[2]
Nationally, Reagan won the election with 489 electoral votes and 50.75% of the popular vote.
Results[]
1980 United States presidential election in Rhode Island[3]
Party
Candidate
Votes
Percentage
Electoral votes
Democratic
Jimmy Carter (incumbent)
198,342
47.67%
4
Republican
Ronald Reagan
154,793
37.20%
0
Independent
John B. Anderson
59,819
14.38%
0
See also[]
United States presidential elections in Rhode Island
References[]
^This figure is calculated by dividing the total number of votes cast in 1980 (432,686) by an estimate of the number of registered voters in Rhode Island in 1980 (547,472). See "General Election November 2, 1980". Rhode Island Board of Elections. Retrieved February 6, 2018.