Skip to content

Saturday, Nov. 14, 2020

Is 2020 the first time Arizona has voted for a Democratic president since the 1950s?

Esther Tsvayg, Gigafact
no

Before Joe Biden's win in 2020, Arizonans had last chosen the Democratic presidential candidate in 1996, when Bill Clinton won reelection. Clinton's win was the first Democratic victory there since Harry Truman's in 1948.

Unlike the 1996 vote, the 2020 results may signal a more durable shift in the state's partisan alignment. The state also elected a second Democratic senator, Mark Kelly, after choosing Sen. Kyrsten Sinema in 2018.

Factors eroding Republican dominance include a fast-growing young Latino population that now accounts for nearly a quarter of Arizona voters, along with an influx of Democratic-leaning newcomers fleeing neighboring California's high cost of living. Cindy McCain, the widow of 2008 Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, endorsed Biden.

This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.

Sources

About fact briefs

Fact briefs are bite-sized, well-sourced explanations that offer clear "yes" or "no" answers to questions, confusions, and unsupported claims circulating online. They rely on publicly available data and documents, often from the original source. Fact briefs are written and published by Gigafact contributor publications.

See all fact briefs

Between 2020 and 2022, under close editorial supervision, Gigafact contracted a group of freelance writers and editors to test the concepts for fact briefs and provide inputs to our software development process. We call this effort Gigafact Foundry. Over the course of these two years, Gigafact Foundry writers published over 1500 fact briefs in response to claims they found online. Their important work forms the basis of Gigafact formats and editorial guidelines, and is available to the public on Gigafact.org. Readers should be aware that while there is still a lot of relevant information to be found, not all fact briefs produced by Gigafact Foundry reflect Gigafact's current methods and standards for fact briefs. If you come across any that you feel are out of date and need to be looked at with fresh eyes, don't hesitate to contact us at support@gigafact.org.

Learn More

Latest Fact Briefs

Be a Friend of facts

Help us fund more great fact briefs like this one.