United States Senate elections, 2000

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Republican holds Republican pickups Democratic holds Democratic pickups

The U.S. Senate election, 2000 was an election for one-third of the seats in the United States Senate which coincided with the election of George W. Bush as president. It featured a number of fiercely contested elections that resulted in a victory for the Democratic Party, which gained four net seats from the Republican Party in the Senate. (Democrats had already gained one seat since the 1998 elections when Zell B. Miller (D-Ga.) was appointed following the death of Paul M. Coverdell (R-Ga.).)

This was six years after many Republicans had won seats in Senate Class 1 during the elections of 1994, and it was this group who were seeking reelection or retiring in 2000. Because such a large number of these seats were being defended by Republicans, most of the races that were considered to be in play were won by challenging Democrats. They defeated Republican senators William Roth (R-Del.), Spencer Abraham (R-Mich.), Rod Grams (R-Minn.), John Ashcroft (R-Mo.), and Slade Gorton (R-Wash.), as well as winning the open seat in Florida. Ashcroft's defeat was noteworthy in that his opponent, Mel Carnahan, had died before the election, but still won. (The Democratic governor had promised to appoint Carnahan's wife to the seat if he won). The Republicans did defeat one incumbent, Chuck Robb (D-Va.), and win an open seat in Nevada.

This left the Senate a 50-50 tie between Republicans and Democrats, which meant Republicans could control the chamber with the tie-breaking vote of new Vice President Richard B. Cheney. However, before Cheney was inaugurated on January 20, after the new Senators took office on January 3, Al Gore was still the Vice President, which meant that the Democrats had the majority during that time. This state of affairs lasted until Jim Jeffords of Vermont left the Republican Party and became an independent who caucused with the Democrats.

1 Results summary
2 Senate contests in 2000
3 See also
4 Senate composition before and after elections

[edit] Results summary

**Summary of the 2000 United States Senate election results**
Parties		Breakdown			Total Seats			Popular Vote		Total Candidates
Parties		Up	Elected	Not Up	1998	2000	+/-	Vote	%	General¹
	Republican Party	19	15	35	54	50	-4	37,645,909	47.736%	34
	Democratic Party	15	19	31	46	50	+4	38,164,089	48.393%	33
	Independent	-	-	-	-	-	-	438,689	0.556%	24
	Libertarian Party	-	-	-	-	-	-	1,036,684	1.315%	22
	Constitution Party	-	-	-	-	-	-	100,603	0.218%	8
	Independence Party	-	-	-	-	-	-	183,764	0.233%	2
	Green Party	-	-	-	-	-	-	652,329	0.827%	8
	Reform Party	-	-	-	-	-	-	188,930	0.240%	8
	Socialist Workers Party	-	-	-	-	-	-	15,996	0.020%	2
	Other parties	-	-	-	-	-	-	259,183	0.033%	12
	Write-in	-	-	-	-	-	-	8,518	0.001%	-
Total		34	34	66	100	100	-	78,191,797	100.0%	153
Source: Election Statistics - Office of the Clerk

¹ Totals do not include participating voters who declined to cast a vote for U.S. Senate. Candidates in the Georgia Special Election to fill the seat of deceased Senator Paul Coverdell were required to be non-partisan. However, Zell Miller and Mack Mattingly were added to the Democratic and Republican columns respectively and all the other candidates were added to the Independent column.

[edit] Senate contests in 2000

Blue=Democratic Gain Red=Republican Gain Gray=Retired Senator

State	Incumbent	Party	Status	Opposing Candidates
Arizona	Jon Kyl	Republican	Re-elected, 79 - 8 - 5	Vance Hansen (Green) Barry Hess (Libertarian)
California	Dianne Feinstein	Democrat	Re-elected, 56 - 37 - 3 - 2	Tom Campbell (Republican) Medea Benjamin (Green) Gail Lightfoot (Libertarian)
Connecticut	Joe Lieberman	Democrat	Re-elected, 63 - 34	Philip Giordano (Republican)
Delaware	William Roth	Republican	Defeated, 56 - 44	Thomas R. Carper (Democrat)
Florida	Connie Mack	Republican	Retired, Democratic victory, 51 - 46	Bill Nelson (Democrat) Bill McCollum (Republican)
Georgia¹	Zell Miller	Democrat	Re-elected, 58 - 38	Mack Mattingly (Republican)
Hawaii	Daniel Akaka	Democrat	Re-elected, 73 - 25 - 1	John Carroll (Republican) Jeff Mallan (Libertarian)
Indiana	Dick Lugar	Republican	Re-elected, 67 - 32	David Johnson (Democrat)
Maine	Olympia Snowe	Republican	Re-elected, 69 - 31	Mark Lawrence (Democrat)
Maryland	Paul Sarbanes	Democrat	Re-elected, 63 - 37	Paul Rappaport (Republican)
Massachusetts	Ted Kennedy	Democrat	Re-elected, 73 - 13 - 12	Jack E Robinson III (Republican) Carla Howell (Libertarian)
Michigan	Spencer Abraham	Republican	Defeated, 50 - 48	Debbie Stabenow (Democrat)
Minnesota	Rod Grams	Republican	Defeated, 49 - 43	Mark Dayton (Democrat)
Mississippi	Trent Lott	Republican	Re-elected, 66 - 32	Troy Brown (Democrat)
Missouri	John Ashcroft	Republican	Defeated, 51 - 48	Mel Carnahan (Democrat)
Montana	Conrad Burns	Republican	Re-elected, 51 - 47	Brian Schweitzer (Democrat)
Nebraska	Bob Kerrey	Democrat	Retired: Democratic victory, 51 - 49	Ben Nelson (Democrat) Don Stenberg (Republican)
Nevada	Richard Bryan	Democrat	Retired: Republican victory, 55 - 40	John Ensign (Republican) Edward M. Bernstein (Democrat)
New Jersey	Frank Lautenberg	Democrat	Retired: Democratic victory, 50 - 47	Jon Corzine (Democrat) Bob Franks (Republican)
New Mexico	Jeff Bingaman	Democrat	Re-elected, 62 - 38	Bill Redmond (Republican)
New York	Daniel Patrick Moynihan	Democrat	Retired: Democratic victory, 55 - 43	Hillary Clinton (Democrat) Rick Lazio (Republican)
North Dakota	Kent Conrad	Democrat	Re-elected, 61 - 38	Duane Sand (Republican)
Ohio	R. Michael DeWine	Republican	Re-elected, 60 - 36 - 3	Ted Celeste (Democrat) John McAlister (Libertarian)
Pennsylvania	Rick Santorum	Republican	Re-elected, 52 - 46	Ron Klink (Democrat)
Rhode Island²	Lincoln Chafee	Republican	Re-elected, 57 - 41	Robert Weygand (Democrat)
Tennessee	Bill Frist	Republican	Re-elected, 65 - 32	Jeff Clark (Democrat)
Texas	Kay Bailey Hutchison	Republican	Re-elected, 65 - 32 - 1	Gene Kelly (Democrat) Mary Ruwart (Libertarian)
Utah	Orrin G. Hatch	Republican	Re-elected, 66 - 32	Scott Howell (Democrat)
Vermont	Jim Jeffords	Republican	Re-elected, 66 - 25	Ed Flanagan (Democrat)
Virginia	Chuck Robb	Democrat	Defeated, 52 - 48	George F. Allen (Republican)
Washington	Slade Gorton	Republican	Defeated, 49 - 49 - 2	Maria Cantwell (Democrat) Jeff Jared (Libertarian)
West Virginia	Robert Byrd	Democrat	Re-elected, 78 - 20	David Gallaher (Republican)
Wisconsin	Herb Kohl	Democrat	Re-elected, 62 - 37	John Gillespie (Republican)
Wyoming	Craig Thomas	Republican	Re-elected, 74 - 23	Mel Logan (Democrat)

¹ special election held due to death of Paul Coverdell (R-Ga.) -- next regular election held in 2004.
² Chafee had been appointed on November 2, 1999, following the death of his father, John Chafee (R-R.I.).