Republican Party presidential primaries, 2000

Republican Party presidential primaries, 2000

January 24 to June 6, 2000
Candidate George W. Bush John McCain Alan Keyes Home state Texas Arizona Maryland Delegate count 1,496 244 22 Contests won 44 7 0 Popular vote 12,034,676 6,061,332 985,819 Percentage 62.0% 31.2% 5.1%
Republican primary results. Red denotes a Bush win. Yellow denotes a McCain win.
Previous Republican nominee Bob Dole Republican nominee George W. Bush

The 2000 Republican presidential primaries were the selection process by which voters of the Republican Party chose its nominee for President of the United States in the 2000 U.S. presidential election. Texas Governor George W. Bush was selected as the nominee through a series of primary elections and caucuses culminating in the 2000 Republican National Convention held from July 31 to August 3, 2000, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Primary race overview

The primary contest began with a fairly wide field, as the Republicans lacked an incumbent President or Vice President. Texas Governor George W. Bush, son of George H. W. Bush, the most recent Republican president, took an early lead with the support of much of the party establishment and a strong fund-raising effort. Former cabinet member George Shultz played an important early role in securing establishment Republican support for Bush. In April 1998, he invited Bush to discuss policy issues with experts including Michael Boskin, John Taylor, and Condoleezza Rice. The group, which was "looking for a candidate for 2000 with good political instincts, someone they could work with," was impressed, and Shultz encouraged him to enter the race.^[1] Thanks in part to establishment backing, Bush dominated in early polling and fundraising figures. After stumbling in early primary debates, Bush easily won the Iowa caucuses.

Arizona Senator John McCain, considered a dark horse, won 48% of the vote to Bush's 30% in the first-in-the-nation New Hampshire primary, giving his campaign a boost of energy and donations.

The main primary season, then, came down to a race between Bush and McCain. McCain's campaign, centered on campaign finance reform, drew positive press coverage and a fair amount of public excitement, with polls giving the senator superior crossover support from independents and Democrats.^[2][3][4] Bush's campaign focused on "compassionate conservatism," including a greater role for the federal government in education, subsidies for private charitable programs, and large reductions in income and capital gains taxes.

The next primary contest in South Carolina was notorious for its negative tone. Although the Bush campaign said it was not behind any attacks on McCain, locals who supported Bush reportedly handed out fliers and made telephone calls to prospective voters suggesting among other things, that McCain was a "Manchurian candidate" and that he had fathered a child out of wedlock with a black New York-based prostitute (an incorrect reference to a child he and his wife had adopted from Bangladesh). Bush also drew fire for a speech made at Bob Jones University, a school that still banned interracial dating among its students.^[5] But the governor was seen to have the upper hand in a debate hosted by Larry King Live, and he won in South Carolina by nine points. McCain won primaries in Michigan, his home state of Arizona, and a handful of New England states, but faced difficulty in appealing to conservative Republican primary voters. This was particularly true in Michigan, where despite winning the primary, McCain lost the GOP vote to Bush by a wide margin.^[6] McCain also competed in the Virginia primary, counting on continued crossover support by giving a speech blasting the religious right. It backfired, and Bush won the state easily. Bush's subsequent Super Tuesday victories in California, New York and the South made it nearly impossible, mathematically, for McCain to catch up, and he suspended his campaign the next day.

Other candidates included social conservative activist Gary Bauer, businessman Steve Forbes, Utah Senator Orrin Hatch, former Ambassador Alan Keyes, former Tennessee Governor Lamar Alexander, former Red Cross director and cabinet member Elizabeth Dole, Ohio Congressman John Kasich, and former Vice President Dan Quayle. Bauer and Hatch campaigned on a traditional Republican platform of opposition to legalized abortion and reductions in taxes. Keyes had a far more conservative platform, calling for the elimination of all federal taxes except tariffs. Keyes also called for a return to a ban on homosexuals in the military, while most GOP candidates supported the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. Keyes continued to participate in the campaign for nearly all the primaries and continued to appear in the debates with frontrunners McCain and Bush. As in 1996, Forbes campaigned on making the federal income tax non-graduated, an idea he called the flat tax, although he increased his focus on social conservatives in 2000. Although Forbes came a close second to Bush in the Iowa caucuses and tied with him in the Alaska caucuses, none of these other candidates won a primary.

Candidates

Nominee

• 
  Governor
  George W. Bush
  of Texas

Withdrew at convention

• 
  Fmr. Asst. Secretary of State
  Alan Keyes
  of Maryland
  (July 25, 2000)

Withdrew during primary elections

• 
  Senator
  John McCain
  of Arizona
  (March 9, 2000)
• 
  Businessman
  Steve Forbes
  of New York
  (February 10, 2000)
• 
  Fmr. Undersecretary of Education
  Gary Bauer
  of Kentucky
  (February 4, 2000)
• 
  Senator
  Orrin Hatch
  of Utah
  (January 26, 2000)

Withdrew before primary elections

• 
  Fmr. Governor
  Lamar Alexander
  of Tennessee
• 
  Commentator
  Pat Buchanan
  of Virginia
  (broke from the Republican Party and entered the 2000 presidential race as the Reform Party candidate.)
• 
  Fmr. Secretary of Labor
  Elizabeth Dole
  of North Carolina
• 
  Representative
  John Kasich
  of Ohio
• 
  Fmr. Vice President
  Dan Quayle
  of Indiana
• 
  Senator
  Bob Smith
  of New Hampshire
• 
  Fmr. Godfather's Pizza CEO
  Herman Cain
  of Nebraska

Declined to run

• 
  Senator John Ashcroft of Missouri
• 
  Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich of Georgia
• 
  Former Congressman Jack Kemp of New York
• 
  Governor George Pataki of New York
• 
  Former Governor Harold E. Stassen of Minnesota
• 
  Businessman Donald Trump of New York
• 
  Senator Fred Thompson of Tennessee
• 
  Governor Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin
• 
  Governor Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey

Polling

Results

Statewide

     Win for George W. Bush

     Win for John S. McCain

Nationwide

Popular vote result:^[8]

• George W. Bush - 12,034,676 (62.00%)
• John McCain - 6,061,332 (31.23%)
• Alan Keyes - 985,819 (5.08%)
• Steve Forbes - 171,860 (0.89%)
• Unpledged delegates - 61,246 (0.32%)
• Gary Bauer - 60,709 (0.31%)
• Orrin Hatch - 15,958 (0.08%)

Notable endorsements

Note: Some of the endorsers switched positions.

George W. Bush

• Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott from Mississippi^[9]
• Former HUD Secretary and 1996 Vice Presidential nominee Jack Kemp from New York^[10]
• Senator Bob Smith from New Hampshire^[11]
• Former Governor and White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu of New Hampshire^[11]
• Governor Jane Dee Hull of Arizona^[12][13]
• Governor John Engler of Michigan
• Senator John Warner from Virginia^[14]
• Governor Jim Gilmore of Virginia^[14]
• Senator John Ashcroft from Missouri^[15]
• Governor Paul Cellucci of Massachusetts^[16]
• Governor Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin^[17]
• Representative John Thune from South Dakota^[18]

John McCain

• Senator Jon Kyl from Arizona^[13]
• Senator Fred Thompson of Tennessee^[19]
• Senator Mike DeWine from Ohio^[20]
• Senator Chuck Hagel from Nebraska^[21]
• Representative Lindsey Graham from South Carolina^[22]
• Representative Mark Sanford from South Carolina^[22]
• Representative Peter T. King from New York^[23]
• Staten Island Borough President Guy Molinari^[24]

Steve Forbes

• Governor Gary Johnson of New Mexico^[25]
• Representative Bob Barr from Georgia^[26]
• Representative Roscoe Bartlett from Maryland^[27]
• Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell^[28]
• Sarah Palin, mayor of Wasilla, Alaska^[29]

Alan Keyes

• Representative Tom Coburn from Oklahoma^[30]

Orrin Hatch

• Senator Robert Foster Bennett from Utah^[10]

Lamar Alexander

• Governor Mike Huckabee of Arkansas^[10]
• Former Governor Terry Branstad of Iowa^[10]

Dan Quayle

• Former Governor Carroll A. Campbell of South Carolina^[10]

John Kasich

• Mike DeWine (initially)^[10]
• Senator George Voinovich from Ohio^[10]
• Representative John Boehner from Ohio^[10]

See also

• Democratic Party presidential primaries, 2000

References