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1996 Democratic Party presidential primaries

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Candidate Bill Clinton Uncommitted Home state Arkansas Contests won 34 1 Popular vote 9,706,802 411,270 Percentage 89.0% 3.8%   Candidate Roland Riemers Lyndon LaRouche Home state North Dakota Virginia Contests won 1 0 Popular vote 651 596,422 Percentage 0.006% 5.5%

Bill Clinton   Uncommitted   Roland Riemers   No Primary Held

Previous Democratic nominee Bill Clinton Democratic nominee Bill Clinton

From January 29 to June 4, 1996, voters of the Democratic Party chose its nominee for president in the 1996 United States presidential election. Incumbent President Bill Clinton was again selected as the nominee through a series of primary elections and caucuses culminating in the 1996 Democratic National Convention held from August 26 to August 29, 1996, in Chicago, Illinois.

This was the first Democratic presidential primary in 16 years in which an incumbent president was a candidate. Clinton went on to win reelection, thereby becoming the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win two consecutive presidential elections.

Primary race overview

With the advantage of incumbency, Bill Clinton's path to renomination by the Democratic Party was uneventful. At the 1996 Democratic National Convention, Clinton - along with incumbent Vice President Al Gore - was renominated following a primary race in which he faced only token opposition. Perennial candidate Lyndon LaRouche qualified for one delegate from Virginia and one delegate from Louisiana, but the state parties refused to award him delegates and the First District Court of Appeals upheld their decision. Former Pennsylvania governor Bob Casey contemplated a challenge to Clinton, but health problems forced Casey to abandon a bid. That left Jimmy Griffin, the former mayor of Buffalo, New York, as the highest-ranking challenger still in the race. After finishing in eighth place, behind even the perennial candidates, in the New Hampshire primaries, Griffin dropped out of the race. Clinton easily won primaries nationwide, with margins consistently higher than 80%.

Roland Riemers scored a victory in the North Dakota primary, where Clinton did not file to appear on the ballot.

Backed by a loyal following, LaRouche managed to get on the ballot in most states and amassed over half a million votes nationwide in the primary. His highest percentage was 13.4% in West Virginia and received over a hundred thousand votes in California.

Another notable campaign besides LaRouche's to challenge President Clinton was Chicago housewife Elvena Lloyd-Duffie, who was reported to have outraised him at one point and got as high as 11% of the vote in Oklahoma and 7% in Louisiana.

Candidates

Nominee

Candidate			Most recent office	Home state	Campaign Withdrawal date	Popular vote	Contests won	Running mate
Bill Clinton			President of the United States (1993–2001)	Arkansas	(Campaign • Positions) Secured nomination: March 26, 1996	9,706,802 (89.0%)	34	Al Gore

Withdrew during primaries

• Activist Lyndon LaRouche from Virginia
• Former Mayor of Buffalo Jimmy Griffin from New York

Declined

• Bill Bradley, U.S. senator from New Jersey
• Bob Casey Sr., former governor of Pennsylvania
• Mario Cuomo, former governor of New York
• Dick Gephardt, House minority leader and U.S. representative from Missouri
• Gary Hart, former U.S. senator from Colorado
• Jesse Jackson, 1984 and 1988 candidate
• Bob Kerrey, U.S. senator from Nebraska
• Colin Powell, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (Republican)

Results

With a number of non-notable people running against Clinton and LaRouche in several states, The nationwide totals went as follows:

† Indicates a write-in candidate

See also

• 1996 Republican Party presidential primaries

References

1. LaRouche v. Fowler. United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit. 2008-08-28
2. ^ "Anyone left? The search for a Clinton challenger in 1996". The Progressive. TheFreeLibrary.com. May 1, 1995. Retrieved December 6, 2010.
3. Newton-Small, Jay (November 24, 2009). "Can a Pro-Life Dem Bridge the Health-Care Divide?". Time. Archived from the original on November 27, 2009. Retrieved December 6, 2010.
4. US President - D Primaries. OurCampaigns.
5. Winger, Richard. "Ballot Access News -- March 6, 1996". Ballot Access News. Retrieved 11 March 2020.
6. FEC: 1996 Presidential Primary Results
7. The Washington Post
8. "Election and voting information".
9. ^ Sabato, Larry, ed. (1997). Toward the millennium: the elections of 1996. Allyn & Bacon. pp. 24–27. ISBN 0205199070.
10. "Our Campaigns - US President - D Primaries Race - Feb 01, 1996".

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42nd President of the United States (1993–2001) 40th and 42nd Governor of Arkansas (1979–1981, 1983–1992)
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Life and legacy	Childhood home Early life and career Governorships of Arkansas Presidential Library Post-presidency Clinton Foundation Clinton School of Public Service Clinton Bush Haiti Fund Chairman, National Constitution Center Honors and awards Public image Troopergate Sexual misconduct allegations Whitewater controversy
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Books	Between Hope and History (1996) My Life (2004) Giving: How Each of Us Can Change the World (2007) Back to Work (2011) The President Is Missing (2018) The President's Daughter (2021) Citizen: My Life After the White House (2024)
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Popular culture	Saturday Night Live parodies of Bill Clinton The War Room (1993 documentary) The Silence of the Hams (1994 film) Primary Colors (1998 film) The Final Days (2000 short film) The Hunting of the President (2004 film) The Special Relationship (2010 film) Clinton (2012 film) Hillary and Clinton (2016 play) Impeachment: American Crime Story (2021 miniseries) The American Presidency with Bill Clinton (2022 documentary series)
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• 1996 United States Democratic presidential primaries
• Mario Cuomo