1996 United States elections

1996 United States elections

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Election day	November 5
Incumbent president	Bill Clinton (Democratic)
Next Congress	105th
Presidential election
Partisan control	Democratic hold
Popular vote margin	Democratic +8.5%
Electoral vote
Bill Clinton (D)	379
Bob Dole (R)	159
1996 presidential election results. Red denotes states won by Dole, blue denotes states won by Clinton. Numbers indicate the electoral votes won by each candidate.
Senate elections
Overall control	Republican hold
Seats contested	35 of 100 seats (33 Class 2 seats + 2 special elections)
Net seat change	Republican +2[1]
1996 Senate results (excluding Oregon's Senate special election)      Democratic gain      Democratic hold      Republican gain      Republican hold
House elections
Overall control	Republican hold
Seats contested	All 435 voting members
Popular vote margin	Democratic +0.1%
Net seat change	Democratic +2
1996 House of Representatives results (territorial delegate races not shown)      Democratic hold      Republican hold      Democratic gain      Republican gain      Independent gain      Independent hold
Gubernatorial elections
Seats contested	13 (11 states, 2 territories)
Net seat change	None
1996 gubernatorial election results      Democratic gain      Democratic hold      Republican gain      Republican hold      New Progressive hold      Nonpartisan

The 1996 United States elections were held on November 5 1996. Democratic President Bill Clinton won re-election, while the Republicans maintained their majorities in both houses of the United States Congress.

Clinton defeated Republican nominee Bob Dole and independent candidate Ross Perot in the presidential election, taking 379 of the 538 electoral votes. Due in part to Perot's fairly strong third party performance (despite being considerably worse than in 1992), Clinton narrowly failed to win a majority of the popular vote. Dole defeated Pat Buchanan and several other candidates in the 1996 Republican Party presidential primaries to win his party's nomination for president.

In the congressional elections, Republicans successfully defended the majorities that they had won in the 1994 elections. Republicans picked up a net of two Senate seats, while Democrats picked up a net of eight seats in the House of Representatives. In the gubernatorial elections, each party picked up a single seat that had previously been held by the other party.

As of 2020, this is the last time a president was elected with both chambers of Congress being of the opposing party.