![]() ![]() The assertion about WMD was hotly advanced by the Bush administration from the beginning, but other major powers including China, France, Germany, and Russia remained unconvinced that Iraq was a threat and refused to allow passage of a UN Security Council resolution to authorize the use of force. Both the possession of these weapons of mass destruction (WMD), and the failure to account for them, would violate the UN sanctions. Among the stated reasons were that Saddam's regime had tried to acquire nuclear material and had not properly accounted for biological and chemical material it was known to have previously possessed. The Iraq issue gave Bush an antagonist to present to the people, rallying support against a common enemy rather than gaining voters through ideas or policy. The Bush administration then turned its attention to Iraq and argued the need to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq had become urgent. The Taliban had been removed by December, although a long reconstruction would follow. Within a month, the forces of a coalition led by the United States entered Afghanistan, which had been sheltering Osama bin Laden, suspected mastermind of the September 11 attacks. ![]() Bush's approval ratings surged to near 90%. ![]() Just eight months into his presidency, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, suddenly transformed Bush into a wartime president. Gore remanded the case to the Florida Supreme Court, which declared there was not sufficient time to hold a recount without violating the U.S. Bush won the presidency in 2000 after the Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Bush won Florida by a five-percent margin, a significant improvement over his razor-thin victory margin in the state 4 years earlier which led to a legal challenge in Bush v. Some aspects of the election process were subject to controversy, but not to the degree seen in the 2000 presidential election. This was the first presidential election since 1988 in which a candidate received over 50% of the vote. ![]() Although Kerry flipped New Hampshire, Bush won both more electoral votes and states than in 2000. Bush swept the South and the Mountain States and took the crucial swing states of Ohio, Iowa, and New Mexico, the latter two flipping Republican. Domestic issues were debated as well, including the economy and jobs, health care, abortion, same-sex marriage and embryonic stem cell research.īush won by a narrow margin of 35 electoral votes and took 50.7% of the popular vote. Kerry criticized Bush's conduct of the Iraq War, despite having voted for it himself. Bush presented himself as a decisive leader and attacked Kerry as a " flip-flopper". Foreign policy was the dominant theme throughout the election campaign, particularly Bush's handling of the war on terror and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Kerry chose Edwards, who had himself sought the party's 2004 presidential nomination, to be his running mate.īush's popularity had soared early in his first term after the September 11 attacks in 2001, but it had declined significantly by 2004. Former Vermont governor Howard Dean emerged as the early front-runner in the 2004 Democratic Party presidential primaries, but Kerry won the first set of primaries in January and clinched his party's nomination in March after a series of primary victories. Bush also became the only incumbent president to win re-election after previously losing the popular vote.īush and Cheney were renominated by their party with no difficulty. At the time, Bush's 62,040,610 votes were the most received by any nominee for president, although this record would be broken four years later by Barack Obama. Due to the higher turnout, both major party nominees set records for the most popular votes received by a major party candidate for president both men surpassed Reagan's record from 20 years earlier. As of 2020, this is the only presidential election since 1988 in which the Republican nominee won the popular vote. Bush and his running mate incumbent Vice President Dick Cheney were elected to a second term, defeating the Democratic ticket of John Kerry, a United States senator from Massachusetts and his running mate John Edwards, a United States senator from North Carolina. The Republican ticket of incumbent President George W. The 2004 United States presidential election was the 55th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 2, 2004. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |