Vermont was won by Vice PresidentAl Gore who won the state by 9.93 percentage points over Texas GovernorGeorge W. Bush, while third-party candidate Ralph Nader took nearly 7% of the vote, his second-best showing in the country in terms of percentage of the vote after Alaska.[1] Gore's win in Vermont marked the third consecutive victory for Democrats in the Green Mountain State, and the last Republican candidate to win Vermont's three electoral votes was Bush's father, George H. W. Bush, in 1988. This election marked the first time in the Republican Party's history that a Republican nominee was elected without winning Vermont, and the first in the history of the Democratic Party that the Democrats carried the state with a majority of the popular vote twice in a row. This would also be the first time when Vermont would vote Democrat in a close presidential election as well.
As of the 2020 presidential election, this is the last time a Republican presidential candidate received more than 40% of the vote in Vermont and where the margin of victory was in single digits. It has also been the only time since 1988 the Republicans have carried any county other than Essex – which has become a bellwether county analogous to the longtime status of neighboring Coos County, New Hampshire.
From this election onward, this state was the only state to be called by news networks for the Democrats at poll closing time 7:00 PM, and it has always put the Democratic candidate at 3 electoral votes. (Despite Gore winning the state by less than 10 points, and Barack Obama winning the presidency twice later on.)