FACT CHECK: Is Trump The First Republican To Win Wisconsin Since 1952?
President Donald Trump said that he’s the first Republican candidate to win Wisconsin in a presidential election since 1952.
Verdict: False
It had been 32 years, not 64 years, since Republicans took Wisconsin in a presidential election.
Fact Check:
Trump visited Wisconsin Thursday to break ground on the construction of a manufacturing plant that could provide as many as 13,000 jobs. “I’m thrilled to be here in the Badger State with the hardworking men and women of Foxconn working with you,” Trump told an audience in Mount Pleasant.
He reminisced about his electoral victory in the state during the speech. “You know, I just realized the other day, they told me – when we won the state of Wisconsin, it hadn’t been won by a Republican since Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952,” said Trump.
“Did you know that? And I won Wisconsin. And I like Wisconsin a lot, but we won Wisconsin. And Ronald Reagan – remember, Wisconsin was the state that Ronald Reagan did not win. And that was in 1952.”
President Ronald Reagan lost only one state in his re-election campaign in 1984, but it wasn’t Wisconsin – he lost Minnesota. Reagan won Wisconsin in 1980, as well as 1984.
Besides Trump, two other Republicans have taken Wisconsin since 1952, including President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who won the state not only in 1952, but also in 1956 when he came up for re-election.
President Richard Nixon actually took Wisconsin three times: twice in his successful election and re-election campaigns, and once in his failed bid against Democrat John F. Kennedy in 1960.
Although Trump exaggerated how long it had been since a Republican clinched a victory in the state, his campaign did break part of the “blue wall” – Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – that Democrats had held for quite some time. Not a single Republican candidate had taken Wisconsin in 32 years.
Here are all the winners of presidential elections in the state dating back to Eisenhower:
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