1996_United_States_elections
The 1996 United States elections were held on November 5. 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.