Memphis, TN-MS-AR · the strongest Democratic and Republican presidential performances recorded here, measured three ways.
1892–2024 · 34 presidential cycles
Highest vote share
Largest share of the presidential candidate vote cast here.
Democratic
Franklin D. Roosevelt1936
96.9%
75,769 votes · D+93.9
Runner-up · Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1940 · 90.2%
Republican
Richard Nixon1972
66.2%
196,837 votes · R+34.5
Runner-up · George H. W. Bush, 1988 · 52.1%
Most votes
Largest number of votes cast for the party’s presidential nominee here.
Democratic
Barack Obama2008
321,271votes
56.4% of the vote · D+13.5
Runner-up · Joe Biden, 2020 · 313,247 votes
Republican
John McCain2008
244,375votes
42.9% of the vote · D+13.5
Runner-up · George W. Bush, 2004 · 240,167 votes
Best relative to the U.S.
This Place’s margin against the national margin in the same election — positive when it leaned toward the party more than the country did.
Democratic
Alton B. Parker1904
+71.2pts D vs U.S.
Place D+51.6 · U.S. R+19.7
Runner-up · Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1940 · +70.6 pts
Republican
Barry Goldwater1964
+21.1pts R vs U.S.
Place D+1.4 · U.S. D+22.6
Runner-up · Richard Nixon, 1972 · +11.3 pts
U.S. House elections · 3 House
Senate and governor results are in the Office selector at the top of this page.
U.S. House
On a multi-state Place, each row sums votes cast in the separate U.S. House races held inside the Place that year. It is a geographic vote total, not one contest or a seat tally.
Some U.S. House rows cover a contest held in only part of this Place — the votes are real, but the total is not place-wide because the rest of the Place had no such race that year.
Memphis, TN-MS-AR · how this place’s counties split between candidates in each party’s presidential nominating contest, cycle by cycle. A primary is a contest inside one party, so it has no Democratic–Republican margin and is not part of the general-election record above.
Akashic reports votes cast, not delegates awarded. The two can disagree: Clinton led the 2008 national primary popular vote by less than half a point and did not win the nomination.
Primary returns are published at county grain and there is no roll-up above it. Each cell counts how many of this place’s counties a candidate led — a count of records, not a vote total. Who led the place as a whole is not knowable from these returns, because county rows carry a leader and a lead but no per-candidate votes.
Presidential nominating contests in Memphis, TN-MS-AR, by party and cycle.
Party
2008
2012
2016
2020
2024
Democratic
Obama6Clinton3131,657 votes · 9 of 9 countiesprimary
○no contest record — Akashic holds no result for that party and cycle here. It is not a claim that no contest was held. Telling apart a contest that was cancelled, one that went uncontested, and one simply not yet ingested needs a nominating-contest calendar, which is a separate ingest from results and does not exist yet.
Republican presidential primaries are not yet ingested — the Republican series runs from 1856 and is in scope. The row is kept so its absence is visible: a Democratic-only panel would otherwise read as though no one else held a contest.
Akashic carries 10 states for 2012 and 3 states for 2024. Cycles in which an incumbent president seeks renomination are thin by nature — few states run a contested primary — so a sparse column is politics, not a hole in the record.
County returns carry a leader and a lead over the runner-up, and nothing more. The full candidate field with vote shares is published at state grain — follow a cycle above to the state contest for it.
voter registration
Registered voters
Total registered voters, over time
Registered voters
† Some years predate full county coverage; a flagged year sums only the counties reporting it.
Voter registration in Memphis, TN-MS-AR
Year
Total registered
2016 (partial)
800,570
2018
846,365
2020
879,025
2022
885,715
2024
912,694
domestic migration
Who moves in and out
Net domestic migration over time
−10,302 net domestic migration · 2025
20112025
Net −87,658 over 2011–2025 · gain loss
Domestic migration in Memphis, TN-MS-AR in Memphis, TN-MS-AR: net domestic migration by year
Year
Net domestic migration
2011
−3,360
2012
−1,900
2013
−8,462
2014
−7,741
2015
−7,600
2016
−6,443
2017
−5,269
2018
−3,492
2019
−3,449
2021
−5,289
2022
−5,924
2023
−8,479
2024
−9,948
2025
−10,302
The Memphis metro straddles Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas, with Shelby County's dense urban core driving reliably Democratic presidential margins above 60% even as surrounding exurban and rural counties trend sharply Republican.
Across the recorded series it reached a Democratic high of 93.9 points in 1936 and a Republican high of 34.5 points in 1972. Between 2020 and 2024 the metro moved 6.7 points toward the Republican candidate; the 2024 margin was 6.5 points.
A population of 1,341,924, a 40% non-Hispanic-white share, and a median household income of $67,403 describe the metro. The metro's voting pattern over the last decade is most similar to that of Columbus, GA-AL and Columbia, SC.
Akashic
Political twins — metros
The metros whose fingerprint — 2000–2024 trajectory, demographics, ancestry, religion — sits closest to this one, and why.
Twin score (0–100) = weighted cosine between tier-standardized fingerprints: presidential margins 2000–2024 with 12-yr trend and elasticity, ACS income, age, education, population and race, top reported ancestries, and religious adherence — chips name the closest-shared dimensions and the widest gap. Re-weight the groups in the twins explorer.
Compare two places, side by side
Twelve curated comparisons line up election history, demographics, and the divergence story for two places at a glance. Browse all comparisons →
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All citations released under CC BY 4.0. Attribution: Akashic Intelligence.
Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi. Akashic. https://akashic.app/cbsa/32820/. Accessed May 20, 2026. License: CC BY 4.0.
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How did Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi vote in 2024?
In 2024, Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi voted Democratic by 6.5 points (D+6.5), carried by the Democratic candidate. Out of 505,081 votes cast, 264,640 went Democratic and 231,564 went Republican.
When did Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi last vote Republican?
The most recent presidential election in which Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi voted Republican was 1988.
How many people live in Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi?
Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi has a population of 1,341,924 according to the 2024 American Community Survey 5-year estimates from the US Census Bureau.
What is the median household income in Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi?
Median household income in Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi is $67,403 — below the national median of $80,734. The Mississippi state median is $60,773.
What is the political history of Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi?
Akashic tracks 34 presidential elections in Memphis, TN-MS-AR, Mississippi from 1892 to 2024. Of those, 29 went Democratic and 3 went Republican.
