Memphis · 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
91.4%
123,302 votes · D+83.1
Runner-up · Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1932 · 86.2%
Republican
Richard Nixon1972
67.6%
291,851 votes · R+37.3
Runner-up · Ronald Reagan, 1984 · 52.1%
Most votes
Largest number of votes cast for the party’s presidential nominee here.
Democratic
Barack Obama2008
408,216votes
53.6% of the vote · D+8.0
Runner-up · Joe Biden, 2020 · 379,441 votes
Republican
Donald Trump2020
353,857votes
47.4% of the vote · D+3.4
Runner-up · John McCain, 2008 · 347,271 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
John W. Davis1924
+70.0pts D vs U.S.
Place D+44.9 · U.S. R+25.2
Runner-up · Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1940 · +61.9 pts
Republican
Barry Goldwater1964
+22.0pts R vs U.S.
Place D+0.6 · U.S. D+22.6
Runner-up · Richard Nixon, 1972 · +14.1 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 · 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, by party and cycle.
Party
2008
2012
2016
2020
2024
Democratic
Clinton14Obama14191,066 votes · 28 of 28 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.
Where a cell reads All others, no named candidate led — the source’s residual bucket did. That bucket holds every name past the ones the contest itemises, including candidates who had withdrawn but still drew votes. It is a total, not a person, so it carries no candidate colour.
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
Year
Total registered
2016 (partial)
1,022,935
2018
1,142,233
2020
1,175,153
2022
1,167,491
2024
1,201,764
domestic migration
Who moves in and out
Net domestic migration over time
−12,431 net domestic migration · 2025
20112025
Net −126,507 over 2011–2025 · gain loss
Domestic migration in Memphis in Memphis: net domestic migration by year
Year
Net domestic migration
2011
−6,039
2012
−3,850
2013
−11,194
2014
−11,555
2015
−11,193
2016
−11,973
2017
−7,654
2018
−9,143
2019
−7,023
2021
−6,519
2022
−7,846
2023
−9,029
2024
−11,058
2025
−12,431
The Memphis media market anchors Tennessee's western tip and pulls in corners of Arkansas and Mississippi, making it a rare cross-state audience zone where urban Democratic concentration meets competitive suburban counties just across the state line.
Across the recorded series it reached a Democratic high of 83.1 points in 1936 and a Republican high of 37.3 points in 1972. Between 2020 and 2024 the market moved 7.2 points toward the Republican candidate; the 2024 margin was 3.8 points.
A population of 1,798,678, a 46% non-Hispanic-white share, and a median household income of $63,269 describe the market. The market's voting pattern over the last decade is most similar to that of Columbia, SC and Jackson, MS.
Akashic
Political twins — media markets
The media markets 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, Mississippi. Akashic. https://akashic.app/dma/640/. Accessed May 20, 2026. License: CC BY 4.0.
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In 2024, Memphis, Mississippi voted Republican by 3.8 points (R+3.8), carried by the Republican candidate. Out of 676,018 votes cast, 319,766 went Democratic and 345,345 went Republican.
When did Memphis, Mississippi last vote Democratic?
The most recent presidential election in which Memphis, Mississippi voted Democratic was 2020.
How many people live in Memphis, Mississippi?
Memphis, Mississippi has a population of 1,798,678 according to the 2024 American Community Survey 5-year estimates from the US Census Bureau.
What is the median household income in Memphis, Mississippi?
Median household income in Memphis, Mississippi is $63,269 — below the national median of $80,734. The Mississippi state median is $56,447.
What is the political history of Memphis, Mississippi?
Akashic tracks 34 presidential elections in Memphis, Mississippi from 1892 to 2024. Of those, 29 went Democratic and 4 went Republican.
