1996 United States Senate election in Arkansas

Common card · No. 441986

The 1996 United States Senate election in Arkansas was held on November 5, 1996. Incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator David Pryor decided to retire. Republican Mike Huckabee initially ran for the open seat and won the Republican primary. However, he withdrew after taking the governorship and was subsequently replaced by Tim Hutchinson. Hutchinson went on to win the general election, becoming the first Republican to win a U.S. Senate seat in Arkansas since Reconstruction in 1872 and the first Republican to ever be popularly elected in the state. Hutchinson would later lose re-election in 2002 to David Pryor's son Mark. In the concurrent presidential election in Arkansas, Democrat Bill Clinton — a native Arkansan who had previously served as governor — defeated Republican Bob Dole. To date, this is the last time that Republicans flipped a Senate seat in a presidential election year despite losing the state in the concurrent presidential election.

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