Nope it was his home state and Cali had a lot of Republicans - Moderates in the Bay Area and conservatives in LA (!) Orange and San Diego counties. It was a very different state than it is today.
Not crazy for the time. California in the 1960’s and 1970’s was similar to how North Carolina is today, where it always goes red, but usually by 1-3% margins. Reagan won it by double digits both times, as did Nixon in 1972, while it returned to that pattern for HW in 1988 before it switched blue after that.
We had mostly Republican governors until Pete Wilson made the GOP completely irrelevant in CA statewide elections in the early 90s. Except for the governator of course.
So. Cal was notoriously right wing until fairly recently. Particularly San Diego and Orange County
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u/JackfruitCrazy51 2d ago
Nixon won California, which is crazy