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United States · Election results history · 1985
Election 1985 Results

Each election opens in its own mode: the forecast before the votes are counted, the live count while races are still too close to call, and the results once every race is decided.

1985 governor election results by state and county

Thomas H. Kean won re-election in New Jersey by 40 points in 1985, while Democrat Gerald L. Baliles kept Virginia's governorship in Democratic hands.

2 governor races were held in 1985. Democrats won 1 and Republicans 1.

The closest were Virginia (D+10.4) and New Jersey (R+40.3).

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Early projection, based on early and incomplete polling: the likely matchups, each weighted by the betting markets' odds of both nominations, not a result. Each county is its 2024 presidential margin moved by its state's projected swing; set a national vote and every state, district and county moves by the same amount from our projection. Colours run in 100 steps from a safe Republican to a safe Democratic margin. Boundaries: US Census Bureau.

About the 1985 governor elections

New Jersey and Virginia held governor elections in 1985, the first year of Ronald Reagan's second term. In New Jersey, Republican Governor Thomas H. Kean, who had won by about 1,800 votes four years earlier, beat Democrat Peter Shapiro by about 40 points, one of the largest margins in the state's history. Kean drew substantial support from Black voters and from traditionally Democratic urban areas. In Virginia, Democrat Gerald L. Baliles, the state attorney general, defeated Republican Wyatt B. Durrette by about ten points. On the same ballot, Virginians elected Democrat L. Douglas Wilder as lieutenant governor, the first Black candidate to win statewide office in Virginia, and Mary Sue Terry as attorney general. Neither governorship changed party. The pair of results showed that ticket splitting was common at the state level, with a popular Republican winning big in New Jersey while Virginia stayed with the Democrats.

Every race

StateDemocratVotesRepublicanVotesOthersMargin
New Jersey Peter Shapiro578,402 (29.3%) Thomas H. Kean1,372,631 (69.6%) 21,591 R+40.3
Virginia Gerald L. Baliles741,438 (55.2%) Wyatt B. Durrette601,649 (44.8%) 153 D+10.4

Margin: the Democrat's share of all votes minus the Republican's. Margins are Democrat minus Republican, of all votes. Certified results, from the states' own archives, the MIT Election Data and Science Lab, Heideman (2026) and Algara & Amlani (2021). By county: "As they were" draws each county as it stood on election day; "Today's" shares the old votes among today's counties by area. County boundaries: Newberry Library, Atlas of Historical County Boundaries (CC BY-NC-SA 2.5). How these results were checked.

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