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Going into 1972, it seemed like no one could defeat Richard Nixon, as his he was wildly popular for opening up relations with China and a strong economy. However, many were still planning to challenge him. The most surprising thing was that Nixon had a major challenger in the Republican primaries in Pete McCloskey. McCloskey, a liberal from California, opposed the Vietnam war and the increasing conservatism of the Republican party. McCloskey promised that if he didn't recive 20% of the vote in New Hampshire, he'd drop out of the race. Fortunately for him, he received 20.12%[1] of the state's votes, and along with conservative candidate John M. Ashbrook, he held Nixon to 66% of the vote. The rest of the Republican primaries were uneventful, but, McCloskey did receive over 15% of the vote in several more states (even getting 30% of the vote (and several delegates) in Oregon) and Nixon was held to under 60% of the vote in his home state of California due in part to McCloskey running a solid campaign in the state, and Ashbrook spending most of his energy on the state's often right-wing voters in areas like Orange county. The strength of McCloskey's campaign terrified Nixon, and out of fear that he needed more moderate Republican support, he replaced conservative running mate Spiro Agnew with the more moderate John Connally. Interestingly, this backfired massively, as both conservatives (who wanted Agnew and were turned off by Connally's continued Democratic alliance) and liberals (who wanted New York Republican Nelson Rockefeller) opposed Connally's nomination, and it was almost blocked by the convention.

While the Republican nomination was chaotic, the Democrats were no better. John Lindsay, the former Republican (and Liberal) mayor of New York shocked the world by winning Arizona, segregationist governor George Wallace beat George McGovern and Hubert Humphrey in Wisconsin, Ed Muskie turned from future nominee to afterthought following a loss in Arizona and Nixon's campaign (supposedly) releasing the infamous "Canuck letter", and when it finally seemed like the Democrats were going to support Hubert Humphrey as an anti-George Wallace candidate, the former Vice President was assassinated in Maryland and the primaries were thrown into chaos with all sorts of candidates running in the remaining primaries and claiming delegates in the states Humphrey won following his assassination. Wallace was not given the nomination in the end, as John Lindsay took the mantle as the "anybody but Wallace" candidate as he was still in the race and the Democratic establishment was willing to nominate someone as politically irrelevant as Lindsay over a segregationist like Wallace (which was why McGovern was forced to endorse Humphrey).[2] Lindsay chose Arkansas representative Wilbur Mills as his running mate to appeal to the south after Wallace's defeat. Still, anger from conservatives was real in both parties.

With Agnew being kicked off the Republican ticket and Wallace supposedly being robbed of the nomination by the Democratic establishment, right-wingers were mad with both parties and the American Independent party planned to exploit that. However, the AIP failed to get its founder Wallace or Agnew to take the mantle of AIP nominee. Humphrey's assassination made Wallace rethink his policies and he moved to the left and refused to be nominated by the AIP. Meanwhile, Agnew knew that joining the AIP would be political suicide and it would be better if he ran for president in 1976 (as a Republican, most likley) instead. With this, the AIP was forced to nominate John Ashbrook to appeal to Republicans and far-right Louisiana representative John Rarick to appeal to Wallace voters (despite Rarick being the direct opposite of Wallace economically). Despite this, the ticket had support out west and looked like it could win the state of Idaho.

Despite the nomination of Connally and McCloskey's strong primary campaign, Nixon still had a massive advantage. John Lindsay was little-known outside of New York and was hated by McGovern supporters, who felt Lindsay was only nominated because the Democratic establishment made him drop out (despite the fact that McGovern didn't win a single primary and dropped out after losing to Wallace in Indiana), so many left-wingers were staying home or voting third party instead of Lindsay. Meanwhile, the Ashbrook campaign was poorly-run and only had the support of hard-right-wingers in the south and west. Still, Lindsay had some clout in the Northeast due to many liberal Republicans defecting just like Lindsay did and many in the Northeast not caring about McGovern's snub. This did lead to some Republican fear that Lindsay could take important electoral votes in New York, Minnesota, Illinois, and other important areas, thus causing a more competitive race. Time would tell if this fear was justified.



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While most expected Lindsay to over preform what was originally expected of him, he actually under preformed massively, and he even failed to win the heavily Democratic state of West Virginia due to many in the state feeling he had robbed their favored candidate, George Wallace and couldn't even win the entire state of Maine, as Maine's 1st congressional district (narrowly) went Republican) Meanwhile, the American Independent Party won Utah and nearly took Idaho. However, Nixon still won in a landslide and would end up having a very interesting second term. In Congress, the Democrats lost fifteen seats in the house, and the AIP and an independent both won individual seats. In the senate, the composition stayed the exact same, although longtime Republican senator Margret Chase Smith was defeated by William Hathaway in Maine. Despite a massive defeat, the Democrats held majorities in both houses of Congress, and would use that to continue to block Nixon's agenda.

[1] Our obvious POD, along with Lindsay winning Arizona
[2] Wallace doesn’t have the whole near-death experience that makes him change as much as soon. Humphrey’s death does rattle him somewhat but not as much.
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