Like the rest of Northern Virginia, Fredericksburg has trended strongly Democratic in the early 21st century. In the 2008 presidential election, voters in Fredericksburg gave Barack Obama a total of 63.6% of the vote. Only Arlington County, Alexandria, and Falls Church in Northern Virginia had a higher percentage of votes for Obama. No Republican presidential candidate has carried Fredericksburg since George H.W. Bush did so in 1988. In the 2016 presidential election, then-candidate Donald Trump garnered the lowest percentage of the city's vote for any Republican candidate since 1936; about two percent fewer votes were garnered in 2020.