Recent statements by GOP operatives - meant to discourage Donald Trump from launching an independent campaign if he fails to take the party's 2016 presidential nomination - have repeated the claim that Ross Perot's first presidential bid gave the White House to Bill Clinton. But according to conservative magazine The American Spectator , the 1992 candidacy of Dallas' chart-loving billionaire actually saved Bush the Elder from suffering the worst re-election defeat of a Republican president since Franklin Roosevelt cleaned Herbert Hoover's clock in 1932: On September 30 - the last day before Perot re-entered the race - Clinton led Bush by an 11-point margin, at 49-38 percent, with Perot taking six percent.