The 2016 election revisited

Quillette has an interesting piece on the 2016 election.  The article includes a lot of discussion of Hillary Clinton’s rather disappointing performance among women voters, especially white women.  Then there’s this:

If the election were a referendum on Obama, as a politician or a symbol, one would expect his popularity to have declined over the course of the race — especially given how it ultimately turned out. Instead, Obama grew more popular throughout 2016, even as favorability for Trump and Hillary tanked. Two years into the Trump administration, Barack’s ratings continue to climb, with 66% of Americans offering a favorable opinion of him.

The “whitelash” theory also suggests a surge [in] white voting. Instead, participation among non-Hispanic whites was stagnant relative to 2012, and down from 2008. In fact, whites made up a smaller share of the electorate in 2016, while Hispanics and Asians made up a larger percentage of overall voters.

More damning: Trump actually won a smaller share of the white vote than Mitt Romney. He was nonetheless able to win because he won more Hispanics and Asians than his predecessors, and more black votes than any Republican since 2004.

Trump did win a number of less well-educated whites who had previously voted for Obama, but he also lost some better educated whites who had previously voted for Romney.  Overall, He did not do especially well among whites, and could not have won without holding his own among the various minorities, despite all his bigoted statements.  He was also helped by a lower turnout among black voters.

PS.  Let’s have a vote.  Which statement is more nuts:

LaVar Ball Claims Lonzo Ball Is Lakers Leader Even With LeBron James

or:

Trump says the US would be at war with North Korea by now if it weren’t for him

Decisions, decisions . . .

 


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9 Responses to “The 2016 election revisited”

  1. Gravatar of Raver Raver
    4. July 2018 at 18:05

    The second statement is crazier because clearly Dennis Rodman prevented that war.

  2. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    4. July 2018 at 22:12

    “Hillary Clinton’s rather disappointing performance among women voters, especially white women.”

    Depends on your baseline. She did better with them than Obama did.

    Trump is just BSing. Politicians do this all the time.

  3. Gravatar of John Handley John Handley
    5. July 2018 at 00:06

    Even if white people as a whole swung against the GOP in 2016, changes in how white people voted could have been the driving factor behind the election. It is crucial that non-college educated whites swung to Trump because they make up a large voting block in many of the states that flipped the electoral college. After all, (and unfortunately) the president is not elected by the popular vote.

  4. Gravatar of Randomize Randomize
    5. July 2018 at 07:57

    The demographic analysis is interesting but not all that important considering that Hillary took the majority vote by a decent margin. The more relevant discussion is why Pennsylvania and Ohio voters chose Trump.

  5. Gravatar of Scott Sumner Scott Sumner
    5. July 2018 at 14:27

    Harding:

    Trump fans:

    “It’s refreshing to see someone totally unlike other politicians”

    “He’s just like other politicians”

    John, Exactly.

  6. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    6. July 2018 at 22:08

    @Scott Sumner

    Trump doesn’t have wings or hooves; obviously he’s not entirely unlike other politicians. Neither is he entirely like other politicians. And I’m not a Trump fan.

  7. Gravatar of J Cox J Cox
    7. July 2018 at 13:40

    With respect to black people voting for Trump, there was a huge difference between black men (13%) and black women (4%), a far larger difference in proportionate terms than those between men and women of other races. I believe that for the black men who voted for Trump, the gender of the candidate played a more important role than the perceived racism of the candidate.

  8. Gravatar of Lorenzo from Oz Lorenzo from Oz
    8. July 2018 at 23:30

    Randomize: 48% is not a majority vote. Hillary won the plurality and did marginally (0.2%pts) better than the Democrats in the House of Representatives. The Donald won 46% and did 3%pts worse than the Democrats in the House of Representatives.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2016

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2016

    The most significant shift in votes in the election was a class on (working class to The Donald, high income voters to Hillary) but it was still relatively marginal. As non landslide elections tend to be

  9. Gravatar of Mark Z Mark Z
    14. July 2018 at 10:45

    Scott, I remember, during the 2016 election, saying in the comments that Trump’s comments and tweets wouldn’t likely hurt his turnout among minorities because any minorities liable to be offended (perhaps the vast majority) already would never vote for Trump (or pretty much any Republican) anyway.

    You called my comment “idiotic.”

    Now you note that Trump apparently did as well or better among minorities than his recent predecessors. I believe the phrase I’m looking for is “I told you so.”

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