It is harder to imagine the others candidates winning Wisconsin, Michigan or even Pennsylvania, none of which had voted Republican since Ronald Reagan was president.
Trump won non-college whites by nearly 40 points, including nearly three out of four white men without college degrees. He carried three Pennsylvania counties that went for Barack Obama in 2012. He did better than Romney in 58 of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties while Clinton did worse than in Obama in 65 of them.
“Mainstream Romney-Ryan conservatism, with its platform of deregulation, free trade and tax cuts isn’t popular with these voters,” said George Hawley, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Alabama, questioning whether it was popular enough in the country as a whole. Hawley made headlines for correctly predicting the presidential results in 48 out of 50 states.
Take away Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan and the Republican presidential ticket is down to 260 electoral votes. Subtract Ohio and the number falls to 242. Where would a non-Trump Republican make this up?
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