Donald Trump had a superior electoral college strategy

By one measure, Wisconsin was the most important state in the nation in November. According to FiveThirtyEight’s tipping-point calculation, it was the state that put Donald Trump over the top to 270 electoral votes and the White House. (Or at least arguably it did: Pennsylvania has a competing tipping-point claim.

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The answer depends on how you handle faithless electors. Our tipping-point calculation works by lining up the states (and congressional districts in states that split their electoral votes) in order based on the margin separating the Republican and the Democratic candidates and counting up until you get to 270 electoral votes. Under some circumstances (see more detail here), there can be multiple tipping-point states. If you ignore the electors who voted for candidates other than Hillary Clinton and Trump, Wisconsin was the tipping-point state in 2016. If you account for faithless electors, then Wisconsin and Pennsylvania share the tipping-point designation.) So here’s an interesting question: How many times did Hillary Clinton visit Wisconsin during the general election? The answer: Zip, zilch, nada. She didn’t set foot in the Badger State after losing the Democratic primary there to Sen. Bernie Sanders in April.

Clinton was originally scheduled to hold a June 15 event in Green Bay, Wisconsin, but it was canceled after the shootings at an Orlando nightclub.

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