What Would Have Been Necessary for Clinton to Win Texas in 2016?
On his Facebook News Feed, Michael Li posted this “imagined” map of the 2016 presidential election, speculating what would have happened if Hillary Clinton had “flipped” Texas. He indicated that it wouldn’t have been easy and that he is less optimistic about Texas turning Blue than other people. Anyway, what would have changed the outcome? First the basics: Clinton lost to Trump by 807,179 votes out of 8,969,266 votes cast. Here’s a chart of voting eligible population and what they did in Texas in 2016: Obviously, there were plenty of people who were registered to vote but did not vote—6.1 million. Now, using the exit polls, what would have had to change for Clinton to win? There are two ways to increase a candidate’s share of the vote: (1) increase the percentage of a category in the electorate that is likely to support your candidacy. For example, if females are more likely to support you, then increase the turnout of females so that they become a larger ...