How Trump Lost
Donald Trump's campaign is running around the country
filing suits alleging election fraud and trying to stop the count and
certification of the vote in swing states. An undercurrent of racism is in the
claims as President Trump cites the heavily black cities of Milwaukee, Detroit,
Philadelphia, and Atlanta as the site of the shenanigans. He presents no
evidence except a few second-hand affidavits because any attempt to buttress
his arguments with numbers would show their falsity.
Pennsylvania
2020
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Pennsylvania |
6,917,613 |
9,089,901 |
76.1% |
Registered +4.2% Turnout +12.2% |
|
Philadelphia County Philadelphia |
741,377 |
1,129,399 |
65.6% |
Registered +2.4% Turnout +3.3% |
|
Allegheny County Pittsburgh |
722,033 |
942,360 |
76.6% |
Registered +1.9% Turnout +11.1% |
|
Montgomery County |
510,157 |
609,649 |
83.6% |
Registered +5.6% Turnout +17.3% |
2016
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Pennsylvania |
6,165,478 |
8,722,977 |
70.1% |
|
|
Philadelphia
County |
717,631 |
1,102,560 |
65.1% |
|
|
Allegheny
County |
650,114 |
924,631 |
70.3% |
|
|
Montgomery
County |
434,687 |
577418 |
75.3% |
|
Clinton lost Pennsylvania to
Trump by 49,941 votes in 2016. Biden beat Trump by 81,654. That's a swing of
131,595 from Clinton to Biden. Given that Philadelphia had only an extra 3.3%
(23,746 voters), compared to a statewide voter increase of 12.2% (752,135
voters), it is hard to make a case for massive voting fraud by double-counting
ballots in the City of Brotherly Love. Since
Biden's margin over Trump in Philadelphia was 4,227 votes smaller than
Hillary's, it's clear that the former Vice-President's victory did not come
from Philadelphia. That 4,227 vote deficit even had to be made up elsewhere in
Pennsylvania for Biden to win.
So, if Biden was running
behind Hillary in Philly, how did he carry Pennsylvania? In the suburbs.
Clinton carried Montgomery County in 2016 by 93,351. Biden carried it by
134,051. Philadelphia County is 45% white with a median household income of
$30,000. Montgomery County is 86% white with double Philadelphia's median
household income ‒ $60,000. Of the 131,595 vote swing to Biden in Pennsylvania, 40,700
or 31% came from Montgomery County, not from repeated scanning of the same
ballots in Philadelphia.
Michigan
Was Pennsylvania an anomaly? The
same allegations of massive fraud, running ballots through counting machines
several times, and denial of adequate access to poll watchers to monitor the
count (they were required to remain 6 ft. away) were made in Michigan, with
special emphasis on Detroit.
Michigan
2020
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Michigan |
5,539,302 |
8,061,525 |
68.7% |
Registered +7.3%% Turnout +13.6% |
|
Wayne County (Detroit) |
878,102 |
1,398,888 |
62.7% |
Registered +3.1% Turnout +9.4% |
2016
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Michigan |
4,874,619 |
7,514,055 |
64.8% |
|
|
Wayne County (Detroit) |
802,195 |
1,355,794 |
59.1% |
|
In Michigan, Biden beat Trump
by 154,188 compared to Clinton's loss by 10,701. That's a swing of 164,890.
Wayne County chipped in 42,166 of Biden's gain, which is about 50% more than
would be expected based solely on the number of registered voters, but
reasonable given the preponderance of black support for Biden. The increase in
registered voters and turnout for Wayne County is still significantly lower
than the rest of Michigan. That Wayne County's turnout was 6% lower than the
state as a whole is not an indication of massive electoral fraud, counting the
same ballot multiple times, or inserting "backdated" ballots into the
mix.
Clinton carried Wayne County with 65.8% of the vote. Biden got
72.1%. Even assuming that every Biden vote over Clinton's 65.8% was fraudulent,
that would come to 12,537 votes, not enough to explain Biden's 155,188 vote
win. Wayne County is 52% white with a median household income of $39,000.
Wisconsin
2020
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Wisconsin |
3,298,041 |
3,684,762 |
89.5% |
Registered +3.5% Turnout +9.7% |
|
Milwaukee County |
459,723 |
557,089 |
82.5% |
Registered -0.8% Turnout +4.2% |
2016
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Wisconsin |
3,004,041 |
3,558,877 |
84.4% |
|
|
Milwaukee County |
441,053 |
561,965 |
78.5% |
|
Like Pennsylvania and Michigan, the big, heavily black
urban area in Wisconsin saw smaller increases in registered voters and turned
in fewer ballots cast, proportionately, than the rest of its state. These
numbers are not an argument for fraud in these heavily Democratic counties.
In 2016, Trump carried Wisconsin by 23,758. Biden won it
with 20,608 for a swing of 44,366. Clinton carried Milwaukee County by 162,753
compared to Biden's 183,045. Just to demonstrate how precise and subtle voters
can be, if Biden had lost the 20,310 votes by which he beat Hillary's total
four years earlier, Biden still would have won Wisconsin by 308 votes, proving
that Biden's victory did not come from Milwaukee. Turnout in Wisconsin
increased by 9.7%, but by only 4.2% in Milwaukee. Again, proof of voting
irregularities in Wisconsin's biggest, blackest city is lacking.
Georgia
2020
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Georgia |
5,000,551 |
7,233,584 |
69.1% |
Registered +15.4% Turnout +20.0% |
|
Fulton County |
524,659 |
808,742 |
64.9% |
Registered +6.3% Turnout +20.7% |
|
Dekalb County |
370,804 |
547,802 |
67.7% |
Registered +3.7% Turnout +16.3% |
2016
|
Location |
Votes Cast |
Registered |
Turnout |
|
|
Georgia |
4,165,405 |
6,266,123 |
66.4% |
|
|
Fulton County |
434,370 |
761,118 |
61.0% |
|
|
DeKalb County |
318,748 |
528,120 |
60.4% |
|
Georgia added a million new voters
since 2016. Automatic voter registration, combined with the fact that Georgia's
population is growing by about 100,000 people per year, helps explain the 20%
surge in turnout. In September 2016, Georgia instituted automatic voter
registration when people got driver's licenses. Also, Stacey Abrams' campaign
for Governor in 2018 registered thousands of previously unregistered people.
Abrams lost her bid for Governor in 2018 by only 54,723 votes. Of the million
new voters since 2016, two-thirds were people of color, and 22% were under age
35. Political scientists have noted for years that the changing demographics in
Georgia would make it a competitive state.
Atlanta is composed of Fulton
and part of DeKalb Counties. As in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, the
registration and voting patterns of the heavily minority metropolitan areas
mostly trailed the rest of their states. Fulton County is the only one where
the increase in turnout exceeded the statewide average ‒ by 0.7%, nearly
the same.
Hillary lost Georgia by 211,141,
and Biden squeaked to victory by 12,670. That's a swing of 223,811 votes.
Fulton and DeKalb Counties added 142,355 to the total vote between 2016 and
2020, a good chunk of the million extra, but less than their proper proportion. Fulton and DeKalb are 18.7% of the registered
voters in Georgia but have produced only 14.7% of the vote increase since
2016. Biden carried Fulton and DeKalb
Counties by 114,558 more votes than Hillary received, just over half of what
Biden needed to capture Georgia. Again, not an argument for double counting or
any fraudulent activity in Fulton and DeKalb. Non-Hispanic whites are a bare
majority of Georgia residents.
Like Pennsylvania, Michigan,
and Wisconsin, it is in the suburbs, like Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, that
the reasons for Trump's loss should be sought.
Arizona
Arizona
voted for a Democratic candidate for president for only the second time in the
72 years since 1948. A medium-sized state, it is solidly Republican, having
punched way above its weight by having produced two presidential nominees in
the past fifteen elections. Arizona has about 2% of the United States's
population but produced 14% of the Republican candidates for president in the
past 60 years. Arizona was the last of the 48 continental states to be admitted
to the Union, in 1912, 108 years ago.
At the legislative hearing staged by Republicans to cast
doubt on Biden's win, one person alleged that there were 200,000 - 300,000
phantom voters. Inflated voting rolls are unlikely given that Arizona's turnout
of voting age population was lower than 30 other states.
Two more likely causes of Republican Trump's almost
unprecedented defeat in Arizona is the reverse coattails of Astronaut
Senator-elect Mark Kelly, the husband of Representative Gabriel Giffords, who
was shot by a would-be assassin in 2011 at a constituent event, and Cindy
McCain, the wife of 2008 Republican presidential candidate and Vietnam War
P.O.W. John McCain's endorsement of Joe Biden for president. President Trump
had impugned the bravery and heroism of McCain's wartime service and ordeal by
saying on C-SPAN a month after his presidential announcement, "He's a war
hero because he was captured. I like people that weren't captured." Such a
comment coming from someone whose bone spurs in his feet prevented him from
wartime military service might easily explain his narrow loss in Arizona.
Collateral Confirmation of Trump's Defeat
Presidential
elections are not just about electing a president; they are also about electing
a government. In presidential years, all 435 members of the House of
Representatives and one-third of the Senate are also elected.
This election, even more than
the 2016 election, was not about a choice between two unpopular candidates but
about the voters trying to figure out some way to get the two parties to stop
bickering. With the emergence of the coronavirus pandemic health crisis and the
concomitant multi-trillion dollar deficits, a properly functioning government
working together is urgent and necessary for the nation's physical and economic
health.
When the country is closely divided, a divided government
is to be expected. Historically, the president's party gains House seats in a
presidential year. It's called coattails. The president's party gained seats in
every presidential election[1]
from 1920 to 1952. In 1956 the
Republicans lost seats on the heels of Eisenhower's re-election, and the
Democrats lost seats when Kennedy won. Then the old pattern of presidential
party gains reappeared from Lyndon Johnson's 1964 landslide until Ronald
Reagan's re-election in 1984. In the nine elections since 1988, however, the
presidential victor's party has lost House seats in six of the nine elections,
whereas it lost seats only twice in the previous twenty-one elections.
Because the real source of
the bickering in Congress is structural, gerrymandered districts where the only
threat to most legislators' re-election now comes from primary challenges from
the fringes of their party, voters are now forced to compensate in every
election in order to keep the extremists on both sides in check.
After winning an extra 41
seats in the off-year election of 2018 as a check on President Trump, the
voters now took back 13 to weakened the Democrats in the House to punish them
for the impeachment. On the basis of recent history showing the party of the
winning presidential candidate more likely to lose seats in the House, the Democrats
would have been expected to maintain or increase their hold if Trump was the
intended victor.
The voters also weakened the
Republicans in the Senate. These results demonstrate voter dissatisfaction with
both parties in Congress. They are trying to make the two legislative branches
as evenly balanced as possible because that increases the power of each
individual legislator. If the defection of a few representatives on either side
can deprive the leadership of its majority, then the consensus of both parties
will be necessary to get anything done.
The two Georgia Senate
run-off elections fortuitously gave the voters the opportunity to know who won
the White House before deciding who controls the Senate. With Biden's victory,
the two Senate seats should at least split, leaving the Republicans barely in
control.
Trump's Missing Concession
Trump
is refusing to concede for two reasons. He is trying to reverse the outcome of
the election and to avoid personal humiliation.
Trump rose to fame on the Apprentice television show. Contestants vied for positions, where
the ultimate put down was "you're fired." Trump's fragile ego
couldn't handle a headline of a "You're Fired" above his picture in
the newspaper the day after if he lost. By not conceding his defeat, the debate
is over whether he lost, not why.
Trump is also trying to replicate George W. Bush's 2000
playbook of stopping the vote count and certification of the election and being
declared the victor in the courts.
Trump's refusal to concede has been both beneficial and
detrimental. On the plus side, he is teaching Americans how the electoral
system works. A generation of people is learning about county clerks,
secretaries of state, boards of elections, certifications, challenges,
electors, and myriad other details of conducting elections that usually get no
attention.
On the negative side, the
time between Election Day and Inauguration Day is usually spent trying to
understand the election so the people can plan for the future.
Trump's Tragedy
The tragedy of Donald Trump's
administration is that he never understood the job. He could have been a good
president if he had understood it. During the 2016 campaign, he ran as a
builder. Even people who disagreed with his race-baiting and boorish behavior
expected him to pave the roads, build bridges, and repair the infrastructure.
Instead, he tried to build a
wall while tearing down the institutions of government, unilaterally pulling
out of deals that had been approved by Congress, and staffing the federal
agencies with people who opposed the functions of the departments which they
were charged with overseeing.
The United States is a great
country, and being president is a high honor. Everything that the government
had done before Trump's election was not a mistake. Trump's contempt for
democratic norms during his administration, and especially in the aftermath of
his loss, is an insult to the integrity and wisdom of the American people.
The Real Problem - An
Ossified Gerontocracy Presiding Over A Collapsing Empire
The real problem is not Donald Trump, who did some good in
shaking up the establishment in Washington, the
Republican Party, and the media.
The problem is that Donald Trump is 75 years old and is
being succeeded by a president who is 78. Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the
House, is 80 (although I think she will be deposed by the new Congress). And
Mitch McConnell, the Senate Majority leader, is 78.
It reminds me of the Soviet Union in the early 1980s with
Brezhnev, Chernenko, and Andropov, elderly, ailing gentlemen. Gerontocracies
are a sign of a political system impervious to change. Those in power remain in
power, and the government serves their interests. Unable to change and adapt to
changed circumstances, the only option is collapse, which happened to the
Soviet Union.
A political system that costs $1 billion to be elected
president and millions upon millions to win lesser offices is not a democracy.
The only people who can get elected to public office today are millionaires of
independent means who can buy party nominations and lawyers who can protect
their own interests in a corrupt political process.
No wonder the government is running a fiscal deficit of
15.2% of GDP, the highest since the end of World War II. The record of the past
four years is one that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats can be proud
of. That's why, given what they had to work with, the voters turned out in
droves to make both parties lose.
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