So, what the heck happened in Ohio?
After years of being a very tight, bell-weather State, in 2016, Trump crafted a commanding victory in Ohio, winning by a whopping 8%, or 447,000 votes. Ohio has voted for the winner in every presidential election since 1964, so it is the very definition of a swing state. JFK was the last president to lose Ohio and win. So, what about 2020?
Over the last several elections, voter turnout has been about the same, 5.2 million votes case.
Obama won Ohio in 2008 by 4% (207,000 votes) and only 1.9% in 2012 (130,000 votes). Bush won Ohio in 2004 by 1.2%. Total voter turnout in 2008 was about 5.2 million and Obama won by 207,000 votes.
The population increased by about 150,000 from 2010 to 2018, which oddly did not change the number of voters. So, what accounted for a switch in loyalty of 577,000 votes?
The Trump strategy worked perfectly in Ohio. His base showed up, but the only way for this large of a flip to have happened is that hundreds of thousands of voters who voted Democrat had to have switched sides. Voters in the Democrat’s strongholds voted at lower rates, but that would not be enough to reach this huge vote change.
In reality, Ohio liked Trump and people from all walks of life, rural, suburban and even urban appear to have voted for him, many switching sides from 2012 to 2016. The vote differential is just too high for any other conclusion. This is a great analysis. https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/politics/2016/11/09/how-trump-won-ohio/93560164/
It will be a big challenge for the Dems to turn Ohio, but if they can flip Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin back to blue and keep all of their States in line, Biden could be the first president since Kennedy to win without winning Ohio or Florida. See my next post.
Author of five novels available on Amazon, numerous articles and other commentary.