Actually, Republicans finally put up someone who could play here, that’s what happened, and it was obvious from day one.
Hillary actually didn’t underperform nearly as badly as I expected her too, but Trump got 300k + voters to show up and vote for him that had not shown up, let alone voted R! He crushed her by simply dumping stupid policies that R’s had made dogma to their party, and their backers would NEVER let them separate from.
The Upper Midwest should have gone Republican, just like the south a LONG time ago, but because Republicans continued to embrace globalist policies like Open Borders and more importantly “Free Trade” there was absolutely no motivation for D’s to switch.. they would just stay home, and not vote at all.
Trump played large ball from day one, and so many people just flat out either refused to recognize it, or was so focused on the small ball nonsense, that has pretty much defined every election since 2000.. they couldn’t see it.
Trump was swinging for the fences, and had he not been for that tape, Trump would have probably gotten another 50 EC votes or so.. .certainly would have taken MN, and NH, and would have flipped other states no one would have imagined.
MN is the most amazing story of election night in my opinion.... Trump nearly took MN! MN! the state that is famous for voting for Mondale! That’s incredible.
PA flipped, because republicans FINALLY had a candidate who could play here... nothing more complicated than that....
Some PA midstaters have been called "dumb Dutchmen" but they are smart enough to recognize Romney and his ilk as Øbama-lite.
This time there was no reason to stay home.