They were always swing states, it's just funny how their characterizations have changed. In 2012, they were too cosmopolitan and enlightened to vote for a barbaric and Southernized GOP; now they're "WWC" wastelands stuck in the 1950s, toiling away complaining about NAFTA. Same states both times, of course, and Trump kept most of the traditional coalition in tact in all of those states ... he added voters, but he didn't lose them like everyone is claiming:
SUBURBS:
MI: Trump 53%-42%
OH: Trump 57%-37%
WI: Trump 55%-39%
TOP INCOME BRACKET
MI: Trump 51%-43%
OH: Trump 57%-39%
WI: Trump 50%-44%
WHITE COLLEGE GRADS:
MI: Trump 51%-43%
OH: Trump 59%-34%
WI: Clinton 53%-41%
There were obviously some unusual trends in this election, but Trump (largely) dominated traditional GOP demographics in these states, as WELL as adding new voters who hadn't voted Republican in the past ... so maybe, just maybe, this was less of a realignment and more of a case of the Democrats nominating a God-awful nominee who couldn't excite the party's own voters, much less attract enough new ones.
This.
I'm always skeptical of trends in the Rust Belt. It always seems to shift toward the party out of power. That being said, Hillary Clinton was a uniquely poor fit for it, so who who knows if this is the new normal, or just a one-off. The Rust Belt as a whole is a pretty elastic region.
