Can Trump swing Pennsylvania in the general election?

[Ljube]

People here need to realize that TRUMP will only campaign in high reward states. I mean, he is not wasting any more time on Iowa.

The math is clear. All he needs are Romney states (all sure thing), Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Therefore, Pennsylvania is key for TRUMP's overall election success.

Beside these three states, he will campaign in Michigan, New York, Wisconsin (maybe) and Minnesota (maybe). Other than these states, he will not campaign in any. Virginia, Colorado, New Hampshire - fool's gold all. Nevada - winnable, but too small.

[Ljube]

Although it is unlikely I could see Trump narrowly winning the popular vote and losing the electoral college if it's a close election. I think that currently, and ironically, Democrats have a slight advantage in the electoral college. I could see, for example, Trump doing really well in many safe Republican states and narrowly losing certain swing states.

On the contrary. It is far more likely for TRUMP to LOSE the popular vote and WIN the Electoral College.

Remember, TRUMP picks up traditional Dem constituencies (working class whites and working class any color) compared to your generic R, but loses a lot of Establishment R types. So I can see TRUMP losing a lot of votes in places like California, New York, Texas, Arizona and still losing/winning the same states a generic R would. TRUMP will lose Virginia and similar states badly. But he will compensate for it in Pennsylvania and similar states.

[Ljube]

Anyone who answers yes is oblivious to the cencus demographics, previous voting trends and there literally being no reasonable way to make the numbers work for Trumps favor.

Trump will never, ever, swing PA in '16. You can't just pull the "whites love Trump!" card as anecdotal evidence to come to the conclusion he somehow wins statewide. He literally has no reasonable path with the numbers & demographics to win >50% of votes cast in the state.

Tell me, are you always this low energy?

I'll bite.

Nothing in regards to energy, just stating some facts, friend.

How do you know this?
Remember where TRUMP was back in June/July? Everybody was making fun of his candidacy.
His favorables were awful.

And behold where he is now!

What makes you think he won't do it again in the general?

[Ljube]

Anyone who answers yes is oblivious to the cencus demographics, previous voting trends and there literally being no reasonable way to make the numbers work for Trumps favor.

Trump will never, ever, swing PA in '16. You can't just pull the "whites love Trump!" card as anecdotal evidence to come to the conclusion he somehow wins statewide. He literally has no reasonable path with the numbers & demographics to win >50% of votes cast in the state.

Tell me, are you always this low energy?

I'll bite.

Nothing in regards to energy, just stating some facts, friend.

How do you know this?
Remember where TRUMP was back in June/July? Everybody was making fun of his candidacy.
His favorables were awful.

And behold where he is now!

What makes you think he won't do it again in the general?

His favorables were awful in a highly conservative Republican primary and party which he has turned around appealing with red meat to white uneducated primary voters. General is a completely different story.

And favorability aside, with Trumps hit in Latinos & Asians & college educated whites, he would need nearly 69% of the uneducated whites (with a massive turnout) and 10% of the black vote to even tip PA with razer thin margins. 69% of the uneducated white vote, with a 5-7%+ turnout bump and blacks running to Trump with lack of turnout is not happening. 69% of uneducated whites is not happening. Romney ran up records with 62% of uneducated whites at a 57% vote (this model uses a 65% turnout + the massive boost to even get the state to flip)

Romney is not a good fit for uneducated white voters.
Besides, TRUMP's new uneducated whites come only partly from first time voters, but mostly from former Dem voters. These union workers hated Romney and LOVE TRUMP.

They hate Hillary too.

[Ljube]

Again, you're underestimating how large a 7% change is for such a large demographic.

If Trump wins 69-70% of the uneducated white vote (absolutely not showing in any polling or anything whatsoever, he is trailing by larger margins than Romney in just about all opinion and polling releases) with a 5-7% turnout increase then I'll owe you a couple hundred bucks. That is a massive, massive sway in an election. It isn't reasonable.

Well, if that happens, we will spend that money on celebration.

[Ljube]

Literally 95% of the Republican vote in Pennsylvania comes from whites already.

If Bush couldn't win it 2004 with 2.8 million votes and 48.4% of the vote, the peak Republican performance in both raw votes and percentage, after 9/11 and tax cuts, then Trump sure as hell isn't winning it by trying to go deeper with Romney's strategy of maxing out a shrinking pool of older white working class voters.

Republicans can get 47% - 48% off the bat, it's surpassing 49% and winning with a plurality or taking a majority outright that they have trouble with. 2.9 million votes and ~51% is basically the Democrats' floor considering inelasticity of the state.

Republicans need to massively improve in Philadephia's and Pittsburgh's suburbs (but especially Philly's), where there are more minorities and college-educated whites. Trump is not the candidate to do that, and his strategy will fall flat just like Romney's.

I'm sure the Democrats would love him to waste resources in Pennsylvania instead of Florida, Virginia, Colorado, and Ohio though.

Virginia and Colorado are probably unwinnable for TRUMP. Therefore, investing in Pennsylvania is not wasting resources.

As I already posted, TRUMP will get new votes from union workers who voted for Obama in 2012. These votes are worth more, as they count twice.
He will also get a large percentage of blacks, also worth two votes each (more than 10%).

The white elite from the suburbs is a problem and here I'm betting they eventually fall in line and vote TRUMP too.

[Ljube]

Literally 95% of the Republican vote in Pennsylvania comes from whites already.

If Bush couldn't win it 2004 with 2.8 million votes and 48.4% of the vote, the peak Republican performance in both raw votes and percentage, after 9/11 and tax cuts, then Trump sure as hell isn't winning it by trying to go deeper with Romney's strategy of maxing out a shrinking pool of older white working class voters.

Republicans can get 47% - 48% off the bat, it's surpassing 49% and winning with a plurality or taking a majority outright that they have trouble with. 2.9 million votes and ~51% is basically the Democrats' floor considering inelasticity of the state.

Republicans need to massively improve in Philadephia's and Pittsburgh's suburbs (but especially Philly's), where there are more minorities and college-educated whites. Trump is not the candidate to do that, and his strategy will fall flat just like Romney's.

I'm sure the Democrats would love him to waste resources in Pennsylvania instead of Florida, Virginia, Colorado, and Ohio though.

Virginia and Colorado are probably unwinnable for TRUMP. Therefore, investing in Pennsylvania is not wasting resources.

As I already posted, TRUMP will get new votes from union workers who voted for Obama in 2012. These votes are worth more, as they count twice.
He will also get a large percentage of blacks, also worth two votes each (more than 10%).

The white elite from the suburbs is a problem and here I'm betting they eventually fall in line and vote TRUMP too.

There is literally no evidence that any of this is actually going to happen though.

Union members were 1,208,245 (5,753,546 votes * 21% of exit poll saying they were) and 57% (688,699) voted for Obama and 42% (507,463) voted for Romney.

Obama's margin of victory was 310,000 votes. Even if they had tied 50-50 amongst union members, that would only have cut Obama's margin by 85,000 votes. Still wins by 150,000 votes (2.9 million to 2.75 million, still less than Bush in 2004).

And blacks, you're just pulling out of thin air. But to entertain your fantasy, 13% of votes said they were black (748,000). 93% voted for Obama (696,000) and 5% for Romney (37,000).

Let's say those percentages were 84% (628,000, an awful showing for a Democrat) and 14% for Republicans (112,000).

Add those numbers to the 50-50 union showing and the Democrat still wins by 30,000 votes.

Trump has no path in Pennsylvania. The votes aren't there.

30000 votes is an awful small number of votes to claim this.
You're forgetting new voters who never voted and TRUMP's gonna turn them out (25% of his share I think in New Hampshire, which is some 2% overall).

[Ljube]

Hell no. The west and middle may swing slightly Republican, only for there to be a harsh swing to the left in the eastern part of the state and the Philly suburbs.

I can hardly imagine a harsher swing there than what already happened to Romney.

[Ljube]

Clarko, look, I'll let you crunch the numbers since you are obviously good at it, just keep an open mind.
Elasticity of a state and previous results matter only if the candidates are conventional. TRUMP is not conventional.

Union workers - TRUMP will win them over with his protectionist policies. How many? Could it be that he gets 20% of previous Dem votes here?

Blacks - They like TRUMP more than other GOP candidates. They are anti-immigration. He will get 10% of blacks for sure, but can he go higher? Up to 15%?

White suburban - How much is TRUMP going to lose here? 5% of the Romney vote?

Never voted before white supremacists/bigots/uneducated - Can he get some 30000 additional votes here? Maybe more?

Please analyze these options and give us the results.
Thanks!

EDIT: In fact, please try to find a plausible combination that will swing Pennsylvania for TRUMP. Or any combination and we will judge if it is plausible later.

[Ljube]

Ljube: here are the racial crosstabs of the PPP poll that had Trump leading -

Clinton-TRUMP-Unsure
Base 43-45-13
White 38-50-12
Black 72-10-18
Other 52-40-8

I truly believe he has strong appeal in Bucks and Delaware which you can debate (at worst, stronger than Romney), and he will outperform significantly in Philadelphia. 13-15% of blacks is far from out of the question, and with the Street's campaigning for him, who knows? He just needs to make it the focus of his campaign, which I expect him to do since he accepted an invitation to speak here.

To be perfectly transparent - Christie got 14% of blacks and Carson got 12%, but that's all irrelevant now. Rubio got 10% vs. Sanders, and Trump got 20% against Sanders.

Romney got only 6% according to exit polls.

Smilo, thanks for this analysis!

Romney tanked with the working class too (not only the blacks). According to your analysis, TRUMP can improve on the Romney's numbers in the suburbs too. If he does that, he's won the election.

Clarko, do you have anything to add?