2016 Results With Winner-Takes-All Counties

[RINO Tom]

So, I got thinking a while ago that sites like these REALLY go overboard in stereotyping voters, places and parties.  If you are "a Democrat/Republican," that INSTANTLY means something to most posters here, and it usually coincides with an assumption that you are from a type of place that votes for that party.  The example I always went to was the fact that if you only took the Clinton counties' populations vs. Trump counties' population in Illinois, Clinton would have won 70.47% of the vote ... in other words, there are a LOT of Trump voters living in Clinton counties.  These voters get no attention and are practically forgotten about.  

So, I totaled up the election results if counties were allocated the same way states are - i.e., winner-takes-all.  Right off the bat, there were three very interesting states that actually would have flipped ... Georgia goes to Clinton (54.10% to 45.90%), Pennsylvania goes to Clinton (50.82% to 49.18%) and New Hampshire goes to Trump (66.98% to 33.02%).  Remember, these are weighted and are not simply looking at who won more counties ... winning a big county counts for much more than a small county.  It is literally just a county-based electoral college for each state and then adding them up by their 2016 Census estimates.  Yet another way of thinking of it is just "what percent of the state lives in a Clinton county, and what percent lives in a Trump county?"  Here are the results:

United States
Clinton (D-NY): 175,754,793 (54.70%)
Trump (R-NY): 145,570,888 (45.30%)

For the states, I will just post the percentages to make it easier to read, but I do have the raw numbers:

AL: 78.57% GOP, 21.43% DEM
AK: 84.71% GOP, 15.29% DEM
AZ: 81.63% GOP, 18.37% DEM
AR: 80.21% GOP, 19.79% DEM
CA: 91.79% DEM, 8.21% GOP
CO: 61.29% DEM, 38.71% GOP
CT: 91.65% DEM, 8.35% GOP
DE: 58.51% DEM, 41.49% GOP
FL: 52.99% GOP, 47.01% DEM
GA GA: 54.10% DEM, 45.90% GOP
HI: 100.00% DEM, 0.00% GOP
ID: 96.37% GOP, 3.63% DEM
IL: 70.47% DEM, 29.53% GOP
IN: 72.23% GOP, 27.77% DEM
IA: 60.29% GOP, 39.71% DEM
KS: 90.26% GOP, 9.74% DEM
KY: 75.57% GOP, 24.43% DEM
LA: 73.95% GOP, 26.05% DEM
ME: 52.33% DEM, 47.67% GOP
MD: 73.81% DEM, 26.19% GOP
MA: 100.00% DEM, 0.00% GOP
MI: 54.11% GOP, 45.89% DEM
MN: 51.60% DEM, 48.40% GOP
MS: 74.17% GOP, 25.83% DEM
MO: 64.25% GOP, 35.75% DEM
MT: 71.94% GOP, 28.06% DEM
NE: 54.66% GOP, 45.34% DEM
NV: 88.73% DEM, 11.27% GOP
NH NH: 66.98% GOP, 33.02% DEM
NJ: 71.59% DEM, 28.41% GOP
NM: 63.21% DEM, 36.79% GOP
NY: 71.12% DEM, 28.88% GOP
NC: 53.13% GOP, 46.87% DEM
ND: 97.46% GOP, 2.54% DEM
OH: 57.83% GOP, 42.17% DEM
OK: 100.00% GOP, 0.00% DEM
OR: 57.78% DEM, 42.22% GOP
PA PA: 50.82% DEM, 49.18% GOP
RI: 84.52% DEM, 15.48% GOP
SC: 74.42% GOP, 25.58% DEM
SD: 94.62% GOP, 5.38% DEM
TN: 75.39% GOP, 24.61% DEM
TX: 50.50% GOP, 49.50% DEM
UT: 61.84% GOP, 38.16% DEM
VT: 99.00% DEM, 1.00% GOP
VA: 52.19% DEM, 47.81% GOP
WA: 73.07% DEM, 26.93% GOP
WV:100.00% GOP, 0.00% DEM
WI: 64.09% GOP, 35.91% DEM
WY: 96.04% GOP, 3.96% DEM

And, of course, the map:

There probably isn't a whole lot people can take away from this, but I thought it was interesting.  Little things here and there are obvious and can be gleamed from it, however ... like the fact that there are clearly a lot of Republicans in highly populated metropolitan counties in Nebraska and Nevada, or else those states' percentages would be way different on election day.  Additionally, in a state like Arizona, there are a lot of Democrats in the same situation that are being barely outvoted.  Anyway, thought I would post for anyone who would enjoy it!

[One Term Floridian]

Lol at Arizona Dems getting screwed because of Trump barely winning in Maricopa County... Actually a pretty cool idea, would be curious to see past elections judged like this

[Politician]

Would these be reasonable 2020 ratings under this map?

[ElectionsGuy]

I think I started something like this but forgot to finish it. It's an interesting way to look at the county results and should highlight the flaws in our electoral college system. I've thought about doing a project where I fill in counties different shades based on their percentage of overall Republican and Democratic vote in the state. That would show how much raw support is actually coming out of different counties, instead of how disproportionate the support is.

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

The massive difference between Nebraska and Kansas here shows something rather unusual in play.

Kansas is less Republican overall, but Democrats still fall slightly short in most of the large Urban Counties. Adding Sedgewick and Johnson to their total would be just enough to flip the state here, both of which were to the left of the state as a whole, though Sedgewick is still a tough task for Democrats. If some of the more Republican areas of Sedgewick were moved to other Counties, it would become a much easier task to flip the County, but Democrats could make up the population loss their with similarly not very difficult tasks of flipping Shawnee and Riley Counties.

Nebraska is more Republican overall, but Democrats managed to come just slightly ahead in most of the large Urban Counties. However, getting the last bit would be very challenging because Nebraska is passed out with lots of extremely Republican rural Counties. Sarpy is basically the only way for Democrats to win. If Sarpy and Douglas were combined into a single County, the new combined County would be enough to get Democrats over the top if Democrats were to actually win it, but Democrats still fall slightly short there creating a dynamic very similar to Johnson County in Kansas.

For Nebraska, Obama would have lost a combined Douglas and Sarpy County in 2008 by just a few hundred votes.

[cvparty]

wow i didn’t know republicans were so well distributed in washington

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

I strongly disagree on Alaska. One ought to take the Borough and census areas into consideration:

[RINO Tom]

wow i didn’t know republicans were so well distributed in washington

Fixed.

I strongly disagree on Alaska. One ought to take the Borough and census areas into consideration:

I'd happily edit it if someone did that for me!

[Mr. Smith]

Texas would be the tipping point instead of Wisconsin...

[One Term Floridian]

The fact that Dems still lose TX under this system (albeit narrowly, Beto certainly "wins" with this system in 2018) tells me there's still a lot of work left to be done to make it a true battleground state