Kasich would have won Ohio and North Carolina, probably would’ve won Iowa, and would’ve come up just short in Florida and the industrial midwest. And everyone here would be talking about what a great candidate Hillary Clinton was to overcome the adversity and be a woman and president and blah dee blah imagine how much worse Trump would have done.
Kasich was nothing more than Romney 2.0 running in a better R year. Toomey would’ve gone down and probably RonJon as well, though I could see Ayotte winning if Kasich were the nominee.
Overall I think Kasich gets 259 if he takes Florida and 230 otherwise, and is lauded as a really strong Republican / the best Rs could have done just ‘the map was set against him’. He probably would’ve lost the PV by about the same as Trump did but everyone would have talked about how Trump wouldn’t have gotten 40% and would’ve lost like 400-130 in the EC and all sorts of other nonsense.
Trump was the only R who would’ve beaten Hillary post-Christie debate. I think Rubio would have as well prior to his flop in the NH debate.
This seems accurate. Only Trump had that rust-belt appeal that pushed him over the top.
