Would Clinton have lost Virginia to a "normal" Republican?

[Del Tachi]

Trump lost Virginia by roughly 110,000 votes (5.4 percentage points) in 2016 with heavy swings/trends toward Clinton in Northern Virginia and Henrico County.  Would Clinton have narrowly lost Virginia against a more traditional Republican candidate like Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush or Ted Cruz?

[dw93]

It depends on who that Republican is. Cruz is just was just as disliked by the establishment in the party as Trump and on top of that, didn't have Trump's Blue Collar appeal. At best he flips Nevada, Florida, Ohio, and Iowa, but still comes short of victory as Clinton holds WI, MI, ME's 2nd, and PA. Jeb's last name alone would tank him in the General, so his Best Case Scenario is probably the same as Cruz's. Rubio could win if he kept his Glass Jaw in tact, if not she eeks out a win. Kasich would be the best candidate for the General, the problem is getting him past the primary.

[here2view]

Rubio and Kasich there's a possibility. Cruz and Bush, no way.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Kasich definitely would


Rubio maybe would

[Yellowhammer]

No, but I’m sure they would have been dumb enough to contest it anyway. The Republican ceiling in 2016 was basically all the Trump states + MN + CO + NV + ME.

+ NH

[uti2]

Rubio voted for the government shutdown alongside Ted Cruz.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/20/sen-marco-rubio-defends-vote-against-short-term-de/


This would limit his appeal in NoVA. As for Cruz's "establishment" issues, they wouldn't be too difficult for Cruz to overcome, all he'd have to do is appoint an establishment VP, someone like Romney or Jeb. But overall, both should have similar electability here.

[RINO Tom]

No, I doubt it.

[Politician]

Absolutely not, unless that Republican was winning the popular vote by 2+ points. It would be about as hard to flip as Michigan with a 'normal' Republican and slightly harder than Wisconsin/Pennsylvania.

[Progressive Pessimist]

It would be closer and if Kaine was still her running mate he would come in much handier in helping her win the state. But more likely than not she wins it.

[Del Tachi]

It would be closer and if Kaine was still her running mate he would come in much handier in helping her win the state. But more likely than not she wins it.

Interesting note on Kaine.  Kaine was a pretty moderate pick for Hillary that seemed to reinforce her campaign strategy of building somewhat of a "grand coalition" against Trump.  In a race with a more "traditional" GOP nominee, I bet Hillary goes with a more "traditional" Democratic Veep - someone like Sherrod Brown or Ron Kind, maybe. 

[uti2]

It would be closer and if Kaine was still her running mate he would come in much handier in helping her win the state. But more likely than not she wins it.

Interesting note on Kaine.  Kaine was a pretty moderate pick for Hillary that seemed to reinforce her campaign strategy of building somewhat of a "grand coalition" against Trump.  In a race with a more "traditional" GOP nominee, I bet Hillary goes with a more "traditional" Democratic Veep - someone like Sherrod Brown or Ron Kind, maybe. 

For Rubio in particular, she had Julian Castro on hand for the job. For the normal Republicans like Jeb/Walker/Christie - Kaine was the default choice. She went with the default pick.

She may have picked a Brown or Bernie if she needed a game-changer - which is what she may have done against Kasich.

[James Monroe]

Rubio and Kasich there's a possibility. Cruz and Bush, no way.

[Pericles]

Rubio voted for the government shutdown alongside Ted Cruz.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/20/sen-marco-rubio-defends-vote-against-short-term-de/


This would limit his appeal in NoVA. As for Cruz's "establishment" issues, they wouldn't be too difficult for Cruz to overcome, all he'd have to do is appoint an establishment VP, someone like Romney or Jeb. But overall, both should have similar electability here.

Nobody would care about that. Rubio appears more sane than Cruz.

[uti2]

Rubio voted for the government shutdown alongside Ted Cruz.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/20/sen-marco-rubio-defends-vote-against-short-term-de/


This would limit his appeal in NoVA. As for Cruz's "establishment" issues, they wouldn't be too difficult for Cruz to overcome, all he'd have to do is appoint an establishment VP, someone like Romney or Jeb. But overall, both should have similar electability here.

Nobody would care about that. Rubio appears more sane than Cruz.

Like he did at the NRA town hall, with the "Buy into my Agenda" line? His policies are very similar to Cruz, he just sticks to a tight script, which can get banal in the face of direct confrontation.

Remember, Dukakis was the "sane" alternative to Bush, and was up double digits, until Bush started hammering him on his policies.

[Rookie Yinzer]

No

[mvd10]

Maybe to Rubio or Kasich (or Bush if he somehow becomes a good campaigner). But winning CO was much more realistic. Virginia would trend D, but if the Republican is an establishment candidate and wins the PV by 2 I don't see why the Republican couldn't win. Long-term Virginia probably is lost for the Republicans though. Northern Virginia is filled with federal workers and lawyers, and I don't really think they would be scared by big government or more regulation (just like these young tech workers in SF who make $100k but have huge college debts). If the Republicans want to win more they probably should focus on keeping Sunbelt suburbs and winning back Northern suburbs.

[Annatar]

No, I think most political analysts as well most people on this forum severely overestimate the impact of a candidate on voters choices, since 1988, with the exception of 2008 which was a unique year, no party has exceeded 51.1% of the vote, most voters, over 90% are locked in with 90% of dems and GOP's voters respectively always voting for their party no matter the candidate. Of far greater importance are the structural trends underway in the electorate, post grad whites moving towards the dems, high school grad whites moving towards the gop etc.

In that environment, I think no republican would have won Virginia, someone like Rubio maybe does better in NOVA, but can he overcome a 200k margin, I doubt it. Even combining Romney's numbers in NOVA plus Trump's numbers in the rest of the state does not make up the margin.

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Are we forgetting that Hillary was a terrible candidate and none of the Republicans had nearly the baggage that Trump had? 

[mvd10]

No, I think most political analysts as well most people on this forum severely overestimate the impact of a candidate on voters choices, since 1988, with the exception of 2008 which was a unique year, no party has exceeded 51.1% of the vote, most voters, over 90% are locked in with 90% of dems and GOP's voters respectively always voting for their party no matter the candidate. Of far greater importance are the structural trends underway in the electorate, post grad whites moving towards the dems, high school grad whites moving towards the gop etc.

In that environment, I think no republican would have won Virginia, someone like Rubio maybe does better in NOVA, but can he overcome a 200k margin, I doubt it. Even combining Romney's numbers in NOVA plus Trump's numbers in the rest of the state does not make up the margin.

Would college grads have trended towards the Dems if someone like Rubio was the nominee though? There wasn't a huge swing with college grads from 1992 to 2012. Based on this (I calculated the numbers with college grads myself by combining postgrads and college grads only) this is how college grads voted (vs the general populace):
1992: 39% Bush (37% Bush)
1996: 44% Dole (40% Dole)
2000: 48% Bush (48% Bush)
2004: 49% Bush (51% Bush)
2008: 45% McCain (46% McCain)
2012: 48% Romney (47% Romney)
2016: 42% Trump (46% Trump)

The swing in the 2000s and early 2010s (pre-Trump) was quite small. This doesn't really stroke with most county-level data (high-income/high-educated counties did shift to the Dems by quite a big margin). Maybe the reason behind that is that those counties often are urbanizing, have become more diverse or have higher proportions of tech workers or federal employees (or other 'creative workers' who might benefit from more government) while college-educated voters in exurban or rural counties have shifted R. I imagine Rubio would have done roughly the same with college-educated voters as other candidates in the 2000s and 2010s, and maybe he would appeal more to urban voters (both whites and minorities) enough to narrowly win Virginia in 2016 if he wins the PV by atleast 2%. But I think it's pretty much lost to the GOP after 2016 (barring landslides or unforseen changes in electoral coalitions).

But if Romney's margins in NoVa and Trump's margins in the rest of Virginia aren't enough to win maybe you're right. If the Republicans want to win Virginia they probably should focus on NoVa, even though that might be futile too (and focusing on NoVa to win Virginia implies not contesting Michigan or those rust belt places that swung hard to Trump).

[Progressive Pessimist]

Are we forgetting that Hillary was a terrible candidate and none of the Republicans had nearly the baggage that Drumpf had? 

Trump had a lot of baggage but he was also a unique Republican that ran a campaign that possibly appealed to voters that the average Republican would not have. I don't think a Rubio type would have necessarily been a lock to win the general election, let alone the state of Virginia. This was definitely a year that favored Republicans though, there is no doubt about that.

[Fuzzy Bear]

Rubio and Kasich there's a possibility. Cruz and Bush, no way.

I'm not sure Trump lost VA by more than the others would have.  The others would have lost for other reasons.

[The Undefeatable Debbie Stabenow]

It would've been closer, but HRC's floor there was probably about Obama's 2012 performance.

[TDAS04]

Nope.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Yes,  to Jeb, and with the sympathy vote from Barbara, his mom, he could be a force in 2020, if he wants to take out Trump.

[Senator-elect Spark]

Not with Tim Kaine on the ticket. NoVa is just too much.