How did Romney lose so bad while winning Independents and getting 93% of GOP vote?

[Redban]

Obama attracted high turnout from Democrats and minorities. The percentage of black voters that showed up was higher than the percentage of white voters that showed up, right?

Romney did good with the Republicans who came out. But a lot of them, especially in the Midwest, just stayed home.

I've heard the claim that apathy killed Mitt Romney in 2012.

[Redban]

Dems definitely did much better than expected with turnout and the minority turnout for Obama did not sag from 2008, which a host of pundits expected.

Romney never seemed to win over social conservatives/evangelicals either.  That group stood behind a whole host of possible challengers before settling on Santorum and then Romney didn't shore support up with that group post-nomination.  Maybe if he'd chosen someone like Mike Pence to shore that up he would've come out okay, but the Paul Ryan pick did little to get GOP voters to the polls in big numbers.

Agree with bolded. Although Romney's official platform was pro-life, conservative, he had a shaky history -- he had a liberal healthcare plan in Massachusetts, he was once pro-choice. Some conservatives didn't trust him. The term "RINO" came up often.