Why was Hillary expected to win

[Da2017]

The 2016 election was an upset for the ages.

[Beet]

I don't know; I never expected her to win. I think most mainstream liberals underestimated the amount of  misogyny out there.

[CookieDamage]

I don't know; I never expected her to win. I think most mainstream liberals underestimated the amount of  misogyny out there.

Agreed. Plus she made a lot of dumb decisions but a lot of external pressures affected the election that she could not control. I was expecting her to win until the last few weeks when I genuinely thought Trump could win. I had a strange feeling all election day and it came to a head when PA, MI, WI, and FL weren't being called.

[Mr. Morden]

Mostly because she was ahead in the polls.

[Rookie Yinzer]

Trump was and is a joke.

He was also outwardly racist and doing things that the GOP thought they needed to do in a more covert way to win.

Honestly, a Republican was supposed to win in 2016 and Trump was so terrible that he almost lost an election that other Republicans would have won handily against Hillary. It's why her team wanted the nominee to be him or hard-right fringe ideologue Cruz in the first place.

[here2view]

Hillary Clinton/Tim Kaine: 302
Donald Trump/Mike Pence: 236

This was my prediction on Election Day. Hillary was expected to win because: 1) She was ahead in the polls for the majority of the election, 2) She had better favorability ratings than Trump, even though hers were putrid, 3) Pundits thought the Democrats had an inherent advantage in the electoral college due to the "Blue Wall", 4) Obama had decent approval numbers, and 5) Regardless of peoples' feelings on Clinton, a lot of people felt a person like Trump could never win.

[Mr. Smith]

Because all the other Republicans were even more out-of-touch and inept and easy to attack. I still hold that Hillary would have routed them easily, and in some cases even picked up a few Sun Belt states against them.

Trump appeared superficially to be even worse. But superficially, The Room is a bad movie.

[America's Sweetheart ❤/𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖔𝖔𝖙𝖞 𝖂𝖆𝖗𝖗𝖎𝖔𝖗]

The 2016 election was an upset for the ages.

It really wasn't. people just didn't think Trump could possibly win, but in reality the polls showed a close race, especially in the last week or so.

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

The 2016 election was an upset for the ages.

It really wasn't. people just didn't think Trump could possibly win, but in reality the polls showed a close race, especially in the last week or so.

It also seemed in the last week that the organizational structure of the Trump campaign was really starting to fracture, and that he gave up at the end, only focusing on trying to at least win Ohio, even if he lost big nationally.

[Fuzzy Bear]

Both the National polls and the individual state polls indicated she would win.  I didn't want her to win, but I didn't think Trump could do what he needed to do to win the EV.

Here's a question:  Would Hillary have won if (A) she had the same political experience, (B) the same liabilities, (C) was still a female, but (D) was NOT Bill's wife and NOT a former FLOTUS?

I have never liked the idea of voting for a pol's spouse for the same office.  It's the Lurleen Wallace/Ma Ferguson thing; the dynasty, the "third term" thing.  Hillary's far more than Lurleen Wallace, but I believe that some folks just can't get past that.  Being an ex-FLOTUS was, IMO, an unrecognized liability for Hillary Clinton.  In retrospect, I think that a candidate like Klobuchar or even Elizabeth Warren would have at least carried MI and WI and MIGHT have even pulled out PA.

[SingingAnalyst]

The momentum seemed to be on her side. It seemed people were more than ready for a woman President, and that Hillary Clinton was highly qualified.

Simply put, the "Trump train" totally blindsided many people, including "experts". Few people saw it coming.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

I think mostly we all just overestimated the American people.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I think mostly we all just overestimated the American people.

Keep saying this on Hillary's behalf and see what happens.

[twenty42]

Mostly because she was ahead in the polls.

Hillary being “ahead in the polls” was the biggest fake narrative of the election, and it came back to bite everybody in the ass. She maintained pluralities in a lot of national and swing state polls, but she rarely “led” them in a sense of carrying over 50%. A 45-40 poll in favor of Hillary would be advertised as a 5-point lead for her, with little mention given to the 15% that were undecided. It came to be that Trump won a whole lot of those undecided votes. The big lesson of the 2016 election was that margins are pretty insignificant if neither candidate is garnering 50% in the polls.

[Pandaguineapig]

Muh "bloo wall" but in all seriousness the increasing editorialization of formerly objective cable and print news sources led to an echo chamber where statistically insignificant leads for Clinton in swing states were marketed as insurmountable leads, obvious outlier polls that favored Clinton were shown as the"state of the race" like the ones that showed Texas tied or Clinton ahead by 10 in Florida. Pundits were also to blame in a sense that a CNN panel that discussed the race would be "balanced" with 2 dems and 2 GOP but the republicans would often be anti-trump like Navarro or Rubin, which created a false sense that Clinton was the established favorite. Many polls also modeled turnout with the assumption of a massive surge in the minority vote that never materialized

[Mr. Morden]

Mostly because she was ahead in the polls.

Hillary being “ahead in the polls” was the biggest fake narrative of the election, and it came back to bite everybody in the ass. She maintained pluralities in a lot of national and swing state polls, but she rarely “led” them in a sense of carrying over 50%. A 45-40 poll in favor of Hillary would be advertised as a 5-point lead for her, with little mention given to the 15% that were undecided. It came to be that Trump won a whole lot of those undecided votes. The big lesson of the 2016 election was that margins are pretty insignificant if neither candidate is garnering 50% in the polls.

I mean, candidates who are leading their opponent in the polls usually win, even if they're both below 50%.

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

I think it had much to do with the 2008 primaries. Many people had been waiting 8 years for her to become president. Remember that she won the popular vote, but lost the delegate vote, which again happened in 2016. That must really suck.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

- Trump being thought unelectable
- Obama's good approvals
- Economy going strong
- "Blue wall"

[SNJ1985]

She consistently led in most polls, had more money, and had overwhelming support from the establishment. Also, few people really thought we could actually break through in states that had been voting Democratic since 1992.

[Izzyeviel]

Trump flopped over the line by less than 100,000 votes in 3 states. That's people being put off by the Comey thing, and people waking up and thinking 'Hillary is going to win anyway, lets stay in bed'

[HagridOfTheDeep]

I think mostly we all just overestimated the American people.

Keep saying this on Hillary's behalf and see what happens.

I don't really care what happens.

One candidate was a proudly ignorant racist who bragged about assaulting women. One wasn't. Your people picked the objectively sh-ttier option. You can get your knickers in a bunch over being called out on it, but the vast majority of non-Americans (and, I'll add, educated people) see your situation for exactly what it was.

Go cry.

[twenty42]

Trump flopped over the line by less than 100,000 votes in 3 states. That's people being put off by the Comey thing, and people waking up and thinking 'Hillary is going to win anyway, lets stay in bed'

I love when people use the “100,000 votes in three states” argument, while ignoring the fact that he won IA, OH, ME-02, and FL in addition to MI, WI, and PA. Not to mention that MN and ME-AL went from Democratic landslides in 2012 to within three points in 2016.

But please, continue to parrot the talking point that it was just three meager wins that put Trump in office. That kind of hubris will be very helpful in our path to victory in 2020.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Because her opponent was Trump

[MATTROSE94]

The same reasons why Richard Nixon was favored to win in 1960 and why Al Gore was favored to win in 2000. The economy was in relatively good shape in 2016 (the US economy grew 3.5% that year) and the incumbent President (Barack Obama) had high approval ratings. Clinton fell into the same trap that Nixon and Gore feel into by taking victory for granted and not campaigning in a strong enough manner. These factors (coupled with some election rigging on the part of the Russians) was enough to deny Clinton a victory.

[Izzyeviel]

Trump flopped over the line by less than 100,000 votes in 3 states. That's people being put off by the Comey thing, and people waking up and thinking 'Hillary is going to win anyway, lets stay in bed'

I love when people use the “100,000 votes in three states” argument, while ignoring the fact that he won IA, OH, ME-02, and FL in addition to MI, WI, and PA. Not to mention that MN and ME-AL went from Democratic landslides in 2012 to within three points in 2016.

But please, continue to parrot the talking point that it was just three meager wins that put Trump in office. That kind of hubris will be very helpful in our path to victory in 2020.

You can spin it all you want. The fact is Trump maximised his turnout, the democrats was depressed. And she still won by 3 million votes overall. Any other candidate would have wiped the floor with Trump - have you paid any attention to the results of special elections over the past year?