If polls had Trump barely ahead in Wisconsin in the final weeks...

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

Is Trump's victory in Wisconsin attributable to the fact that would-be Clinton voters thought the result was a foregone conclusion, and didn't bother?

[Mr. Morden]

My understanding is that it's usually the other way around: When a race is seen as uncompetitive, it's the trailing candidate's voters who tend to be demoralized and don't bother showing up.  OTOH, there may be an asymmetry between the two parties, with the Republican coalition consisting of more diehard partisans, who will vote no matter what.

[Averroës Nix]

Polls consistently had Clinton below 50% with a dopey, lackluster third-party candidate who functioned mostly as a polite alternative to Trump taking close to 10%. They may have showed Clinton ahead by about 5 points, but they should not have been comforting.

Turnout in Wisconsin dropped, but there's no reason to believe that had anything to do with polling, which consistently showed a competitive statewide contest.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Turnout in Wisconsin dropped, but there's no reason to believe that had anything to do with polling, which consistently showed a competitive statewide contest.

What about those reports that tens of thousands of would-be voters - disproportionately black and/or poor, young, full-time service-sector workers, etc. - intended to vote, but were unable to, because of

- ridiculously long lines,

- a smaller number of voting locations

- not being able to get off work in time to get to a voting place, and of course

- Voter ID and other lovely restrictions put in place since Scott Walker and co. took over Wisconsin?

Trump won Wisconsin over Clinton by less than 25,000 votes. From the reports I read (I'll link to them if I can find them), as many as 50,000 people fit the above "intended to vote, but couldn't" description. I think it's a safe bet that most of those people would have cast their ballots for Clinton.

Just something to keep in mind.

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

My understanding is that it's usually the other way around: When a race is seen as uncompetitive, it's the trailing candidate's voters who tend to be demoralized and don't bother showing up.  OTOH, there may be an asymmetry between the two parties, with the Republican coalition consisting of more diehard partisans, who will vote no matter what.

2016 is so strange, and normal rules don't seem to apply. I keep coming back to the similarity between Trump and Brexit. Both were protest votes. There were significant numbers of people who voted Brexit not thinking it would pass, but wanting to send a message about how p'ed off they were. There were a lot of Wisconsinites, I think, who voted Trump because they thought he had no realistic chance of winning.

It's speculation, and hard to support or contradict with evidence.

[Averroës Nix]

Turnout in Wisconsin dropped, but there's no reason to believe that had anything to do with polling, which consistently showed a competitive statewide contest.

What about those reports that tens of thousands of would-be voters - disproportionately black and/or poor, young, full-time service-sector workers, etc. - intended to vote, but were unable to, because of

- ridiculously long lines,

- a smaller number of voting locations

- not being able to get off work in time to get to a voting place, and of course

- Voter ID and other lovely restrictions put in place since Scott Walker and co. took over Wisconsin?

Trump won Wisconsin over Clinton by less than 25,000 votes. From the reports I read (I'll link to them if I can find them), as many as 50,000 people fit the above "intended to vote, but couldn't" description. I think it's a safe bet that most of those people would have cast their ballots for Clinton.

Just something to keep in mind.

It's plausible that voter suppression influenced outcomes in several states.

(Incidentally, New York State is a place where this has been normalized for a long time. The contrast is amazing when I visit people I know in states that encourage high turnout. For example, Washington sends voters pamphlets with descriptions of every candidate with ballot access and an enclosed paper ballot, with easy instructions for submitting that ballot in several different ways and all kinds of accommodations for accessibility.)

It's also a more compelling explanation than speculating that voters were complacent because the polls showed a narrow Clinton lead in a swing state. And more consistent with my memory of late October of 2016: Mounting unease, greater with every successive day that the polls failed to break decisively in Clinton's favor, as we slouched toward our election day.

[J. J.]

Some pollster/pundit had it it tightening about a week out.  However, no poll showed Trump winning in WI, but you had to see it getting closer.   

 I posted something on FB and one of our  said it wasn't true.  I said, "Don't blame me, blame ______." I might have added, "Trump still won't take WI."    If you were a voter in Wisconsin, you know it was getting closer.

Here is the final RCP map without tossups:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/2016_elections_electoral_college_map_no_toss_ups.html

You had to know it was going to be close, unless you tuned into Sabato or MSNBC.

In my final map, I had it as a 269/269 tie with WI going to Clinton.  I actually thought it might go to the House.