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Scott Rasmussen's Number of the Day for May 22, 2017

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By Scott Rasmussen

The Number of the Day columns published on Ballotpedia reflect the views of the author.

May 22, 2017: Pennsylvania is home to three of the nation’s 206 Pivot Counties. These are counties that voted twice for Barack Obama and then voted for Donald Trump. Both in Pennsylvania and nationwide, these counties had an outsized impact on the election outcome. From now until Election 2018, Ballotpedia will regularly release new data on these counties and explore what they can teach us about national trends. Last week, the most recent report detailed demographic data for the Pivot Counties.

The Pennsylvania Pivot Counties are Erie County, Luzerne County, and Northampton County. Earlier looks at the Pivot Counties showed that they were especially important in delivering Iowa and Michigan to Trump. In Pennsylvania, however, it turns out that increased margins in solidly Republican counties played a bigger role. Forty-nine of the nation’s 2,226 solidly Republican counties are found in the Keystone State.

Statewide, Trump’s 2016 campaign outperformed Mitt Romney’s 2012 effort by 354,132 votes (Romney lost by 309,840 votes; Trump won by 44,292 votes). As shown in the table below, the solidly Republican counties provided 78 percent of those gains. That’s partly because 2016 turnout was higher in these counties by almost 200,000 votes. Additionally, Trump carried these counties by 34 percentage points (65 percent to 31 percent). Four years earlier, Romney’s margin was only 23 points (61 percent to 38 percent). Pivot Counties provided 18 percent of the GOP improvement. That’s still pretty remarkable given that they cast only 7 percent of the vote.

Pennsylvania countiesNet vote change from 2012 to 2016% of net votes gained by GOP in 2016% of total votes cast in 2016
Pivot64,81118.3%6.6%
Solid GOP277,07678.2%35.7%
Solid Dem-2,572-0.7%48.6%
Other14,8174.2%9.1%
Total354,132100.0%100.0%

Obama won the Pennsylvania Pivot Counties by 14 percentage points in 2008 and by 9 points in 2012. However, in 2016, Trump won these counties by 8 points.

Pennsylvania counties201620122008
Republican52%45%42.0%
Democrat44%54%56.0%
MarginR+8D+9D+14

Statewide, Obama won Pennsylvania by 10 percentage points in 2008 and by 5 points in 2012. In 2016, Trump won by less than a percentage point. In other words, in 2008 and 2012, the Pivot Counties were more supportive of the Democratic candidate than the rest of the state. But in 2016, those same counties were more supportive of the Republican than the rest of the state.

The table below shows the Republican margins contributed by each type of county in the last three presidential elections.

Pennsylvania counties201620122008
Pivot33,658-31,153-53,493
Solid GOP742,264465,188317,918
Solid Dem-763,621-761,049-843,380
Always wrong000
Other31,99117,174-41,523
Total44,292-309,840-620,478

The map below highlights the different types of counties in Pennsylvania.




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Scott Rasmussen’s Number of the Day is published by Ballotpedia weekdays at 8:00 a.m. Eastern. Click here to check out the latest update.

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Columns published on Ballotpedia reflect the views of the author.

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