On the day of President Trump’s inauguration, let’s remind ourselves how many votes he and Clinton won
Ii stayed up all night on the day of the US presidential election. By the morning, it was clear that Donald Trump had won a clear majority in the Electoral College, while Hillary Clinton had narrowly won more actual votes nationwide.
Over the days and weeks that follwed, the difference in the votes polled by the two candidates grew and grew. What are the final, official figures?
Trump took 62,979,636 636 votes, while Clinton secured 65,844,610 votes – a difference of 2,864,974 votes. So, in the end, almost 3 million more Americans supported Clinton rather than Trump.
Trump has declared that, if there had not been the Electoral College, he would have campaigned in a different way, allocating more resources to states with larger populations. But, of course, exactly the same is true for Clinton.
We cannot know the result of an election which from the start would have been determined by a simple nationwide majority and anyway this is not going to happen because there is inadequate support for the necessary constitutional change. What we do know is Trump and his agenda do not command the support of a majority of the American electorate and he would be wise to govern with that in mind, trying to craft some common ground between his supporters and opponents.
Some chance …