Today’s post is written by guest blogger Edward (Ned) York.
Because I am American, many of my English friends are now inevitably steering our conversations to the phenomenon of Donald Trump and whether I think he could actually become U.S. President. Like being asked whether I think the stock market is going to go up or down, I cautiously shrug my shoulders and admit that I have no special power of divining the future. However, I am confident in my ability to read numbers and so based upon various political data, I can envision—for a variety of reasons—Hillary Clinton becoming the 45th President of the United States.
The U.S. general election officially begins once the parties have nominated their presidential candidates in July and ends when voters cast their ballots on the 8th of November. Brace yourself for an unmatched media frenzy as the campaigns will no doubt sink to new lows in the depths of American political dialogue. From Trump, expect unfiltered and bellicose rhetoric filled with harsh and poisonous language aimed at immigrants, minorities and women. He will dominate the daily news cycle with his outlandish pronouncements. He will campaign to Clinton’s right on issues such as gun control, abortion and repeal of the Affordable Care Act (aka “Obamacare”), and he will attack her from the left on issues like trade, federal spending and the use of military force. In contrast, Clinton will be controlled, cautious and rhetorically positive. She will outline detailed policies and talk about what she will do to make the lives of Americans better. She will try to paint Trump as unfit—undisciplined temperament, lack of experience and ideologically unpredictable—to govern the country and be commander in chief. It will be a political and cultural war but without bloodshed. However, the manner in which each candidate will fight may grab our attention but probably will not be the deciding factor in determining who will win. For that answer we must familiarize ourselves with the strange methodology Americans have adopted for choosing a President.
U.S. general elections follow a decidedly different process to those in the U.K. When Americans vote for a President, they are actually voting for presidential electors, known collectively as Electoral College delegates. It is these delegates, voted for by the people of each State, who elect the chief executive. The U.S. Constitution assigns each State a number of electors reflective of that State’s population and equal to the combined total of the State’s Senate and House of Representatives delegations (e.g., California has 55 while Alabama has 9). It’s important to keep in mind that while the U. S. will be holding a general election to choose a country-wide leader, in fact, there will be 50 separate State elections taking place on November 8th. Each state will hold a popularity contest in which the candidate who is “first past the post” will be awarded all that State’s delegates (“winner take all” system) to the Electoral College. There are 538 Electoral College delegates and the party candidate with a majority of at least 270 will be able to claim victory.
At this point, as Trump is soon to become his party’s official presidential candidate, he is currently occupying a high political floor. Trump is the “King Kong of the Republican Party” and wherever he walks the political earth rumbles and shakes. Yet, as it turns out, in spite of the fact that the Republicans control both houses of Congress, Democrats will start the general election campaign with a statistical advantage in the Electoral College. Here’s the underlying math. If Clinton wins the 19 States (and the District of Columbia) that every Democratic nominee has won from 1992 through 2012, she will be awarded 242 electoral votes. The Republican road to victory is far more challenging. There are 13 states that have sided with the Republican presidential nominee in each of the last six elections. But these States only have a total of 102 electorate votes. That means that Trump has to capture at least 168 more electoral votes to get to 270. The Electoral College math is working against him.
And, in 2016 Trump confronts the political scene at a time when the demographic profile of America is slowly but dramatically shifting. While it was the white, older male voters, the bedrock of the Republican support, who catapulted Trump to victory during his party’s primary season, the U.S. general election will be fought on a decidedly different terrain. 31%—up from 29% in 2012—of the U.S. electorate is now comprised of Latinos, African Americans, Asians or other ethnic or racial minorities. In addition, the “gender gap” (the difference in proportion of men and women voting for a preferred candidate) is forecast to be wider this general election than ever before with females favoring their candidate in significantly greater numbers than males. All of these voting blocs which coincidently have repeatedly been the object of Trump’s derision and contempt will be expanding with major Democratic efforts to register newly eligible voters. Consequently, Trump’s ability to enlarge his base of support—to increase his political ceiling of support—is, in all probability, limited.
It’s not impossible to imagine that Trump could beat Clinton, since many, many events will happen between now and when the U.S. general election takes place. However, I believe that the Electoral College map as well as the changing composition of the American voters bode well for Clinton. How will this distinctly American drama end? For the definitive answer to that question we’ll have to be patient and wait until November to find out which candidate has triumphed to win the very soul of the American people.