MSU IPPSR scholars analyze and reflect on the November election

<p>Providing the analysis are Arnold Weinfeld, associate director for the institute, institute director <a href="https://twitter.com/mattgrossmann">Dr. Matt Grossman</a>, and MSU economist Dr. Charlie Ballard. </p><p>“Michigan did go against Donald Trump and swung toward the Democrats, but not by much and not by as much as the polls were expecting,” Grossmann says. “We again saw a polling error in the same direction in very similar states from 2016, but of course, with a different electoral result that was mainly driven by white voters with a college degree in the suburbs and in West Michigan and the Traverse City area. Other than that, a lot of people voted the same way. We continue to find pretty big divides between elites and the public, especially on the Republican side where the Republican base is much more culturally conservative and much more favorable toward Donald Trump. And they still have views associated with racial resentment and white identity that are quite different than the political elite.”</p><p>“The biggest issue in this election was Donald Trump,” adds Ballard. “And that's really often true when somebody is running for a second term as President. The election becomes a substantial referendum on whether you want this person to continue in office. And what we saw was that Trump once again outperformed the polls. The other thing that I think is quite interesting is that Republicans outperformed Trump.</p><p>“He may have outperformed the polls, but not enough to win the election and Joe Biden's margin in the popular vote is substantially more than Hillary Clinton's margin in the popular vote four years ago. But the Democratic blue wave that some people have been thinking would happen really did not happen. Democrats actually lost seats in the House of Representatives. Take Susan Collins of Maine for instance. The Republican out polled Donald Trump in her state by double digits and she won re-election easily. And so, what we're seeing is that the nation and to a substantial extent, Michig