To Dream the Impossible Dream

Throughout the impeachment inquiry, Donald Trump's defenders, and Mr. Trump himself, have cited his "landslide" victory in the Electoral College in 2016.  Trouble is, that's wrong.  Merriam-Webster defines landslide as a great majority of votes, an overwhelming victory, or winning an election by a huge majority.  Those frames don't fit the Electoral College.

Let's do the arithmetic.  There are a total of 538 votes available in the Electoral College.  One can reasonably assume that an overwhelming victory in that venue would require about 376. votes - roughly 70%.   Even at 60%, hardly a big enough margin to characterize as overwhelming, 323 Electoral votes would be needed.  In 2016, Donald Trump got 304 votes, or approximately 56%.  A majority, but not a huge one.

The popular vote in 2016 paints a different picture.  According to the independent, non-partisan Cook Political Report, Hillary Clinton garnered 65,844,610 votes; Donald Trump managed  62,979,636.  That's a difference of 2,864,974. The total number of votes for all other candidates  were 7,804,213, making a grand total of over 136,627,000 popular votes.  In that context, while still not a landslide, Clinton's victory was statistically more impressive than Trump's in the Electoral College:

• Electoral College Trump percentage: 56%
• Popular vote Trump percentage: 46%

No wonder Mr. Trump claimed that millions of illegal (AKA immigrant) votes were cast for Secretary Clinton, and that but for those votes, he would have won the popular vote as well as tat in the Electoral College.