A closer look at the Pennsylvania results illustrates the problem that Clinton faced. While she slightly underperformed in Philadelphia compared to Obamas 2012 showing, she over-performed in the Philadelphia suburbs. She swept all four suburban counties (Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery) by a combined margin of nearly 190,000 votes, 65,000 votes better than Obamas suburban advantage four years earlier.
That gave Clinton a lead of more than 660,000 votes heading out of the Philadelphia metro area. Add an edge of nearly 110,000 votes for Clinton in Pennsylvanias other major population center, Allegheny County (Pittsburgh), and she had an impressive lead of more than 770,000 votes 65,000 votes larger than Obamas in 2012 to withstand a Republican counterattack in the rest of the state.
Obama had been able to do so easily, as Romney could trim only 400,000 votes from Obamas lead in the vast swath of Pennsylvania outside the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh areas. But the Trump forces concentrated on the states interior, with its small and medium-sized cities, old industrial centers, small towns, and rural terrain. Much of the resource-rich territory had seen better days economically and was tailor-made for Trumps pledge to Make America Great Again. While Romney carried seven counties in Pennsylvania with at least 70% of the vote, the number for Trump was 23.
The result was a Trump margin of more than 800,000 votes outside the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh areas, enough for a narrow statewide win. It was the first time that Republicans had carried the Keystone States electoral votes since 1988, and they did it with a different playbook than then. In the 1980s and before, the Republicans path to victory in Pennsylvania often started by building a big lead in the Philadelphia suburbs. Not so with Trump, who won both the state and the White House by following his own version of the path less traveled.
