2016 United States presidential election in West Virginia

The 2016 United States presidential election in West Virginia was held on November 8, 2016, as part of the 2016 General Election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated. West Virginia voters chose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote pitting the Republican Party's nominee, businessman Donald Trump, and running mate Indiana Governor Mike Pence against Democratic Party nominee, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her running mate, Virginia Senator Tim Kaine.

Main article: 2016 United States presidential election
2016 United States presidential election in West Virginia
November 8, 2016
Turnout57.45%[1]
 
Nominee Donald Trump Hillary Clinton
Party Republican Democratic
Home state New York New York
Running mate Mike Pence Tim Kaine
Electoral vote 5 0
Popular vote 489,371 188,794
Percentage 68.50% 26.43%
County results
Trump:      50–60%      60–70%      70–80%      80–90%
President before election

Barack Obama
Democratic

 Elected President

Donald Trump
Republican

Treemap of the popular vote by county.
Elections in West Virginia

On May 10, 2016, in the presidential primaries, West Virginia voters expressed their preferences for the Democratic, Republican, Green, and Libertarian parties' respective nominees for president. Registered members of each party only voted in their party's primary, while voters who were unaffiliated chose any one primary in which to vote.

Donald Trump easily won West Virginia, with 68.5% of the vote, giving him his largest share of the vote in any state. Hillary Clinton received just over a quarter of the vote, with 26.4%. Trump's performance in the state made it his second strongest state in the 2016 election after Wyoming.[2]

West Virginia was also one of two states where Donald Trump won every county, the other being Oklahoma. This was the second consecutive presidential election where every county within the state voted Republican. Trump's 42.2% margin of victory is the largest of any presidential candidate from either party in the state's history, besting Abraham Lincoln's 36.4% margin of victory in 1864. Hillary Clinton's performance was the worst by a nominee from a major party since 1912, when 3 candidates split the vote and received over 20% of the vote each, and the worst performance ever by a Democrat in West Virginia.

Primary elections

Democratic primary
County results of the West Virginia Democratic presidential primary, 2016.
  Bernie Sanders

Six candidates appeared on the Democratic presidential primary ballot:[3] (alphabetically)

West Virginia Democratic primary, May 10, 2016
Candidate Popular vote Delegates
Count Percentage Pledged Unpledged Total
Bernie Sanders 124,700 51.41% 18 18
Hillary Clinton 86,914 35.84% 11 8 19
Paul T. Farrell Jr. 21,694 8.94%
Keith Judd 4,460 1.84%
Martin O'Malley (withdrawn) 3,796 1.57%
Rocky De La Fuente 975 0.40%
Uncommitted N/A 0 0 0
Total 242,539 100% 29 8 37
Source: The Green Papers, West Virginia Secretary of State

Republican primary
County results of the West Virginia Republican presidential primary, 2016.
  Donald Trump

Eleven candidates appeared on the Republican presidential primary ballot:[3]

West Virginia Republican primary, May 10, 2016
Candidate Votes Percentage Actual delegate count
Bound Unbound Total
Donald Trump 157,238 77.05% 32 0 32
Ted Cruz (withdrawn) 18,301 8.97% 0 0 0
John Kasich (withdrawn) 13,721 6.72% 1 0 1
Ben Carson (withdrawn) 4,421 2.17% 0 0 0
Marco Rubio (withdrawn) 2,908 1.43% 0 0 0
Jeb Bush (withdrawn) 2,305 1.13% 0 0 0
Rand Paul (withdrawn) 1,798 0.88% 0 0 0
Mike Huckabee (withdrawn) 1,780 0.87% 0 0 0
Chris Christie (withdrawn) 727 0.36% 0 0 0
Carly Fiorina (withdrawn) 659 0.32% 0 0 0
David Eames Hall 203 0.10% 0 0 0
Uncommitted 1 0 1
Unprojected delegates: 0 0 0
Total: 204,061 100.00% 34 0 34
Source: The Green Papers

Polling

Analysis

As expected, Republican nominee Donald Trump won West Virginia in a 42-point rout (the largest of any presidential candidate in the state's history) over Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton,[4] thanks to ardent support from coal industry workers in Appalachia. He thus captured all five electoral votes from the Mountain State. Trump had promised to bring back mining jobs in economically depressed areas of coal country, whereas his opponent had proposed investing millions into converting the region to a producer of green energy.[5][6] Democrats' championing of environmentalism is viewed as a threat in coal country, and Clinton faced a towering rejection from Mountain State voters. Clinton was also seen as being "haunted" by a comment she made within the state itself, in which in describing the transition to clean energy she stated "We’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business."[7]

West Virginia was once a solidly Democratic state; it voted Democratic in every election from 1932 to 1996, except for the Republican landslides of 1956, 1972, and 1984. However, in recent years it has drifted to becoming solidly Republican, and has stayed that way since it was won by George W. Bush in 2000. Barack Obama, for example, failed to win even a single county in 2012. West Virginia is one of the two states where Hillary Clinton did not win any counties, the other being Oklahoma, which last voted for a Democrat in 1964.[8]

General election

Statewide results
2016 United States presidential election in West Virginia[9]
Party Candidate Running mate Popular vote Electoral vote Swing
Count % Count %
Republican Donald Trump of New York Mike Pence of Indiana 489,371 68.50% 5 100.00% 6.30%
Democratic Hillary Clinton of New York Tim Kaine of Virginia 188,794 26.43% 0 0.00% 9.11%
Libertarian Gary Johnson of New Mexico Bill Weld of Massachusetts 23,004 3.22% 0 0.00% 2.28%
Mountain Jill Stein of Massachusetts Ajamu Baraka of Illinois 8,075 1.13% 0 0.00% 0.47%
Constitution Darrell Castle of Tennessee Scott Bradley of Utah 3,807 0.53% 0 0.00% 0.51%
Total 714,423 100.00% 5 100.00%

By congressional district

Trump won all three congressional districts.[10]

District Trump Clinton Representative
1st 68% 26% David McKinley
2nd 66% 29% Alex Mooney
3rd 73% 23% Evan Jenkins

By county
County Clinton% Clinton# Trump% Trump# Others% Others# Total
Barbour20.19%1,22274.78%4,5275.04%3056,054
Berkeley28.75%12,32165.91%28,2445.33%2,28542,850
Boone20.61%1,79074.90%6,5044.48%3898,683
Braxton25.95%1,32169.49%3,5374.56%2325,090
Brooke26.71%2,56868.92%6,6254.37%4209,613
Cabell34.60%11,44760.00%19,8505.40%1,78833,085
Calhoun17.42%45677.76%2,0354.81%1262,617
Clay19.11%56877.39%2,3003.50%1042,972
Doddridge12.75%36283.03%2,3584.23%1202,840
Fayette27.97%4,29067.53%10,3574.50%69015,337
Gilmer21.43%54574.56%1,8964.01%1022,543
Grant10.33%51287.69%4,3461.98%984,956
Greenbrier26.77%3,76567.94%9,5565.30%74514,066
Hampshire18.36%1,58077.74%6,6923.90%3368,608
Hancock25.68%3,26270.14%8,9094.18%53112,702
Hardy20.47%1,15575.74%4,2743.79%2145,643
Harrison27.52%7,69467.06%18,7505.42%1,51627,960
Jackson21.85%2,66374.01%9,0204.14%50412,187
Jefferson39.42%9,51854.68%13,2045.90%1,42524,147
Kanawha37.34%28,26357.93%43,8504.73%3,57775,690
Lewis19.44%1,34776.13%5,2744.43%3076,928
Lincoln20.65%1,45975.11%5,3074.25%3007,066
Logan16.93%2,09280.08%9,8972.99%37012,359
Marion30.24%6,96463.69%14,6686.07%1,39723,029
Marshall22.08%2,91873.14%9,6664.78%63213,216
Mason20.43%2,08175.14%7,6544.43%45110,186
McDowell23.18%1,43874.63%4,6292.19%1366,203
Mercer20.47%4,70475.73%17,4043.80%87422,982
Mineral17.73%2,05078.43%9,0703.84%44411,564
Mingo14.41%1,37083.19%7,9112.41%2299,510
Monongalia40.78%14,69951.13%18,4328.09%2,91736,048
Monroe19.14%1,11176.54%4,4434.32%2515,805
Morgan20.55%1,57374.89%5,7324.56%3497,654
Nicholas19.39%1,84076.40%7,2514.21%4009,491
Ohio30.62%5,49362.10%11,1397.28%1,30617,938
Pendleton22.60%72974.36%2,3983.04%983,225
Pleasants19.71%62174.86%2,3585.43%1713,150
Pocahontas25.45%92868.46%2,4966.09%2223,646
Preston19.51%2,47075.35%9,5385.14%65112,659
Putnam23.64%5,88471.46%17,7884.90%1,22124,893
Raleigh21.75%6,44374.44%22,0483.81%1,12729,618
Randolph25.15%2,73570.15%7,6294.71%51210,876
Ritchie12.17%49683.56%3,4054.27%1744,075
Roane23.29%1,22272.06%3,7814.65%2445,247
Summers24.48%1,19071.06%3,4554.46%2174,862
Taylor22.81%1,49172.39%4,7334.80%3146,538
Tucker21.61%75173.81%2,5654.58%1593,475
Tyler13.88%50781.99%2,9964.13%1513,654
Upshur19.16%1,76675.99%7,0054.85%4479,218
Wayne22.11%3,35773.46%11,1524.43%67315,182
Webster18.67%55677.30%2,3024.03%1202,978
Wetzel21.69%1,35972.13%4,5196.18%3876,265
Wirt15.94%38678.90%1,9115.16%1252,422
Wood23.59%8,40071.41%25,4345.0%1,78135,615
Wyoming13.56%1,06283.60%6,5472.83%2227,831

See also

References
  1. "2016 General Election Turnout". www.sos.wv.gov. Archived from the original on 13 July 2017. Retrieved 28 June 2019.
  2. "2016 Presidential Election Statistics". Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved 2018-03-05.
  3. http://ballot-access.org/2016/02/02/west-virginia-presidential-primary-ballots-set/
  4. "West Virginia Election Results 2016". Retrieved 2016-11-12.
  5. "Deep in Virginia's craggy coal country, they saw Trump as their only hope". Washington Post. Retrieved 2016-11-12.
  6. Thomas, Zoe (2016-11-02). "Coal country West Virginia feels forgotten by politics". BBC News. Retrieved 2016-11-12.
  7. Strauss, Daniel (May 10, 2016). "Clinton haunted by coal country comment". Politico. Retrieved June 3, 2017.
  8. "West Virginia Election Results 2016 – The New York Times". Retrieved November 10, 2016.
  9. https://transition.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2016/2016presgeresults.pdf
  10. https://www.cookpolitical.com/introducing-2017-cook-political-report-partisan-voter-index
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