WHAT DID THE ELECTION SURVEY TELL US?

WHAT DID THE ELECTION SURVEY TELL US?

After the general election I did a survey of citizens to find out how they felt about the results. I surveyed 76 individuals. The population was 60% male and 40% female, 77% had some college education with 4 of them having earned PhDs; about half were retired; only a few were unemployed. The participants ranged in age from 14 to 94 and included voters and non voters.

It was a politically diverse group with 51% liberal/Progressive/Democrat, 37% Conservative/Republican and the rest registering as Independents, Libertarians or Greens. 

When asked about being religious, 85% indicated that they were. They included Quakers. Unitarians and those who considered themselves as Spiritual.

Of those with some college education, 64% voted for Clinton,
30% voted for Trump, there were 3 votes for Stein (The Green candidate) and one vote for Johnson (The Libertarian candidate). Of those who had a high school education or less, 63% supported Trump. with 37% choosing Clinton. 

In the survey, those who voted for Clinton 54% were male 46% were female. Of those who supported Trump 71% were male and 29% were female. Among women supporters Clinton won 73% of the vote with Trump getting 27%.
This shows that Trump received more of the female vote than expected.

MY OBSERVATIONS---

The comments from those of you who completed the survey tell me that Hillary Clinton lost the election because she was not the right candidate to go up against the juggernaut of Donald Trump. She used traditional tactics to oppose an individual who used the media and "school yard" behavior to his advantage. Her campaign ignored advice to visit the areas of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin that went for Trump.  Someone noted that if they had done a survey like this during the campaign and responded to it, it  might have altered the outcome of the election. We will never know.

The most popular candidate in this survey was Bernie Sanders.  He won the most votes in the primary and even some Republicans indicated they might have voted for him in the General Election, if he had been a choice.

Neither Clinton nor Trump had a lot of enthusiastic support in the survey.  Many who voted for Clinton qualified their decision to vote for her. "A vote against Trump, not for Clinton". Didn't want Trump". "No time for Trump".  "Not an idiot" Others did cite "experience", more competent", "is intelligent" "cares about kids", "values women's rights" as reasons to support her.

Most participants who supported Trump actually were voting against the establishment and the status quo.  They did not really vote for his policies or programs, they voted "for change", to "shake things up", against a "liberal agenda"and "Clinton's policies".  I had the feeling that some of the people who supported Trump were already having second thoughts about their decision after the election.

I believe religion played a bigger role in the results of the election than some have postulated. In the survey 92% of Trump voters indicated they considered themselves to be religious.  That dropped to 61% of Clinton's supporters who indicated that they were religious. I grew up in a rural area of central Pennsylvania and the vast majority of the folks who live there are conservative Christians and Republican.  Trump won these areas by huge margins. In one small municipality close to where I grew up, he won by a 10 to 1 margin. This is evidence for an on going trend.  The Republicans have become  the "religious party" and the Democrats are increasingly the "secular party".  This will need to be factored into all future elections if candidates plan to be successful.

The comments participants produced in the survey speak for themselves and I do not plan to do any analysis of them.  NOTE:  The main report which includes comments on the various questions was sent out before the holidays.

This has been an interesting experience for me and has given me something to do in cold weather.

Thanks to all who participated.  I would appreciate any comments, questions, suggestions you might have.

Thanks,

Dick Brown