A couple of things: Most people, especially Republicans, don't really vote for the person but for the party affiliation. Republicans vote that way because of tribalism, it's the white people's party. I don't believe Trump really brought out or switch too many votes but when you're talking about an election being decided by 80k over 3 states, every vote matters. Vote totals for both candidates were down. I don't think we realize Obama was a special candidate. People were in bad shape and they were really looking for him to do some big things and he didn't as much as they wanted. He was more evolutionary than revolutionary. Of course, he had an opposition party who's goal wasn't to govern but to deny him any victories, no matter the cost.
The other thing was black voter suppression. I think it is totally under appreciated what a difference it made. Not just the legislative actions the GOP takes but the Russian propaganda that encouraged the black vote to stay home. You can see it on the board how people echo it. The majority of the propaganda the Russians put out was intended to inflame white resentment and to turn black people off to Hilary Clinton. The Bernie Bros. did a good job of passing that shit around. Most of the white people were going to vote republican anyway but it was really effective at keeping the black vote home.
I don't think Trump has gained more voters this election than he has lost. I've overheard many white people talk about how stupid he is. The difference in this election is will the black vote turn out in the battleground states.
