Donald Trump has won Georgia’s 16 electoral votes, according to projections from Fox News and NBC News.
Based purely on Georgia’s electoral history, Trump’s victory in the state should come as no surprise. The Peach State has voted for a Republican president in every election but three since 1960.
Still, the Clinton campaign’s loss in the state adds on to crucial losses in much more competitive swing states including North Carolina, Florida and Ohio.
Polling in the state has shown Trump consistently ahead since August. On Election Day, TPM’s PollTracker Average showed Trump leading Clinton 48.3 to 44.1 — a healthy lead, to be sure, but far below the one he held in deeper red states like Alabama or Mississippi.
Those odds could be attributed in part to Georgia’s changing demographics: White voters made up 57 percent of the state’s electorate this year, versus 59 percent four years ago, according to the Augusta Chronicle. In 2012, 12,933 Latinos voted early by the Monday before election day. In 2016, that number was 31,623, according to CNN.
Neither presidential campaign spent much money on the state, especially compared to other hubs of television advertising like Florida.
As of a Nov. 2 Atlanta Journal-Constitution report, Clinton and her joint fundraising committee with the Democratic Party had spent $1.9 million in Georgia, though the vast majority of that was funneled to other state Democratic parties around the country. The Trump campaign, meanwhile, had spent just $233,000 in Georgia.
On Oct. 20, Priorities USA, a Clinton-aligned super PAC, began a $2 million ad buy in the state, according to Mother Jones. That unusual sign of optimism had many curious whether the Clinton campaign thought Georgia might be in play in 2016, or at least an ambitious goal for future Democratic presidential candidates.
Tuesday’s vote gave them their answer: No such luck, at least this year.
