FiveThirtyEight does AH

[Charles EP M.]

FiveThirtyEight's Ella Koeze did a piece last year on "How 13 Rejected States Would Have Changed The Electoral College", with the intention being:

One way to understand just how skewed the Electoral College can be is by rearranging the states inside of it. We know what would happen if the Electoral College were gone, but what would happen if it were simply different?

Our current state borders are fairly arbitrary. Throughout American history, people have been proposing new states, but most don’t appear on the map today, either because they once existed but were later redrawn, or because they simply never caught on. But what if some of these would-be states were around today? Would moving those state borders, without changing any votes, change our political reality?

It turns out the answer is "no" but it definitely shows how arbitrary the US electoral college is and our "THIS IS RED THIS IS BLUE" views. So one is the State of Superior, proposed in 1897 for the top of Michigan, which means (if all the voters were the same) "Trump would have won Superior by a 21-point margin, leaving Michigan’s lower peninsula to be narrowly won by Clinton", changing how we talk about and view the place(s). And for Illinois, solidly blue state, definitely Democrat, if Chicago was its own state "the rest of Illinois then would have become a red-leaning swing state". The West Coat proposed states of Lincoln and Jefferson would be Republican in 2016 and kill the idea of the entire coast as pure blue.

As a general thought exercise, it's quite clever.

(This is also a good way to get AH states quickly)

 

[napoleon IV]

There's other proposed states that lead to interesting outcomes (I haven't done the exact math so there may be some errors and I'm not sure how many EVs there are):

There was another proposed State of Lincoln, which would have been the south-southwest portions of Texas (map). This state would have gone for Clinton, and the remaining portion of Texas would be even redder.

There have been a couple of proposals to merge the portions of Maryland and Virginia on the Delmarva Peninsula with Delaware to create a new state called Delmarva. One of these proposals would have seen Maryland and Virginia's Delmarva portions merge with Kent and Sussex County in Delaware. This state would have voted for Trump, but the remainder of Delaware (New Castle County, which I guess would be it's own state) would have voted for Clinton. The other proposal would have merged the Eastern Shore of Maryland with Delaware, which would have resulted in the whole state going to Trump. In both cases Maryland would be an even bluer state.

Two Long Island State proposals: the first is Nassau and Suffolk Counties becoming their own state. This state would have narrowly gone for Trump. The second proposal would add Brooklyn and Queens to the State of Long Island, and this state would have been easily won by Clinton. The rest of New York State remains solid blue in both proposals.

Finally, a really stupid and implausible idea: the Italian Unionist Movement was a group that after WWII proposed that Italy become a US state. If made a state Italy would be the largest state by population in 2016 (a little over 60 million, compared to a little under 40 million for California). Obviously there is no voting data for Italy in US elections, but given that Italians generally have a negative view of Trump there's a pretty good chance that Italy would vote for Clinton. Also, ignore the legions of butterflies that I killed here.

 

[MAC161]

Finally, a really stupid and implausible idea: the Italian Unionist Movement was a group that after WWII proposed that Italy become a US state. If made a state Italy would be the largest state by population in 2016 (a little over 60 million, compared to a little under 40 million for California). Obviously there is no voting data for Italy in US elections, but given that Italians generally have a negative view of Trump there's a pretty good chance that Italy would vote for Clinton. Also, ignore the legions of butterflies that I killed here.

Reminds me of the headline included in the opening pages of Watchmen: "Vietnam 51st State!" Can't imagine what would have to be mucked around with for that to happen (apart from the events shown in the comic), or what it might mean for the other U.S. territories in the Pacific, and maybe even the Philippines given the probably-increased U.S. military presence in SE Asia (a bigger Subic Bay, for example).

 

[Charles EP M.]

There have been a couple of proposals to merge the portions of Maryland and Virginia on the Delmarva Peninsula with Delaware to create a new state called Delmarva.

Oh so THAT'S where Steven Universe got the state name from.