In Donald Trump's completely baffling and incoherent interview Sunday with 60 Minutes, he was clear about one thing: He won. "Big, big." Here’s Trump:
...it’s going to be America first. It’s not going to be what we’re doing—we, we’ve lost-- we’re losing this country. We’re losing this country. That’s why I won the election. And by the way, won it easily, I mean I won easily. That was big, big.
Right. Pssst, Donnie, you lost the popular vote. Big, big. In fact, ballots are still being counted and you might lose by as much as two percent of the vote.
“We probably have about 7 million votes left to count,” said David Wasserman, an editor at Cook Political Report who is tracking turnout. “A majority of them are on the coasts, in New York, California, and Washington. She should be able to win those votes, probably 2-1.” By mid-December, when the Electoral College officially casts its ballots, Wasserman estimates that Clinton could be ahead by 2 percentage points in the popular vote.
If that turns out to be true, Clinton's vote totals could approach those of President Obama's 2012 showing. It won't change the outcome of the election, but it doesn't amount to a "mandate," unless you subscribe to the idea that citizens in two of the most populous states in the nation don’t count: New Yorkers and Californians. There’s a reason people have been protesting for a week straight—and it ain’t because Trump has a “mandate.”