Winning Margins in U.S. Elections

As both candidates are striving to win at least 270 electoral votes in the 2020 election, many are expecting a closer contest than the polls suggested. As our chart shows, Donald Trump won 304 electoral votes in 2016 despite narrowly losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton.

Although at the time Trump claimed his win "was the biggest electoral college win since Ronald Reagan", his triumph was not as much of a landslide as taht statement would suggest. In fact, Trump won fewer electoral votes than all but one president since Ronald Reagan: with 271 (2000) and 286 (2004) votes, George W. Bush was the only one to win by a smaller margin.