“In real estate it’s location, location, location,” veteran political reporter Tim Skubick told the Washtenaw Economic Club on November 10. “In politics it’s turnout, turnout, turnout.”

In a talk just days after Donald Trump’s upset presidential victory, Skubick ran the numbers: Trump got 151,000 more votes than Mitt Romney did in Michigan in 2012, while Hillary Clinton trailed Barack Obama’s total by 230,000–enough to turn Obama’s 54-44 percent triumph into a virtual tie. Though the outcome was still not official as the Observer went to press, Trump held a slim 11,000-vote lead.

Just don’t blame Ann Arbor: city voters turned out in force for the first woman nominated by a major political party. Clinton won every precinct and got 86 percent of the vote.

Clinton also carried every precinct in Chelsea, Dexter, Saline, and Ypsilanti, and the townships of Ann Arbor, Pittsfield, Scio, and Ypsilanti. As he did nationwide, Trump did better in rural areas, winning most or all precincts in ten outlying townships. Still, Clinton rolled up 68 percent of the county vote.

Libertarian Gary Johnson picked up 3 percent and the Green Party’s Jill Stein 1 percent–leaving just 28 percent for Trump. County clerk Larry Kestenbaum calls it the worst showing by a Republican nominee in the county “in at least a century and probably ever.”