In 2016 I think both the Rs and Ds nominated the candidate that could have only possibly lost to the other. I believe pretty much any other D would have crushed Trump. And that pretty much any other R would have beaten Hillary in the popular vote and had a MUCH wider EC margin.
I strongly disagree with this as it pertains to Trump.
I've said it before and I'll say it again:
At the beginning of the 2016 Primaries there were something like 20 candidates (4 D's, 16 R's) and 19 more-or-less supported the More Democrats / Cheap Labor pro-immigration position as dictated by their paymasters.
Only one candidate took the side of the American People on the immigration issue and he became President. That was NOT coincidental.
Your assertion that another R would have won on 2016 is laughable. The money candidate was Jeb! (remember him). Jeb! wouldn't have even threatened Hillary in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.
Wisconsin (10), Michigan (16), and Pennsylvania (20) have 46 EV's between them. If you add those 46 to the 227 that Hillary won you get 273 which is a majority. That is even without the 5 D EV's that went elsewhere in protest/despair.
Trump put Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania in play by standing up to the donors and taking the side of the American People on the Immigration issue and making that THE centerpiece of his campaign.
To be fair, Jeb! probably wouldn't have lost quite as badly in places like your adopted home State but he still wouldn't have come close to a majority and he would have lost the EC in a big way, bigly as it were.
