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2016 Election

The 2016 US presidential election between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump was marked by low satisfaction with candidates from both parties, and was viewed as excessively negative and focused on things other than policy issues. Despite this, interest in the campaign was high and polling revealed stark racial and ethnic differences in support for the candidates. 

As a candidate, Trump pushed false claims that "illegal" votes would be cast, and predicted that if he won the popular vote but failed to win the electoral college, his supporters would riot. Rumors of inappropriate ties to Russia on the part of Trump persisted, with Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham leading calls for investigation. (Those have since been substantiated.) Trump also said his opponent should be "locked up" for her use of a private email server. 

On November 8, 2016, Hillary Clinton won 48.03 percent of the popular vote. Trump received 45.94 percent of the votes. This meant Clinton won the popular vote by more than 2.8 million votes. Trump won the Electoral College, with 304-227.

Race was a decisive factor in voting. White men and women voted 63 and 53 percent respectively for Trump. All other races voted overwhelmingly for Clinton.

See Russian Meddling in Election and Trump Relationship with Russia.

Subtopics

Timeline

2016.02.16Trump: "I'm going to open up our libel laws so when [the media] write purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money." politico.com (See also Constitutional Issues, Attempts to Discredit Media)
This would appear to violate the guarantee of a free press made in the First Amendment.
2016.02.17Trump says he supports waterboarding and similar interrogation techniques because "Torture works". washingtonpost.com (See also Constitutional Issues)
The Eighth Amendment prevents the use of cruel and unusual punishment, protecting people within the U.S., at a minimum, from punishments that involve torture and the intentional infliction of pain.
2016.03.05Trump directs a crowd of supporters to raise their right hands and asks them to "pledge" allegiance — not to the flag but to Trump. washingtonpost.com (See also Fascism)
The supporters raised their arms en masse, evoking scenes from Nazi Germany.
2016.06.26One month before Election Day, Jared Kushner’s real estate company finalized a $285 million loan as part of a refinancing package for its property near Times Square in Manhattan, just as the lender - Deutsche Bank - was working to settle money laundering cases against them, which then were settled shortly thereafter. washingtonpost.com (See also Jared Kushner, Conflicts of Interest, Corruption)
2016.07.15Trump selects Mike Pence as his running mate. nytimes.com (See also Mike Pence)
2016.07.19Melania Trump delivers speech at the Republican National Convention that appears to plagiarize lines from a 2008 speech by Michelle Obama. washingtonpost.com (See also Melania Trump)
2016.07.19Tiffany Trump speaks at Republican National Convention: "In person my father is so friendly, so considerate and so real." telegraph.co.uk (See also Tiffany Trump)
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2016.07.20Pence accepts the nomination for Vice President at the Republican convention washingtonpost.com (See also Mike Pence)
2016.10.04In vice presidential debate, Pence repeatedly declines to defend controversial statements made by Trump, instead dodging or denying that Trump made the statements. npr.org (See also Mike Pence, Assaults on Facts)
2016.10.08Pence cancels an appearance in Wisconsin and expresses dismay over Trump's "grab 'em by the pussy" comments. nbcnews.com (See also Mike Pence, Misogyny)
2016.10.18Trump spokesperson, citing a debunked blog post, said that Obama only won in North Carolina in 2008 because of voter fraud. mediaite.com (See also Voter Fraud)
2016.12.01Trump kicks off a "Thank You" tour so he can revel in crowds, boast in person, and disparage Hillary Clinton and the media. nytimes.com (See also Unprecedented Actions, Narcissism, Attempts to Discredit Media)
2016.12.04Eric Trump: "The Sad Truth: The Cost Of Stein/Clinton's #Wisconsin Vote Recount Could Have Saved At Least 5,000 Children's Lives." twitter.com (See also Eric Trump)
2016.12.04Pence tries to defend Trump’s false claim that "millions" voted illegally. washingtonpost.com (See also Mike Pence, False Statements, Assaults on Facts)
It's an awkward 3-minute exchange.
2017.01.23Trump tells lawmakers 3 million to 5 million illegal ballots cost him the popular vote. There is no evidence this occurred. washingtonpost.com (See also False Statements)
2017.01.23Without evidence, Trump tells lawmakers 3-5 million illegal ballots cost him the popular vote. washingtonpost.com (See also Unpresidential Behavior, False Statements, Assaults on Facts)
There is no evidence of widespread illegal voting in the 2016 election.
2017.01.24Trump Spokesman Sean Spicer reiterated Trump's claim again, with zero evidence that millions of people voted illegally. buzzfeed.com (See also False Statements, Assaults on Facts, Sean Spicer)
The president believed millions voted illegally based on "studies" but he did not elaborate on what those studies were.
2017.01.27Two Russian intelligence officers who worked on cyberoperations and a Russian computer security expert have been arrested and charged with treason for providing information to the United States mobile.nytimes.com (See also Russia, Trump Relationship with Russia, Corruption, Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.03.22FBI reviewing information that indicates Trump associates communicated with suspected Russian operatives, possibly to coordinate the release of information damaging to Hillary Clinton during election. cnn.com (See also Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, Russia, Corruption)
2017.06.01In the early weeks of the Trump administration, former Obama administration officials and State Department staffers fought an intense, behind-the-scenes battle to head off efforts by incoming officials to normalize relations with Russia. yahoo.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.06.02The Republican-controlled House Intelligence Committee asked U.S. spy agencies late last year to reveal the names of U.S. individuals or organizations contained in classified intelligence on Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election, engaging in the same practice that President Trump has accused the Obama administration of abusing. washingtonpost.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Hypocrisy)
2017.06.03The special counsel investigating possible ties between Trump’s campaign and Russia’s government has taken over a separate criminal probe involving former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, and may expand his inquiry to investigate the roles of the attorney general and deputy attorney general in the firing of FBI Director James Comey. apnews.com (See also Corruption, Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia, Legal Activity)
2017.06.05Russian Military Intelligence executed a cyberattack on at least one U.S. voting software supplier and sent spear-phishing emails to more than 100 local election officials just days before last November’s presidential election. theintercept.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.06.06The nation’s top intelligence official told associates in March that Trump asked him if he could intervene with FBI Director James Comey to get the bureau to back off its focus on former national security adviser Michael Flynn in its Russia probe. washingtonpost.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Michael Flynn, Corruption, Russia)
2017.06.06The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee says that Russian attacks on election systems were broader and targeted more states than those detailed in an explosive intelligence report leaked to The Intercept. usatoday.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.07.17House Republicans are pressing to defund the sole federal agency that exclusively works to ensure the voting process is secure. wsj.com (See also Assaults on Government)
2017.08.24Congressional investigators have unearthed an email from a top Trump aide, Rick Dearborn, who is now Trump's deputy chief of staff, that referenced a previously unreported effort to arrange a meeting last year between Trump campaign officials and Russian President Vladimir Putin. cnn.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia, Russia, Jeff Sessions)
2017.09.07Donald Trump Jr. said he was open to receiving information about Hillary Clinton's "fitness, character or qualifications" when he accepted a meeting with a Russian lawyer last year in his opening statement of about 15 to 20 minutes before taking questions behind closed doors from staff members of the Senate Judiciary Committee latimes.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia, Donald Trump Jr)
2017.09.11Russian operatives hiding behind false identities used Facebook’s event-management tool to remotely organize and promote anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim rallies. thedailybeast.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Russia, Trump Relationship with Russia, Immigration)
2017.09.11Russian politician Vyacheslav Nikonov, a member of the Duma, said U.S. "intelligence missed it when Russian intelligence stole the president of the United States," on a Russian panel television show. axios.com (See also Russia, Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.09.13Donald Trump's former national security adviser, retired Gen. Michael Flynn, has refused a new request to appear as a witness before the Senate intelligence committee, asserting his Fifth Amendment rights. cnn.com (See also Michael Flynn, Legal Issues, Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.09.25Nearly 17,000 registered Wisconsin voters — potentially more — were kept from the polls in November by the state’s strict voter ID law, according to a new survey of nonvoters by two University of Wisconsin political scientists. nytimes.com
Privately, some Republicans have allowed that the laws' main intent is to keep people who often vote Democratic - the poor, the young and minorities, from going to the polls.
2017.10.04A number of Russian-linked Facebook ads specifically targeted Michigan and Wisconsin, two states crucial to Donald Trump's victory last November - where Trump won by 10,700 and 22,700 votes respectively. cnn.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.10.04At a rare bi-partisan news conference, Senators Richard M. Burr, Republican of North Carolina and the committee’s chairman, and Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia and its vice chairman, broadly endorsed the conclusions of American spy agencies that said President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia directed a campaign of hacking and propaganda to disrupt the 2016 presidential election. nytimes.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.10.04Two former heads of the CIA said Russia probably didn’t have the ability to microtarget U.S. voters and districts in the 2016 presidential campaign on its own, meaning some sort of assistance would have been necessary. bloomberg.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.10.19CIA Director Mike Pompeo incorrectly asserted Thursday that U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Russia's interference campaign did not affect the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. nbcnews.com (See also Mike Pompeo, Russian Meddling in Election, False Statements)
2017.10.26Twitter said Thursday it would "off-board" ads linked to Russian state outlets Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik over concerns they tried to influence the 2016 election. axios.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.10.30Facebook plans to tell lawmakers on Tuesday that 126 million of its users may have seen content produced and circulated by Russian operatives, many times more than what the company previously disclosed about the reach of the disinformation campaign during the 2016 presidential election. washingtonpost.com (See also 2016 Campaign, Russian Meddling in Election)
2017.11.14On Aug. 3 of last year, just as the US presidential election was entering its final, heated phase, the Russian Foreign Ministry sent nearly $30,000 to its embassy in Washington. buzzfeed.com (See also Trump Relationship with Russia, Russia)
The wire transfer, which came from a Kremlin-backed Russian bank, landed in one of the embassy’s Citibank accounts and contained a remarkable memo line: “to finance election campaign of 2016.”
2017.11.30Donald Trump over the summer repeatedly urged senior Senate Republicans, including the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, to end the panel’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. nytimes.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Conflicts of Interest, Russia, Legal Issues)
2017.12.13Donald Trump Jr. met with the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee for 9 hours, as part of the panel’s investigation into Russia, the 2016 U.S. election and whether his father’s election campaign colluded with Moscow. reuters.com (See also Donald Trump Jr, Legal Issues, Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, 2016 Campaign)
2017.12.14Donald Trump continues to reject the evidence that Russia supported his run for the White House as part of an unprecedented assault on a pillar of U.S. democracy. washingtonpost.com (See also Russia, Trump Relationship with Russia, Jared Kushner, Reince Priebus, H.R. McMaster, John Kelly, 2016 Campaign)
2017.12.15Special Counsel Robert Mueller has requested that Cambridge Analytica, a data firm that worked for President Donald Trump’s campaign, turn over documents as part of its investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election, according to people familiar with the matter. wsj.com (See also Legal Activity, 2016 Campaign, Steve Bannon, Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia)
2017.12.22Donald Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon and his former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski have been asked to testify to House lawmakers investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. bloomberg.com (See also Steve Bannon, Russian Meddling in Election, Legal Issues)
2018.01.03The White House announced Wednesday that Donald Trump is dissolving his voter fraud commission after states failed to hand over requested information. thehill.com (See also Voter Fraud, Voter Suppression, False Statements, Reversals)
2018.01.04Donald Trump gave firm instructions in March to the White House’s top lawyer: stop the attorney general, Jeff Sessions, from recusing himself in the Justice Department’s investigation into whether Mr. Trump’s associates had helped a Russian campaign to disrupt the 2016 election. nytimes.com (See also Jeff Sessions, Department of Justice, Corruption, Russian Meddling in Election)
2018.01.17US authorities are poring over hundreds of newly uncovered payments from Russian diplomatic accounts, including transactions by former ambassador Sergey Kislyak 10 days after the 2016 presidential election and a blocked $150,000 cash withdrawal five days after the inauguration. buzzfeed.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia, Corruption)
2018.01.18The FBI is investigating whether a top Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin illegally funneled money to the National Rifle Association to help Donald Trump win the presidency, as it is illegal to use foreign money to influence federal elections. mcclatchydc.com (See also Russia, Trump Relationship with Russia, Legal Issues)
2018.02.08The U.S. official in charge of protecting American elections from hacking says the Russians successfully penetrated the voter registration rolls of several U.S. states prior to the 2016 presidential election. nbcnews.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Department of Homeland Security)
2018.02.09Rachel L. Brand, the No. 3 official at the Justice Department, plans to step down after nine months on the job as the country’s top law enforcement agency has been under attack by Donald Trump. nytimes.com (See also Resignations and Dismissals, Department of Justice, Jeff Sessions)
2018.02.13Russia is already meddling in the midterm elections this year, the top American intelligence officials said, warning that Moscow is using a digital strategy to worsen the country’s political and social divisions. nytimes.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Russia, Trump Relationship with Russia)
2018.02.16The special counsel investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election charged 13 Russian nationals and three Russian organizations with illegally trying to disrupt the American political process, including efforts designed to boost the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump and hurt that of his opponent, Hillary Clinton. nytimes.com (See also 2016 Campaign, Russian Meddling in Election, Legal Activity)
The indictment represents the first charges by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, for meddling in the 2016 presidential election — the fundamental crime that he was assigned to investigate.
2018.02.27The U.S. intelligence community developed substantial evidence that state websites or voter registration systems in seven states were compromised by Russian-backed covert operatives prior to the 2016 election — but never told the states involved. nbcnews.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
2018.03.12Over two-thirds of U.S. House of Representatives Democrats urged Donald Trump to enact sanctions on Russia, the latest push by lawmakers for a response to investigators’ findings that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. election. reuters.com (See also Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election)
2018.03.16Facebook is suspending the Trump-affiliated data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica, after learning that it failed to delete data that it had taken inappropriately from users of the social network. washingtonpost.com (See also Corruption, Steve Bannon)
The company was funded by Robert Mercer, and Steve Bannon once sat on its board.
2018.03.17Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, John Dowd, said that he hopes Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein will shut down Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russia’s election interference. thedailybeast.com (See also Legal Issues, Russian Meddling in Election, 201)
2018.03.19Senior executives at Cambridge Analytica – the data company that credits itself with Donald Trump’s presidential victory – have been secretly filmed saying they could entrap politicians in compromising situations with bribes and Ukrainian sex workers. channel4.com (See also 2016 Campaign, Corruption)
2018.03.20Donald Trump called on Tuesday to congratulate President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on his re-election, but did not raise with him the lopsided nature of his victory, Russia’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election or Moscow’s role in a nerve agent attack on a former Russian spy and his daughter living in Britain. nytimes.com (See also Unpresidential Behavior, Trump Relationship with Russia)
2018.03.28A top Trump campaign official had repeated communications during the final weeks of the 2016 presidential race with a business associate tied to Russian intelligence, according to a document released on Tuesday by the special counsel investigating Russian interference in the election. nytimes.com (See also Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia, Legal Issues)
The campaign official, Rick Gates, has pleaded guilty in the investigation by the special counsel into Russian election interference.
2018.04.27A direct line of communication between the Kremlin-connected Agalarov family and the Trump family was open during the transition after President Donald Trump’s presidential election. buzzfeed.com (See also Trump Relationship with Russia)
2018.05.08Russia was preparing to undermine confidence in the United States’ voting process when its hackers surveilled around 20 state election systems in the run-up to the 2016 elections, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee. nytimes.com (See also Russia, Cybersecurity)
2018.05.16The Republican at the helm of the Senate’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election backed the assessment by American intelligence agencies that Moscow favored Donald J. Trump in the race, contradicting both the president and fellow Republicans in the House. nytimes.com (See also Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election)
Senator Richard M. Burr of North Carolina, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement that he saw “no reason to dispute” the intelligence assessment, which was delivered in the final weeks of the Obama administration.
2018.05.29Donald Trump accused prosecutors working on the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election of planning to meddle in this year’s midterm elections, escalating his attack on the probe while offering no evidence to back up his assertion. washingtonpost.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, False Statements, Assaults on Civil Liberties)
2018.07.03The Senate Intelligence Committee backed the intelligence community's assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election to aid President Donald Trump and is continuing its efforts to undermine U.S. democracy. politico.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election)
The finding that reveals Russia meddled in far more extensive ways than previously known is yet another strong rebuke to Trump and many of his allies who continue to cast doubt on the finding from the intelligence community that Moscow carried out an operation to help his candidacy and hurt Hillary Clinton.
2018.07.13A federal grand jury handed down an indictment in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation that provided new details about Russia hackers’ attempted, and in at least one case, successful infiltration of state and local election systems, stealing the personal information of approximately 500,000 voters in a July 2016 hack, led by a Russian military officer, of an unnamed state’s board of elections website. talkingpointsmemo.com (See also Criminality, Russian Meddling in Election, 2016 Campaign)
2018.07.16Donald Trump refused to support the collective conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election, saying that Russian President Vladi­mir Putin had given him an “extremely strong and powerful” denial during their private talks here, and would not challenge Putin’s claim that the Russian government played no role in trying to sabotage the U.S. election, even as the Justice Department indicted 12 Russian intelligence officers, accusing them of hacking Democratic emails as part of a broad subterfuge operation to help Trump win the... washingtonpost.com (See also Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia)
2018.09.06Donald Trump will not answer federal investigators’ questions, in writing or in person, about whether he tried to block the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, according to one of the president’s attorneys. apnews.com (See also Legal Issues, Russian Meddling in Election)
2018.09.21Donald Trump walked back his order earlier this week to declassify information in the ongoing probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, saying Justice Department officials and others had persuaded him not to do so for the time being. washingtonpost.com (See also Reversals, Trump Relationship with Russia, Department of Justice)
2018.10.08Rick Gates, a top Trump campaign official requested proposals in 2016 from an Israeli company to create fake online identities, to use social media manipulation and to gather intelligence to help defeat Republican primary race opponents and Hillary Clinton. nytimes.com (See also Criminality, Corruption, Russian Meddling in Election)
2018.11.28Senate Republicans blocked a bipartisan push to vote on legislation protecting special counsel Robert Mueller. politico.com (See also Conflicts of Interest)
2018.12.05Michael T. Flynn, Donald Trump’s first national security adviser, helped substantially with the special counsel’s investigation and should receive little to no prison time for lying to federal investigators, according to prosecutors, as Mr. Flynn was a key cooperator who helped the Justice Department with several investigations sitting for 19 interviews with Robert Mueller’s office and other prosecutors and handed over documents and communications. nytimes.com (See also Michael Flynn, Legal Activity, Trump Relationship with Russia, 2016 Campaign)
Mr. Flynn has pleaded guilty to lying to investigators about conversations he had with the Russian ambassador to the United States during the presidential transition.
2018.12.09Thirteen damning, detailed things that we already know about Donald Trump, Russia, and the 2016 election. axios.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Jared Kushner, Donald Trump Jr)