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2016 United States presidential election in Illinois

election in Illinois

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 5, 2026
Entity authorityQ23018271 ↗
Source-derived summary

The 2016 United States presidential election in Illinois was held on Tuesday, November 8, 2016, as part of the 2016 United States presidential election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated. Illinois voters chose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote, pitting the Republican Party's nominee, businessman Donald Trump, and running mate Indiana Governor Mike Pence against Democratic Party nominee, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and her running mate Virginia Senator Tim Kaine. Illinois had 20 votes in the Electoral College.

Illinois was won by Clinton, who garnered 55.83% of the votes cast against Trump's 38.76%, thus winning the state by a margin of 17.07%. Prior to the election, news organizations accurately predicted that the state would be carried by Clinton, who was born in Illinois. Clinton won by a slightly wider margin than Barack Obama in 2012 (by 0.2%), making it one of eleven states (and the District of Columbia) in which she outperformed Obama's 2012 margin; however, due to an increase in third-party voting, her overall percentage of the vote was lower than Obama's in both his runs. Trump flipped eleven counties red, although all of them have small populations; the most populous of them, Whiteside County, has under 60,000 residents. He also became the first Republican ever to win the White House without carrying DeKalb, DuPage, Kane, Lake, Will, or Winnebago Counties.

Primary elections

Presidential primary elections for three parties were held in Illinois. From January 25 to February 17, 2016, the Green Party of the United States held primaries and caucuses, as part of the Green Party presidential primaries, to elect delegates representing a candidate at the 2016 Green National Convention.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “2016 United States presidential election in Illinois” is election in Illinois. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through United, States and presidential, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA strong contextual entry point for chronology, institutions and public events when official records are distinguished from later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2016, 2012—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, United, States and presidential is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “election in Illinois” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 5, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q23018271. The first chronological checks are 2016 and 2012.

Critical limits

Official terminology may obscure informal participation, dissent or communities documented only indirectly. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
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Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “2016 United States presidential election in Illinois”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow 2016 United States presidential election in Illinois primary sources, 2016 United States presidential election in Illinois archive and United research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “2016 United States presidential election in Illinois”?
  2. What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
  3. Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “2016 United States presidential election in Illinois” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.