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Westmoreland County's Turnout Helped Trump Win Pennsylvania

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - Pennsylvania is considered to be a swing state for presidential elections.

Lately, it had not lived up to that reputation - until last night. For the first time since 1988, Pennsylvania elected a Republican candidate, despite having more registered Democrats.

Rural areas carried Donald Trump over the top, including Westmoreland County.

Out of all the areas in western Pennsylvania, it was Westmoreland County that gave Trump more votes than any other area in our region.

Lifelong residents were not entirely surprised by this news.

At Dick's Diner in Murrysville today, the talk was about Trump not only winning the election, but carrying Pennsylvania.

"I was thinking he was a dark horse and he was pulling ahead," Lester Dolton said.

"I thought it was pretty surprising. I mean, I wasn't expecting that at all. I thought Hillary had Pennsylvania in the bag," Jessica Lewandowski said.

Westmoreland County played a large role with 116,427 voters casting their ballot for Trump, giving him 64 percent of the vote there.

Hillary Clinton got 59,506 votes.

Mark Graw has lived in the area for 50 years. As a registered Independent, he wrote in his own vote.

"Neither one of those candidates were worth voting for, so I had to go a different way," he said.

Barbara lackey voted for Clinton, but has her own reasoning as to how Trump pulled out a win.

"I think there must have been a big, big turnout of working class people that supported a change in government. They're tired of Washington," she said.

"My thing about it is I'm just glad it's over with. I'm glad we can move on with our lives, hopefully make some money, hopefully we don't invade Canada," George Gaydos said.

White voters are a shrinking part of the population here in Pennsylvania, but they still make up the majority with 4 out of every 5 voters.

White women were evenly divided among the candidates, but Trump was able to gain the support of white men with every 3 out of 5 voting for him.

Elsewhere in the state, unwavering loyalty and a lot of pride is what many Butler and Beaver County residents have for Donald Trump. They all have high hopes for their president-elect.

Steadfast supporters in Butler and Beaver counties have many reasons why Trump was always their choice.

"We needed a shakeup. And I think someone that hasn't been in office may see things differently and turn things around," said Rhonda Knoll of Cranberry.

"I always thought we needed a business man to run the country. And even though he has had a few failed businesses, so did HarryTruman and we can't condemn him for that," said Glenn Irwin of Cramberry.

"I believe that it would be nice to have a fresh face, someone who hasn't been in politics very much, someone who I guess you can say wasn't corrupted," said Nasya McMahan of Chippewa.

They also have many reasons why they believe Trump won the election.

"I think the push at the end. Just at the very end the states that he went to. And I just think they were tired of what was happening. And i think at the very end everybody woke up," said Knoll.

"Well, I mean obviously he was going against Hillary, and there is a lot of stuff going against her so that definitely played in his favor. But another one I think was just a lot of people really liked his attitude and how he presented himself," said McMahan.

"Because the people needed a change. In my job were all over Washington and Westmoreland county and the signs are all over the place. Everybody wanted a change," said Irwin.

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