Insiders on Election Night: Trump win shocked even true believers

NEW YORK - As election evening began in Midtown Manhattan, people who wanted Donald Trump to win - loyal Republicans who risked the scorn of conservative critics to work hard on Trump's behalf - were not only not sure he would win, they were actively trying to imagine the best-case scenario for his defeat.

About 4:30 in the afternoon, I ran into a well-connected Republican operative on Sixth Avenue. She thought Florida didn't look good - Trump would have to make up too many votes to counter a heavy Hispanic turnout. But North Carolina looked good, as did Ohio and Iowa. All that was OK, but without Florida - no Trump victory.

We talked about whether Trump would surpass 206 electoral votes, which was Mitt Romney's losing total in 2012. The answer was yes - just winning Ohio would do that trick. And beating Romney might quiet some of those NeverTrumpers who predicted Trump would lead the GOP to an utter blowout loss of historic proportions.

But then the Republican expressed doubt about her doubts.

"I'm more nervous than I was in 2012," she said. Back then, at 4:30 in Boston, she knew full well that Romney would lose. This time, although the road looked tough for Trump, there was enough of an air of unpredictability about the results that, even though she thought Trump would falter, she wasn't nearly as sure as four years ago.

At the Hilton Midtown, where Trump would hold his election-night event, a Republican strategist who had worked on the Dole campaign, two Bush campaigns, the McCain campaign, and the Romney campaign had little confidence Trump would win, but felt sure he would exceed Romney. Even a close loss would have value, he explained, because it would likely force the Beltway Republicans who refused to help Trump to look into the mirror and ask whether they could have done more to elect a GOP president.

That's the kind of thinking that was going on in the early evening of the most extraordinary Election Night in U.S. history. Trump supporters wanted Trump to win - that's why they were there - but there were doubts galore.

Even Jeff Sessions, the Alabama senator whose early endorsement was a huge boost for Trump, seemed unsure about a Trump victory. Sessions said that in the last few days he visited Trump county headquarters in Arizona and Virginia. He was struck by the intensity of the support there. "The feelings of the American public are legitimate, and the politicians need to hear it," Sessions told me. "This isn't going away. This isn't a one-time thing."

The implication was that, even if Trump lost, Trump's focus on working Americans would go on.

All the while, the Trump campaign was expressing optimism. I ran into Jason Miller, the communications director, the night before the election and the morning voting began. He said Trump strategists felt very good not just about Florida but about North Carolina and Ohio and Michigan and Pennsylvania and other Rust Belt states.

At 9 p.m., as some Trump fans were still contemplating an unhappy night, another Trump adviser, Boris Epshteyn, said optimism was "sky-high" at Trump Tower.

Of course they would say that. But it turned out the optimism was right on the money.

"I think it's a long shot," said another Trump volunteer, this one from Virginia. But there was one thing that kept hope alive for him. In this race, he said, "The metrics that usually apply don't apply."

By about 10 p.m., the news began to brighten: Florida was looking better. So was North Carolina. And Ohio.

I ran into Sessions again. Like everybody else, he was in better spirits.

"When I endorsed Donald Trump, I thought our candidate needed to appeal to the upper Midwest," he said. "Otherwise, we'd never get elected president. And so he carried Indiana by a huge vote, he carried Ohio by a nice vote ..."

I asked whether his worry was that the Republican Party had become too centered in the South to win a national election. "There's not enough votes," he said. "California is not doable. New York is not doable. When I endorsed Trump, I thought he brought that to the table. And added to your more conservative states, that can put you over the top."

Everyone's nerves settled as the minutes ticked by. The big TVs all around were playing Fox News, which had Trump at 254 electoral votes - just 11 away from victory.

The problem was, nothing happened for a long time. Some supporters became frustrated with the slow pace of vote counting. Trump seemed stuck. The audience became frustrated with Fox for not calling the race, not knowing that no other news organization had called it either.

They heard the report that Hillary Clinton would not speak to her rally, about a mile away, and then they watched as top aide John Podesta took the stage to vow to wait for more returns before Clinton spoke on Wednesday.

Then more waiting. Word spread that Trump was coming to the Hilton. The race still had not been called, but it would have been completely unlike Trump to stiff an audience that had waited hours to see him.

By the time Trump walked onstage to deliver a graceful victory speech - it was nearly 3 a.m. - The Associated Press and other media organizations had called the race, proclaiming him the president-elect.

Yes, there were some people there who said they knew all along he would win. But Trump's supporters had spent months looking at the same polls as everybody else. When it turned out those polls were wrong, and their man was racing to victory, Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning made for a very, very happy shock.

© 2016, Universal