The complacency trap is real

On Election Day 2016, staffers at Hillary Clinton’s Brooklyn headquarters were popping champagne corks and celebrating what they assumed would be her victory over Donald Trump. The next day, after her narrow defeat was finalized, one of her key strategists, a former student of mine, called me in tears.

“What went wrong?” he kept asking. “All of our data showed us we were going to win easily.”

One an…