In the course of a spirited denunciation of Donald Trump, George Will writes, “Romney, who advocated making illegal immigrants’ lives so unpleasant they would ’self-deport,’ might be president if he had received ten points more than his 27 percent of the Hispanic vote.” A lot of people have made similar claims. But take a look at this Nate Silver-generated interactive tool: Drop the Democratic share of the Hispanic vote by ten points in 2012, and the only state that flips to Romney is Florida. Instead of losing the Electoral College 332-206, Romney would have lost it 303-235.

What if Romney had done 20 points better among Hispanics? He still would have lost. He’d have had to do 45 points better among Hispanics to win without doing better in any other group. Hispanics were too thin on the ground, especially in swing states, and Romney’s overall vote too weak, for even fairly large shifts to have made a difference.

On the other hand, if Romney had done three points better among whites, four points better among blacks, and two points better among Hispanics, he would have won. He needed more votes, obviously, but he didn’t need more Hispanic votes in particular.