On the last two days of the campaign, Donald Trump said on Tuesday, "I did six speeches, and then I heard that my opponent — does anybody remember my opponent?” | Getty Trump tells Wisconsin: Victory was a surprise

Donald Trump used the latest stop on his so-called thank-you tour Tuesday to remind Wisconsin voters what he’s thanking them for.

The president-elect regaled supporters in West Allis with a roughly 30-minute tale of how a man who would have been content with losing after giving it his all wound up defying the polls and becoming America’s next president.


“Should I go over that evening just once quickly?” Trump asked, teasing the crowd just moments after insisting the media were “devastated” after his election night win.

“So it began with phony exit polls. And I got a call from my daughter at about 5 o’clock, and she was called by people in their business,” Trump began, referring to his daughter, Ivanka. “And her husband, Jared, great guy, he was called. Then they called me and they said: ‘I’m sorry, Dad. It looks really bad. Looks really, really bad.’”

Trump recalled asking what the problem was and conceded that he “really assumed I lost” because, despite his constant rant against “phony” polls, he thought they had some credibility.

“So I sort of thought I lost, and I was OK with that,” Trump admitted. “I wouldn’t say great. In fact, I called my vice president and I said, ‘It’s not looking good.’ Right, Mike [Pence]? I said not looking good.”

But the numbers were, indeed, “phony,” Trump said, suggesting pollsters would ask respondents whether they agree that the real estate mogul is a bad person — with “’yes’ in a big box!” and a “no” that couldn’t be found, he joked.

He recounted his shock at the notion that he could actually lose, which he found surprising given the massive turnout at his rallies.

“Then we got down to the last two” days of the campaign “and I did six speeches,” Trump said. “They know. These guys knew. They were exhausted, the press. And then on the seventh day, which was a — you remember — Monday, right? I did six speeches, and then I heard that my opponent — does anybody remember my opponent?”

The crowd launched into a roar of boos that competed with and ultimately morphed into the “lock her up” chants that dominated Trump’s campaign events.

“They don’t remember. They don’t remember,” Trump said, pausing before acknowledging to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, “These people are brutal.”

The president-elect continued his play-by-play, recalling that fateful June 2015 day when he descended down the Trump Tower escalator and launched his campaign. And he credited himself for being right about issues such as illegal immigration and trade.

“I got the bad news from my daughter, and I said that’s too bad,” Trump said, fast-forwarding to Election Day. “So I go and see my wife. I say, ‘Baby, I’ll tell you what, we’re not gonna win tonight because the polls have come out and’ — you know, I always used to believe in those exit polls. I don’t believe in them anymore.”

“’It’s just looking bad. But, you know what, I’m OK with it because of the fact that I couldn’t have worked any harder,’” Trump continued. “’You can’t do any worse than that. I mean, I just couldn’t have done it. And if I lose, I lose. And you know what? If I lose, I lose and I’m gonna have a nice, easy life. We can all relax, together, right?’”

Trump maintained that he put out “every single ounce of energy” in his blood and felt, regardless of the outcome, there was nothing more he could do. But his wife, Melania, expressed confidence that he would win.

“So now the polls just closed, and they start announcing numbers,” Trump said. “And I say, ‘Oh, this is gonna be embarrassing.’ I’m trying to figure out what am I gonna do. And I have this ballroom that’s not that big because I didn’t know if I was gonna win or lose.”

But what he did know is that if he was going to lose, “I didn’t want a big ballroom.” Trump reenacted the brisk concession he would have delivered, in which he would have thanked his supporters and said good night.

Returning to the story line, Trump contrasted his ballroom with the glass-ceiling convention hall and fireworks display that Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton had reserved.

“They knew they were gonna win until the final week. They knew bad things were happening, and I got a good sign when four days before the end — I called up Mike — they just canceled the fireworks,” Trump said. “It was a front-page story. They canceled. Now usually you cancel fireworks because you don’t want fireworks if you’re gonna lose, right? Did anybody ever use fireworks if they’re gonna lose? Governor, in the history of elections, if you lose, you don’t set off fireworks, right?”

Trump said he “wanted to be a wise guy” after reports of the cancellation. “So I offered them 5 cents on the dollar for their fireworks, OK?” Trump told the crowd. “I did. We never heard back. No, we never heard back. We never heard back. But that was a good sign, do you agree?”

But still, he continued, he felt he would lose. That is, until “the real numbers started coming.”

In a mock newscaster voice, Trump repeatedly said “breaking news” as he narrated big wins in Ohio, Iowa, Florida, North Carolina, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, as well as traditional red states where polls suggested Clinton’s campaign had a chance: Arizona, Georgia and Utah.

“Then it happened, folks, out of nowhere,” he said. “Boy, that map was getting red as hell. That map — that map was bleeding red.”

“That map was so beautiful looking,” Trump added. “And I’ll never forget the guy who was saying for months: ‘There is no path to 270 for Donald Trump.’ But there was a path to 306.”

While Trump won the requisite number of Electoral College votes to win the White House, Clinton has a popular vote lead of more than 2.5 million. The popular vote would have been an easier win for the president-elect, he said, but the Electoral College is “genius.”

“It’s a very different way of campaigning,” Trump said, likening the popular vote versus the Electoral College to match play versus stroke play in golf. “You know, it’s very different.”

But Trump prevailed, and, as his drawn-out tale of how he became the nation’s 45th commander in chief indicated, he’ll never forget it.

“I’ll never forget when they were on the map and they put up Wisconsin, and he said, ‘There is no path for Hillary Clinton to become president,’” Trump said, sparking another roar from the crowd. “’Donald Trump is your next president of the United States.’ Because of you. So I wanna thank — I wanna thank the people of Wisconsin. You’re incredible people.”