How Donald Trump Won the 2024 Election
And analyzing how Kamala Harris lost
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One could argue that 2016 was a fluke and 2020 was a reaction to the pandemic. But the 2024 election is different. It’s indicative of a different America. An America that Donald Trump won quite handily by expanding his base and likely winning the popular vote for the first time.
In 2016, there were good arguments that James Comey’s 11th-hour commentary on Hillary Clinton’s emails had an impact on the race.
In 2020, America was a leader amongst developed nations in pandemic-related deaths, and Trump paid the price.
But now in 2024, after four years of higher inflation, wars around the world, and a poor approval rating for the sitting President, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris had an uphill climb. She did many things right, including focusing on the Blue Wall states that Clinton largely ignored in 2016. But unfortunately for Harris, she also made critical mistakes.
Meanwhile, Trump ran on straightforward messaging that tugged at Americans’ nostalgia for the country they had before the pandemic. This combination of Harris's mistakes, which I highlighted before the election, and how Trump seized on opportunities allowed him to expand his base beyond his performance in the past two elections.
Trump is poised to win the Electoral College and the popular vote for the first time, in addition to the Senate and perhaps the House of Representatives. With the U.S. Supreme Court squarely in his corner with a strong conservative majority, Trump has won far more than the presidency. He’s won all branches of government and the immense power that comes with it.
How Donald Trump won so decisively
A few weeks ago I started noticing a downward trend in Kamala Harris’ poll numbers. It largely coincided with a shift her campaign made in its rhetoric. Instead of celebrating the “opportunity economy” she initially promoted after accepting the nomination, she shifted her focus to Donald Trump.
Harris consistently cited what his former cabinet members and officials said about him. She even called him a “fascist.” Many compared Trump to Hitler.
While I personally agreed with many of these statements and comparisons, I also feared what they could do to independent voters and to people considering voting for Donald Trump.
They’re antagonizing. Patronizing. They’re the same brand of negative fear-mongering that Democrats criticize Trump for engaging in, even if there are elements of truth.
Had Kamala Harris stuck with her positive vision for the future of America, the outcome of the 2024 election may have been different. Her message “We’re not going back” doesn’t work if many Americans are nostalgic for a more stable period of American life where prices were lower, Russia hadn’t invaded Ukraine, and October 7th hadn’t happened.
In addition to the negative, Trump-centric messaging shift by Harris campaign, three other stories help explain why Trump won so decisively. The first and most prominent – Kamala Harris’s inability to embrace and/or distinguish herself from President Joe Biden.
It’s no secret about President Joe Biden’s unpopularity. He’s suffered from low approval ratings ever since the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan and the rise of inflation. The problem is that Kamala Harris never clearly articulated how she would be similar to Biden and how she would be different.
Her answers always hedged. In some interviews, she said the Biden policies wouldn’t change, while in others she stressed that they’re different people without going into much detail into how different.
Harris was weak in defending the Biden administration’s immigration policies. She failed to describe inflation as a global phenomenon that affected everyone, not just America. In fact, America fared much better than many other developed nations over the past few years, beating back inflation successfully while keeping unemployment low and the stock market high.
We simply never heard Harris’s clear vision for how her policies would differ from Biden’s and how they would be similar. I’m not sure if she was trying to respect her former boss, but this unclear messaging likely cost her given Biden’s unpopularity.
In addition, not as many voters showed up for Harris as they did for Biden in 2020. As of now, it appears Harris won some ~66.5 million votes compared to Biden’s ~81.2 million votes in 2020. Some of this is likely due to the “uncommitted” movement that many Democrat supporters agree with to varying degrees because of the situation in Gaza and Harris’s plan to continue the Biden Administration policy. There was a large movement of these voters who planned to support a third-party candidate like Jill Stein, sit out the election, or even vote for Donald Trump.
The male vote was a huge factor too. Early evidence suggests that Harris did far worse than Biden did in 2020 with men, especially black men and young men. I had warned about Harris’s failure to reach young men on multiple occasions. It still baffles me that she ignored the man-o-verse podcast circuit that Trump hit hard. Harris didn’t appear on Joe Rogan, Lex Fridman, Theo Von, All In, and more. Trump appeared on all of them.
You cannot win over the minds of young men - or any men for that matter - if you don’t show up where they hang out. I’m sorry, but appearances by Harris on The View, the Call Her Daddy Podcast, and even SNL are not going to reach that target audience. This segment of the population is not as directly persuaded by compelling women’s rights arguments that they might otherwise hear elsewhere.
Harris should have appealed to young men – and all men – directly through the podcasting medium. She neglected it in the same way Hillary Clinton neglected Blue Wall states in 2016 and this likely cost her.
Democracy doesn’t pay the bills
For as much as political writers like myself warn of the dangers to democracy of another Trump presidency, there’s something more fundamental that we often miss. Democracy doesn’t pay the bills.
It’s easy to get wrapped up in academic and intellectual discourse about checks and balances, the rule of law, and the need for an independent judiciary, but in the end, how does that help a working-class voter in a Blue Wall state buy groceries for their family? Or put gas in their car or truck? Or afford a home with ~7% interest rates?
The democracy arguments, as important as they are, simply missed the mark. I’m guilty as charged.
I’ve had a stark realization that my arguments in favor of democracy are being articulated from a position of privilege. I have a steady income, a stable home life, and a supportive family. Many Americans do not enjoy these luxuries.
So as important as the health of American democracy may be, that’s not going to address many voters’ immediate inflation and economic concerns. That’s not going to factor in when they’re asked whether they’re better off than they were four years ago. Or whether the first Trump era was overall better for them and their families.
The “threats to democracy” arguments can also cut the other way – cancel culture, perceived censorship, and elitism all pose threats to fundamental democratic principles, including free speech. Democrats must take a hard look in the mirror when making “threats to democracy” arguments to ensure they’re entering that space with clean hands.
As I’ve personally experienced, many on the left don’t want to engage in debate and prefer to silence opposing viewpoints. Nowhere is this more clear than the divisive issue of Israel and Gaza.
Trump’s messaging was simply far more practical. He pulled on the nostalgic heartstrings for an America of another era. While this may not be completely accurate, nostalgia is a powerful emotion and force. When Trump promises greater tax cuts and better economic outcomes that put “America first” that message resonates far better than “my opponent is a threat to democracy.” Even if the latter message is true.
A new America in 2024
It’s now undeniable that Donald Trump has ushered in a new America in 2024. He achieved the unthinkable by winning the presidential election after the chaos of January 6th, multiple indictments and felonies, attempts on his life, and a mainstream media apparatus that jumps on his every word and action. Although for as much as the media critiques Trump, it also loves covering Trump (because it sells) and it’s partially complicit in normalizing Trump (even though his candidacy was unprecedented in American history).
Regardless of what you think about Donald Trump, however, he’s expanded his MAGA base and achieved a stunning victory that makes 2016 appear small by comparison. He will potentially be entering the White House again with all branches of government at his disposal.
And this time he won’t be surrounded by generals and politicians like Mike Pence who may oppose him and check his behavior. He will have a team of yes-men who have big plans to gut the federal government and remove agency independence so they’re all beholden to one man – Donald Trump. The implications, as I’ve written previously, are significant.
But this is what the majority of Americans have requested. It’s time to see it through.
If Trump actually goes through with the sweeping tariffs across the board and the mass deportations of millions, how do you think that'll affect inflation and the economy? Surely inflation will shoot up and the economy will nosedive?