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What Just Happened?! And Why?

Sheila Markin

THE ELECTION THAT GOT US TRUMP 2.0

On November 5th, 2024, Donald Trump won a second term as president. He clinched both the Electoral College and the popular vote.

90% of the counties in America trended Republican in this election.

Many Democrats just stayed home compared to 2020.

11 of the 14 Senate Democratic incumbents up for reelection won more votes in their states than Harris which tells us that in the choice between Harris and Trump more voters chose Trump.

Incumbent governments across the globe lost their elections. The US actually did better than the rest of them that got dinged.

Our country went for a strongman who said he would fix everything and rejected Harris because she was the one seen as too extreme.

What Americans want is actually what the Biden/Harris administration was trying to deliver but failed to help Americans understand how they had worked to make their lives better and planned to work in the future to make their lives better in part because of fractured, siloed media

Americans really were hurting because of inflation.

Harris did not get enough time to get known to the American people. But even if she had had more time, she might have lost because:

 

WHY DID TRUMP WIN?

As the data is coming in we are learning more. So far these findings seem to be supported:

 

HARRIS v TRUMP = TRUMP

Other incumbent governments are losing elections around the world post pandemic because of inflation and fall out from the pandemic that drove more isolated people into siloed news sources. This happened here even though our economy had rebounded better than any other economy on earth thanks to the efforts of the Biden/ Harris administration. We did not have a recession. We got the so-called remarkable, impossible, amazing “soft landing”. The Biden administration did not have a clear channel of communication or powerful, well told story with clear evidence of success to tell Americans about the fantastic job they had done rescuing our economy after the pandemic. And even if they had told that story, the cost of living was still too high.

It looked like Harris had the momentum to win, especially near the end of the campaign. Her rallies were overflowing with excited, cheering people. She filled every stadium with tens of thousands of Americans who waited in long lines to be part of this movement. Her message sounded inspirational to many Americans.

At the end, Trump’s campaign had the hallmarks of a losing campaign. He could not fill the stadiums where he spoke. He had lost most of his small dollar donors who had already emptied their wallets buying his branded bibles and gold gym shoes. Many of his rallygoers were leaving the stadiums early as Trump droned on and on for hours about Haitians “They’re eating the cats. They’re eating the dogs.”  He could hardly manage to open the door of the big rig garbage truck, nearly falling over in the attempt. He rambled. He said crazy shit. Was this really a strongman who could fix everything?

Yet Trump was elected by doing incrementally better across the map of America even in places where Biden had eked out wins in 2020.

FEWER PEOPLE VOTED INCLUDING DEMOCRATS

Millions of voters who had voted in the 2020 election did not vote in this election. That includes many Democrats. There’s an internet conspiracy theory about why that was. The theory is that Musk used Starlink to rig the election. While enticing as an explanation for the surprising loss of Democratic voters who failed to get off their couches and vote, it is unconnected to reality.

According to the Associated Press last month, voting machines are, generally, not connected to the internet. With a few exceptions, however, there are some jurisdictions in a few states that permit ballot scanners to transmit unofficial results using a mobile private network after voting ends on Election Day, and after memory cards containing the vote tallies have been removed.

When an internet connection is necessary, election officials typically utilize private networks to reduce the risk of malicious activity. They also take additional measures to scan their systems for potential vulnerabilities and threats.

Chip Trowbridge, the chief technology officer of Clear Ballot, a voting system manufacturer tested and approved by the federal Election Assistance Commission (EAC), told ABC News last month, “Those systems absolutely cannot have any network,” he said. “In fact, if you look at the machines from Clear Ballot, the only wire that comes out of them is a power cord.

WHAT WERE THE MAJOR ISSUES THAT GOT TRUMP ELECTED?

THE LOSS OF THE AMERICAN DREAM/ECONOMY

The biggest reason Trump won was because the American dream has slipped out of reach for too many blue-collar working Americans. As the rich get richer and the working man is unable to get ahead or has to work two jobs to make ends meet, government should expect to be blamed for failing to do its job.

Trump was able to portray himself as the outsider. His allies know how to use the strongman playbook and a variety of megaphones to get into power by pinning the blame on “others” for that loss including Black and brown people, immigrants, the Democrats, the “radical left-wing lunatics”, trans people. The real group that deserve the blame are the rich guys at the top who are so greedy they think they need another yacht or jet instead of sharing the wealth with the workers who got them so rich in the first place.

It’s true that a huge flow of immigrants did come into our country in the first 3 years of the Biden administration. The Democrats should never have allowed that to happen because it set Trump up to win this election by fear mongering about an open border. The truth is that immigrants are not the real reason working Americans are losing the American dream. During the pandemic immigrants helped our country to continue to be the economic powerhouse we are compared to other countries around the world. We need low wage workers in this country to do jobs Americans don’t want to do- washing dishes in restaurants, repairing potholes on bridges at night, picking fruit.

Trump is real good at finding groups to blame. Just as Hitler was. He himself was aggrieved and was being attacked, he said, by the same woke leftist Democrats as they were. He amplified the fears of Americans in order to get himself back into power.

THE “ECONOMY” ISSUE WASN’T JUST ABOUT THE PRICE OF EGGS

Incomes rose 1.3% during the Trump administration for working Americans doing jobs like tool and die or metal working etc.

During the Biden administration incomes went down or were flat. Workers blamed the Biden/Harris administration because it happened on their watch.

In the past, Obama and Clinton were blamed for NAFTA and global agreements that decimated working class jobs in red states. So, the Dems already had egg on their collective faces when it came to appealing to working class Americans. The Dems are labeled as the “elites”. They are seen as out of touch with blue-collar working America which makes up about 60% of the workforce.

Only 32% of Americans are registered as Democrats anymore.

In 1940, 90% of Americans would make as much or more than their parents. Now that number is down to 50%. A white child in a working-class family in 1978 compared to 1992 is making 6% less income. Industrial workers wages in coastal areas like California and other blue states have gone up but in rust belt states like Michigan and Wisconsin, wages have gone down in low end wage factory jobs.

The American dream and upward mobility have eluded too many working Americans even while the rich are very obviously getting richer at the top.

This is why so many Americans (especially men) were angry and blamed Biden and Harris as the out of touch elites. Trump also got a surprising number of younger voters. The next generation is feeling stifled. They can’t afford to buy a house. They can’t move up in the world. They voted for Trump because they saw him, not Harris, as the change candidate who understood their needs and represented a return of male dominance and power.

The loss of the American dream also helped Trump to coalesce a multi-racial coalition of angry male working-class voters who are non-college Latinos, Blacks and White workers even though Trump is a fake populist, who is all in with white supremacy, and wants to make his rich friends and himself even richer.

Biden and Harris thought Americans were still upset about the supply chain issues that created inflation during the pandemic. They were too silent and too dismissive about the underlying anger fueling Trump’s support. The economic pain is about the more long-term loss of the American dream.

Democrats missed the main issue for working Americans. They thought they had earned the support of blue-collar Americans given the good economy they delivered after the pandemic. But they failed to communicate well enough or combat the massive disinformation going on inside internet podcasts, chat rooms and right-wing media. They relied too much on legacy media. That was a mistake.

Democrats really should have understood this economic pain and done a far better job of addressing it, fixing it, and then LOUDLY messaging about it. Democratic senators like Elissa Slotkin, who understood that, survived this Republican tsunami.

WHAT IS COMING

Both Trump’s tariffs and the massive removal of immigrant workers will make it harder for blue collar Americans to get ahead not easier. The price of eggs and butter are going to go up under Trump 2.0 if he follows through on the policies he talked about in his campaign. Trump’s coming administration will severely damage our economy.

Prediction: In Trump administration 2.0 voters are going to feel betrayed as Trump trashes the economy and our freedoms. They will get mad about it because they thought they voted for the opposite of what they are about to get. Because Trump has a trifecta; Senate, House, the White House, and Supreme Court, and Trump will get anything he wants, the damage will be on Trump and he should have to own it.

The Dems need to make sure Americans know who is to BLAME when it gets harder for American workers to make ends meet, get Christian nationalism forced down their throats including criminalized abortion and contraception, lose the right to control their bodies or love who they want to love, and see rampant corruption in government. Trump will try to pretend it is not happening or blame some other group. But Trump needs to be forced to own the damage that’s coming, and the Dems need to make sure he does.

IMMIGRATION

The first three years of the Biden Admin saw the largest influx of migrants coming across the southern border into our country in history. By far. An estimated 10-12 million people from over 100 countries entered the US. There were many reasons for this that were beyond the Administration’s control, but the administration also rescinded many of Trump’s executive orders with others expiring, without replacing [them] with any new policy that made sense. (Ron Filipkowski- Meidas Touch)

Trump understood the fears of American blue-collar workers. And he stirred them up more by saying that immigrants who were coming across the border and would take their jobs and making it harder for them to find affordable housing. That simple and stark message resonated with working Americans who were already not getting ahead. White guys saw a rising tide of black and brown people and because they were not getting ahead, they felt threatened by that wave that was also changing the country’s demographics. These angry, blue-collar Americans think a totally closed border will solve their problems. It will not.

Blue-collar Americans do not understand the downside of an economy without low wage workers to fill potholes on bridges at night or pick fruit- jobs that Americans don’t want. They don’t understand how expelling immigrants could kick start inflation that will hurt their ability to get ahead.

The reason they don’t understand that is because no one on Tucker Carlson’s podcast or Joe Rogan or Fox explained that to them. The issue is successfully being used to gin up their fears so they will vote for Trump and the MAGAs. That’s why Trump’s plan to round up illegal immigrants appeals to them so much especially in border counties.

Trump won Miami-Dade for the first time. In Texas he won the border counties by 14 pts.

HARRIS WAS SEEN AS THE INCUMBENT

Only 28% of Americans thought the country was going in the right direction. Biden’s low approval rating of 43% was transferred to Harris.

Harris got into big trouble when she failed to distinguish herself from Biden on The View. When she was asked how she would be different from Biden, she said she couldn’t think of a thing.  At that moment she became the incumbent with all of his baggage. Biden had also set her up for trouble in the first place by giving her the border issue to fix.

Trump made sure everyone knew it was her fault that all these migrants came streaming into our country illegally. The Harris campaign did not do enough to change the perception that she was the “border czar” who failed to close the border.

Take Aways

Her plans to build millions of affordable homes and provide help for new small businesses only got her so far with working Americans, especially men, who did not hear a clear enough answer they trusted about how they would reclaim the American dream. They felt too unseen and unheard by the Democrats who they decided were too far to the left, too extreme. Harris’ campaign appealed more to women by focusing on reproductive rights. But too many women isolated that issue from their presidential choice.

BRO v ROE: THE WOMAN v MAN ISSUES

Trump’s, albeit fake, alpha male image appealed to many men and especially many Hispanic men who come from a culture where the man should be the chief breadwinner, the alpha male should rule the roost, the little woman should take care of the kids and be in the kitchen. That idea is also the Christian nationalist’s version of the way a family should work.

With working class men feeling dissed and too unseen by Harris, (who was focusing on the unfairness to women with the loss of their reproductive rights), their chance at the American Dream slipping away, and with subgroups like trans people getting special treatment, many men felt aggrieved and sidelined. Trump took advantage of that. He and the right-wing podcasters uplifted the bros and the alpha males. They characterized supportive Democratic men as sissified and doubled down on trans people getting sex change operations and special treatment. That struck a chord with people who were already upset that real men were not getting ahead in life. The idea that a boy could go to school, get a sex change operation and come home a girl was insane. But as with other crazy ideas Trump launched, it resonates with the collective unconscious of Americans feeling beset by change especially men who are not feeling validated.

Even though Mexico now has a woman president, many Hispanic men could not imagine a woman as president of the United States: in the Oval Office, behind the Resolute Desk, or in the role of Commander-in-chief. Trump had a 20 pt lead with Hispanics.

That Trump is the poster boy for a version of masculinity that is toxic not only did not turn off these voters, it aligned with the values of millions of voters.  These blue-collar Americans reject the ultra-hypersensitivity about cultural correctness, wokeness, pronouns and #metoo stuff. In their view, the Dems have paid too much attention to special subgroups like LGBTQ folks and others and were not paying attention to them. Trump paid attention to them. Harris might be she/her, but Trump was a man. End of story.

Trump gained ground both with Haley Republicans and with the lowest socioeconomic groups of Americans. 90% of Republicans voted Republican in this election. Republicans came home to Trump in the end.

The Lost Bros

There was almost no ground game for Trump in the battleground states while Harris canvassers reported they were getting a great response at the doors. How did Trump win without that ground game? Trump appealed to the “lost bros”, the millions of guys listening to Joe Rogan’s, Tucker Carlson’s, and Charlie Kirk’s podcasts. Musk’s efforts online and Trump’s appearances in the bro podcasts worked better in this post pandemic era where people rely on online content for their information.

Trump portrayed himself as strong with his head affixed to the body of Superman or another superhero even though he is, in truth, old and weak.  As we know, his character is extraordinarily weak, his ability to think is limited these days and his physical power is failing.  But he portrayed himself very differently on social media.

The idea that a woman could be the most powerful person in the country and the world, rubbed millions of men the wrong way, men who were already feeling edged out of power by women and angry about that. Many men looked at Trump and thought- “I want what he has. I want to get away with what he gets away with. I want to be like Trump.”

Trump spent his time on the bro podcasts and in rallies being himself in all his error prone glory. He was forgiven for all his missteps because he was being authentically himself. Millions of voters have come to expect a kind of flawed, raw, confessional, disarming authenticity that they get from their celebrities and from stand-up comedy these days.

Trump’s riffs may have sounded crazy to some people, but to his rallygoers he was trusting them with his stream of consciousness whether it was musings about whales or Hannibal Lector. He treated his listeners as if they were his therapist- hearing his innermost thoughts. He created a relationship, trust, and sense of connection with his base that way.

Trump is a Master of Performance Politics. Images. Marketing. Storytelling. Unconscious Motivation. The Way Big Groups Think.

Democrats must get better at that.

Take Aways

Dems need to find ways to communicate using online platforms, podcasts and other new media. They need engaging, powerful personalities, fighters and more fiery combatants to do podcasts where they slam the Republicans. They need their own media ecosystem that rivals the one on the right. Harris did great in her debate with Trump because she came across as a strong combatant. Trump was afraid to get in the ring with her again. Even though Harris’ ads on TV were shown over and over they may have been too focused on the issue of abortion. They were seen by too few people because too few people watch TV anymore.

The Dems MUST find better ways to reach voters and tell their story with convincing messengers (maybe more working Americans) about how they are helping the American people.

WHAT HAPPENED WITH ABORTION RIGHTS?

When it came to Roe, many voters, including women with abortion initiatives on the ballot in their states, separated that issue from their presidential choice. The thinking was “I will vote to get abortion rights in my state, but that doesn’t mean I need to vote for Harris for president.”

The two decisions were seen as independent when they should have been understood by voters as connected. Trump cannot be trusted NOT to enforce the Comstock Act which is still on the books as federal law but not currently being enforced. All he would have to do is give the nod to enforce it again to create an overnight de facto national abortion ban that would criminalize conveyance in the US Mail of anything connected to abortion or contraception depending on how the courts would interpret the word “obscene”.

That threat was not understood or believed.

WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE GAZA FACTOR?

Gaza hurt Harris. In Dearborn Michigan, a majority- Arab American city, the war in Gaza helped Trump win Michigan with 42% of the vote. Harris got 36%. Jill Stein got 18%. People on both sides of the Gaza/ Israel issue voted for Trump. Which was insane.

WAS HARRIS DOOMED TO LOSE?

I do not want to blame the Harris campaign for failing to address these issues that lost her (and all of us) this extraordinarily consequential election. Kamala Harris herself was a truly inspirational candidate but not for enough Americans.

She beat Trump up in the debate. She ran a “flawless” campaign for a country that was ready for a woman president. But our country is not ready for that. It is a right-leaning country with blue states and blue dots in metropolitan areas. If she had run for governor of California maybe she would have won. Maybe that is what she should go for next.

Even if her campaign had addressed these problems, there is a real chance that because she is Black and Asian and a Woman, her campaign was doomed to defeat from the get-go in a country with 332 million people where not enough of them are ready yet for that kind of leadership. We seem to have a lot of misogynistic, sexist, xenophobic, angry Americans, especially men, who want to feel better about themselves and their prospects for success.

I think she began her campaign with a huge deficit of maybe 2 to 5 or more points depending on the state and district simply because she is a woman. And then, even though it was Biden not Harris who was the president who failed to effectively address and message about these incredibly important economic issues in his term of office, she was the incumbent in the minds of voters. She took the heat for Biden.

Even if Biden had addressed these problems, the mountain may have been too high to climb for any woman let alone a woman of color from left leaning California who reminded this triggered electorate that they were being judged as not woke enough in the eyes of the coastal elites.

IF THE DEMS COULD DO IT OVER AGAIN

As the returns came in, it became more and more clear that Harris had lost too many of the voters that had gotten Biden narrowly across the finish line in 2020, including suburban voters who had been thought to be her ace in the hole. Many women split for Harris, but not enough of them.

It would have been better if Biden, who promised to be a transitional president, had stuck with that decision that got him out of retirement when Trump came on the scene as an existential threat to democracy. There should have been an open primary instead of anointing Harris as the candidate. The candidate also needed to have the time for Americans to get to know him.

I say HIM for a reason.

We have a strong bench of governors including Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania, Andy Beshear in Kentucky, JB Pritzker in Illinois, Jared Polis in Colorado, and others. And we have other terrific rising stars in the Democratic Party.

Even though Gretchen Whitmer is talented and wonderful, I hope the Democrats understand the huge danger of nominating a woman for president in this country right now with men feeling lost and worried about being replaced. In a country where the 50/50 divide is so strong between blue and red America, starting with a huge deficit just because you are a woman sets you up to lose just the way Harris lost, with incremental shifts across the board because too many voters cannot imagine a woman commander-in-chief and too many men feel emasculated.

Kamala Harris probably faced an impossible task. You can’t change a deeply embedded cultural ideology in 100 days or even in 100 months. It takes a culture decades to evolve and become more open and progressive. A macho man as the Democrat’s candidate might still have lost given the mood of this country. But a strong more alpha male guy had a better chance of winning, especially if he separated himself from Biden’s policies, made clear promises to men that allayed their fears (I WILL shut the border! You will not be replaced! Here’s how you will be able to get ahead!) and vowed to uphold the reproductive rights of women.

I like James Carville’s idea that the Dems have a pre-primary in 2026 (at the time of the midterm elections) where they introduce our deep, strong bench of governors to Americans who, by that time, are likely to be sorry they fell for Trump 2.0.

 

 

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