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      ‘Queen of polling’ J Ann Selzer quits after Iowa survey missed by 16 points

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      J Ann Selzer, the celebrated Iowa election pollster, announced on Sunday that she is moving on “to other ventures and opportunities”, two weeks after her survey in the state wrongly predicted a strong shift to Kamala Harris in the days before the election.That poll, which projected a 47% to 44% lead for the vice-president over Donald Trump on the back of older women breaking for Democrats over the issue of reproductive rights, came three days before the national vote, giving Democrats false hope that Harris could win the White House decisively. When the votes were counted, Selzer was off by 16 points as the former president won the state decisively.Selzer, known as the “queen of polling”, shot to fame in 2008 when she predicted that a virtually unknown senator, Barack Obama, would beat frontrunner Hillary Clinton in the Iowa caucuses.She told MSNBC before the vote that Harris was leading in early voting in Iowa “because of her strength with women generally, even stronger with women aged 65 and older. Her margin is more than 2-to-1 – and this is an age group that shows up to vote, or votes early, in disproportionately large numbers.”Trump disputed the poll in a post on his Truth Social network at the time.“In fact, it’s not even close! All polls, except for one heavily skewed toward the Democrats by a Trump hater who called it totally wrong the last time, have me up, BY A LOT.”According to unofficial results, Trump ultimately won Iowa by 13 points, 56% to 43%.In a column published by the Des Moines Register on Sunday, Selzer wrote that public opinion polling had been her “life’s work” and had made a decision to step back from it a year ago.“Would I have liked to make this announcement after a final poll aligned with Election Day results? Of course,” she wrote. “It’s ironic that it’s just the opposite.”Seltzer ventured that her strong track record had “maybe that history of accuracy made the outlier position too comfortable”.“Polling is a science of estimation, and science has a way of periodically humbling the scientist. So, I’m humbled, yet always willing to learn from unexpected findings,” she added.A review of Selzer’s final 2024 poll hasn’t revealed a clear reason for missing Trump’s runaway victory in the state, the paper said in a column published on Sunday, adding that it is “evaluating the best ways to continue surveys that will provide accurate information and insight about issues that matter to Iowans”.Editor Carol Hunter wrote that the Iowa Poll “has been an important legacy indicator and we recognize the need to evolve and find new ways to accurately take the pulse of Iowans on state and national issues”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut the black eye the polling business has received for failing to predict a strong Trump victory in the electoral college, 312 to 226, and popular vote, taking with him all seven swing states and seeing every state moving Republican, may not be entirely deserved.Most political polls for the 2024 presidential election saw a close race in the electoral college, and a popular-vote victory for Harris. But the election results so far show that Trump added more than 2m votes to his 2020 total, while Harris received millions fewer votes than Joe Biden did four years earlier, in what some are calling the lost “couch vote”.Trump won the electoral college 312 to 226, and currently leads the popular vote by 1.7%. UC Riverside polling expert Andy Crosby wrote that Trump’s margin of victory was within the 2.2% margin of error of most of the final elections polls.After what turned out to be the final Selzer Iowa poll this year, she had offered these words of warning to excited Never Trump podcasters at The Bulwark: “People looked at my methodology … and it’s published in every article in the Des Moines Register, how we do it, but you look at it on paper and you go, It’s too simple, this can’t possibly work. And so far it has, but I’m prepared that one day it will not work and I will blow up into tiny little pieces and be scattered across the city of Des Moines.” More

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      The ‘foolproof’ election forecaster who predicted Trump would lose – what went wrong?

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      Surely not even Nostradamus could get it right all of the time.Allan Lichtman had correctly forecast the result of nine of the past 10 US presidential elections (and even the one he didn’t, in 2000, he insists was stolen from Al Gore). His predictive model of “13 keys” to the White House was emulated around the world and seemed all but indestructible.Until, that is, Donald Trump, the notorious human wrecking ball, came along and broke his crystal ball. Lichtman had prophesied that Democrat Kamala Harris would win eight of his keys, claiming the presidency, forcing him to face the harsh truth that his winning streak was over. Was it a big personal blow?“Of course,” the 77-year-old admits by phone. “But I care far less about the personal blow than I care about the blow to our democracy. Even before the election I said, ‘Look, if I’m wrong, the implications are vastly greater for our society than they are for the keys.’ It’s much more important to look at the broader implications.”Lichtman, a history professor who has been teaching at American University in Washington for more than a half a century, developed his keys to the White House in the early 1980s. With Vladimir Keilis-Borok, a Soviet expert on earthquake prediction, he analysed elections in terms of stability (the party holding the White House holds it) versus earthquake (the party holding the White House is ejected).The pair devised 13 true/false questions: if six or more keys went against the White House party, it would lose. Lichtman used the model to successfully predict Ronald Reagan’s victory in 1984 and (nearly) every election that followed. After the 2016 election, he received a copy of his Washington Post interview with a message written in a Sharpie pen: “Congrats, professor. Good call. Donald J Trump.”The 2024 election was always going to be a tough test for Lichtman. Joe Biden dropped out in favour of Harris while Trump, who survived two assassination attempts, is a norm-busting figure who was bidding to become the first former president to win back the White House since Grover Cleveland in the 19th century.Why did he think Harris would win, and what went wrong? “The keys are premised on the proposition that a rational, pragmatic electorate decides whether the White House party has governed well enough to get another four years,” he explains. “Just as this kind of hate and violence is new, there are precedent-shattering elements now to our political system, most notably disinformation.“There’s always been disinformation but it has exploded to a degree we’ve never seen before. It’s not just Fox News and the rightwing media. It’s also rightwing podcasters and we have a brand new player, the $300bn guy, Elon Musk, whose wealth exceeds that of most countries in the world and has heavily put his thumb on disinformation.”Musk’s Super Pac reportedly spent about $200m to help elect Trump while his social media platform X, formerly Twitter, amplified rightwing propaganda. Musk was a leading Trump surrogate and has since become a near-permanent fixture at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida. Along with the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, he will now head an effort to reduce wasteful government spending.Lichtman continues: “It’s been reported that the disinformation that he disseminates has been viewed billion of times. The disinformation extends to every aspect of our society and our economy. Many people are living in an alternative universe and that calls into question the fundamental basis of political decision-making in this country.”That includes disinformation about inflation, jobs, employment, the stock market, growth, hurricane aid, the Ukraine war and undocumented immigrants, falsely portrayed as dangerous killers when in fact they commit crimes at far lower rate than native-born Americans.Another problem for Lichtman’s model was a presidential candidate who has constantly torn up the rulebook and defied categorisation. “We’ve seen Trump far more than we’ve ever seen in the history of this country channel the darkest impulses in American life – things that have always been with us but were increased exponentially this time: racism, misogyny, xenophobia, antisemitism.“We’re seeing something new in our politics, which affected the prediction and could affect future predictions but has a much bigger message for the future of our democracy. George Orwell was 40 years too soon. He made it clear that dictatorships don’t just arise from brutality and suppression. They arise from control of information: doublethink. Famine is plenty, war is peace. We’re in the doublethink era and maybe we can get out of it, maybe not.”After Lichtman made his 2024 prediction, he and his wife received a backlash in the form of death threats, vulgar abuse and even people trying to breach their home. They were also the victims of swatting (false reports of a threat intended to draw a heavy police response at the target’s home) and doxing, in which their private information was published online.“I’ve been doing this for 42 years and I have never experienced anything remotely like this,” he says. “I haven’t had to call the police before ever; now they’ve been here several times. They’re on alert. They notified the FBI.”Once an idealistic 13-year-old who watched John F Kennedy speak in New York, Lichtman is dismayed that politics has come to this. “It tells me that America has fallen to an absolute new low,” he reflects.“All I have done is exercise my free speech and yet here I am, subject to all of this hate, attempts to breach the security of my family, and it’s consistent with what we heard from Donald Trump, who’s constantly invoking violence as legitimate, plus for dehumanising those he doesn’t agree with as vermin, scum, something less than human to be dealt with. We’ve never seen anything like this before in America.”Looking back at his 2024 miscalculation, Lichtman is not about to let Democrats off the hook. He had been a staunch defender of Biden until the end and condemned the party for forcing him to step aside in favour of Harris. He is now unimpressed by its epic blame game and self-flagellation over the election result.“They’re pointing the finger at everyone else but not taking any responsibility. This election proves what I’ve been saying for years. I can summarise American politics in one sentence. Republicans have no principles, Democrats have no spine.”As if to prove the point, Trump has nominated Matt Gaetz, a Maga bomb thrower once subject to a sex-trafficking investigation, as his attorney general. The post is currently held by Merrick Garland, whom Lichtman has known for 60 years.“I love the guy,” he says. “I thought he was maybe the greatest federal judge in America and he is now the poster child of the spineless Democrats who have let all this happen. He diddled for almost two years before appointing a special counsel [to investigate Trump’s role in the January 6 2021 insurrection].“We all knew on January 7 what Trump had done. Certainly we knew it by the time Merrick Garland was appointed in early 2021. If he had acted as he should have right away, everything would have been different. I believe Trump would have been convicted of serious federal crimes and either be in jail or be on probation and the whole political system would have been different.”Lichtman adds: “He epitomises the spineless Democrats. ‘Oh, I don’t want to do this because I might seem political and Republicans might criticise me.’ Didn’t he learn anything from his supreme court nomination? Republicans are going to do what they’re going to do.“It doesn’t depend on what you do. I always go by the mantra of: it’s not just the evil people who wreak havoc on this world, it’s the good people who don’t do enough to stop them. And Merrick Garland is right front and centre of that.”The Trump-Musk axis “broke my predictive model this year”, Lichtman admits, but he intends to pick himself up, dust himself down and try again in 2028. “I fully expect to adjust the keys according to what I see unfolding over the next several years,” he promises. “The beauty of being a presidential predictor is you have four years to correct your course.“Presuming I’m still around at 81 and fully engaged in my faculties, I will be very carefully monitoring developments over the next few years apropos of the keys and also speaking out in defence of our democracy. The keys are one thing – they’re totally non-partisan – but I have my own political views as well and I fully intend to express them. And when I think the Democrats are worthy of criticism, I don’t hold back.” More

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      To the stars vowing to flee Trump’s America: maybe your excruciating endorsements were part of the problem | Marina Hyde

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      I wish celebrities would learn the art of the French exit. But they can’t, which is why Eva Longoria has announced she no longer lives in America. “I get to escape and go somewhere,” she explained. “Most Americans aren’t so lucky – they’re going to be stuck in this dystopian country.” What’s brought this on, apart from the obvious? “Whether it’s the homelessness or the taxes … it just feels like this chapter in my life is done now.” Great to learn that Eva dislikes both homelessness and taxes. America’s loss of this major political thinker is some other country’s gain – and this highly called-for intervention reminds us why celebrities should speak their brains even more often. If only into a pillow, or an abyss.As always in these moments of the silly voters making a silly mistake, many stars have pledged to follow her. We’ll see. Either way, celebrities seem totally unaware that these high-handed statements of first-class migration are not the admonishment to the lesser orders that they are meant to be, and may even encourage them.But then, stars have always been totally unaware of how very little they bring to this particular party. The last few days of the Harris campaign were an increasingly excruciating riot of celebrity bandwagonning. Did the Kamala campaign ask man-born-in-Pennsylvania Richard Gere to make his video for her – or did the actor freelance one out of fear of not having “used his platform”? It was certainly Richard’s most critically misunderstood electoral outing since his address to the Palestinians before their 2005 elections. “Hi, I’m Richard Gere,” that one began, “and I’m speaking for the entire world …”If anything good were to come out of the wreckage of the Harris campaign, let it be the final death of the idea that showbiz endorsements can help swing elections. They can’t. Not one bit. Not even if it’s Taylor Swift in the 2024 US presidential election, not even when it was Russell Brand in the 2015 British general election, and not even if they have tens of millions of followers. (It does move the dial, however, if you own the platform.) Election issues and politicians swing elections.The minuscule amount of positive data we have on celebrity endorsements suggests they might have some effect in getting their fans to register to vote and volunteer for campaigns. I suspect these days that is more than offset by the perception of elitism that actively harmed the Harris campaign and others before it. If anything could turn you hard Maga, it’s watching Lady Gaga sing Edge of Glory at Kamala’s eve-of-polling-day concert – the worst thing she’s been in since Joker II – and then discovering that Oprah, who also appeared, had billed the Harris campaign $1m via her company. This week, Winfrey insisted she wasn’t paid personally, with the Harris campaign simply required to pay for “production costs” on an earlier “townhall” featuring her, Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Ben Stiller, Chris Rock and Jennifer Lopez. Hmm. If only there was some billionaire – but the good kind! – or even just some mega-rich folk involved in said event, who could perhaps have picked up the wage bill herself/themselves, rather than siphon it off the campaign.Meanwhile, it is easier to leave Twitter than America, as I think Marcus Aurelius once remarked. In the week the Guardian exited X – though not in the French style – you couldn’t move for people informing you they were herding with almost impossible dignity over to Bluesky.And it does feel slightly hilarious that huge numbers of people who have spent the past decade-plus shrieking about the evils of social media – usually on social media – have been “liberated” from one platform, only to promptly rush and enslave themselves to another. Really? You can see it all stretching ahead of you – fun period, emergence of Blueskyocracy, the first Bluesky cancellation of someone, the exponentially intensifying purity spiral, followed by legacy titles or legacy humans announcing an exit from that one too. It’s all such a predictable timesuck. Bluesky might be the new email.Speaking of which, when people ask me for my email, I have to tell them very truthfully that I am so old-fashioned that I only have one – my Guardian one. I always used to follow this up by saying something along the lines of “I know, it’s ridiculous. If I ever stopped working there, no one would be able to contact me.” But now I keep thinking – oh my God! No one would be able to contact me via email! THE MODERN DREAM!This has felt particularly desirable since the election, when I’ve been drowning in emails from the multiple liberal publications I already subscribe to, stagily rending their garments and assuring me that “we do this for you”. It seems like every cloud has a silver lining – ideally a gold one, with all sorts of titles dreaming of the Trump subscription bump they got last time around. Again: we’ll see.My unfashionable view is that the world would benefit from less partisan media, not more. Over in the US for the election, I mistakenly kept turning on CNN for news, and was genuinely shocked at the offering since the last time I seriously paid attention to it (admittedly some years ago now). It didn’t really even have headlines on the hour, let alone coverage of “news”, and appeared to be a talking shop that saw itself purely as an active agent for the Harris campaign. To this outside observer, it didn’t seem to be doing anything different from Fox News, except that it was doing it for the other side.And it doesn’t even work. Retreating into ideas of “resistance” is a big part of how we got here. People hate on Trump for cashing in with his merchandise, but isn’t rather a lot of the current liberal media convulsion just another form of Trump merchandise? Off-brand, yes. But still Trump merchandise – and as tacky, intentionally commercial and likely to lead to regret in the end as the official stuff.

      Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

      A Year in Westminster: John Crace, Marina Hyde and Pippa Crerar. On Tuesday 3 December, join Crace, Hyde and Crerar as they look back at a political year like no other, live at the Barbican in London and livestreamed globally. Book tickets here or at guardian.live More

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      US election updates: loyalty trumps all as Kennedy is lined up for health department

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      Donald Trump has nominated Robert F Kennedy Jr to lead the Health and Human Services department, and chosen government posts for members of his own legal team in the latest raft of appointments given to his most loyal backers despite ongoing criticism.Public health experts warned that the choice of RFK Jr on Thursday could cost lives because of his vaccine denial and notorious support of conspiracy theories. His role still needs to be confirmed by the Senate, and some senators have already expressed doubt that some of Trump’s nominees will garner sufficient votes despite a Republican majority in the chamber.Two members of Trump’s legal team, Todd Blanche and Dean John Sauer, have been nominated for deputy attorney general and solicitor general respectively. Trump put forward Jay Clayton, who chaired the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under Trump’s first term, for US attorney for the southern district of New York.Trump’s nominee for attorney general, Matt Gaetz, continued to draw criticism from his Republican colleagues, with senior Republican senator John Cornyn joining Democratic senator Dick Durbin to call for a report into allegations of sexual misconduct by Gaetz – which he denies – to be shared with the Senate. Republican Kevin McCarthy, who was ousted as House speaker last year in a putsch backed by Gaetz, said the ex-congressman “won’t get confirmed” as attorney general.The flurry of nominations this week has led some to wonder whether Trump’s 2024 picks are more extreme than those he chose in 2016 – here’s a look at how they stack up so far.Here’s what else happened on Thursday:Trump transition news and updates

      The FBI should investigate both Gaetz and Tulsi Gabbard before they are confirmed for their cabinet posts, Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton has said. Gabbard, who Trump nominated as director of national intelligence, is known for her tolerant view of Russian president Vladimir Putin and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.

      Elon Musk reportedly met Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations on Monday, and discussed how to defuse tensions between Iran and the US, two Iranian officials told the New York Times. As Trump prepares to address conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, Musk, the world’s richest man, has been assisting in discussions with foreign officials, establishing himself as the country’s most influential civilian come January.

      Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are seeking Americans who are “high-IQ small-government revolutionaries” and willing to work over 80 hours a week to join their new department, at zero pay. Trump named Musk to co-lead the newly created government efficiency department that sits outside the federal government.

      Advocates have urged state governments to find new ways to defend immigrants and block Trump’s mass deportation plan. California shielded many non-citizen residents from removal in Trump’s first term but immigrants rights groups warn an aggressive, multi-pronged response will be needed.

      A Democratic lawmaker will file a motion specifically mentioning Trump can only serve two terms, after the president-elect joked he would be willing to serve an unconstitutional third term as president while meeting with House Republicans on Wednesday.

      Trump announced his former Georgia congressman Doug Collins as secretary of veterans affairs. Collins ran for Senate in 2020, finishing third in the primary. He also “provided counsel to Trump in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election as Trump sought to challenge Georgia’s election results”. More

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      US election updates: Cabinet picks, Biden meeting and winning the House cap busy day for Trump

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      Donald Trump’s cabinet picks have sparked alarm among national security officials and divided Republicans just as they secured a majority in the House of Representatives, giving the party full control of Congress.The president-elect nominated congressman Matt Gaetz to serve as attorney general, the country’s chief law officer. Gaetz has protested against election results alongside far-right groups and faced an inquiry by the House ethics committee over allegations including sexual misconduct. The inquiry ended when he resigned from Congress on Wednesday. He has denied any wrongdoing.Some of Gaetz’s Republican colleagues slammed his nomination, which representative Max Miller labelled “reckless” and “silly”, and senator Lisa Murkowski said was not serious. John Bolton, a former national security adviser, said Gaetz “must be the worst nomination for a cabinet position in American history”.Trump also announced his nominee for director of national intelligence would be Tulsi Gabbard, who is a critic of Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and has questioned atrocities attributed to the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad. Gabbard has previously clashed with Marco Rubio, who Trump on Wednesday confirmed would be nominated as secretary of state.The new appointments followed Trump’s announcement of Peter Hegseth for defence in a move that stunned military officials, some of whom questioned whether Hegseth had the experience to manage a government department with a budget of more than $800bn.Here’s what else happened on Wednesday:Trump cabinet news and updates

      Republicans in the House of Representatives have retained their majority, securing the 218 seats required. Mike Johnson won the party’s nomination to stay on as House speaker, gaining Trump’s endorsement before the vote on Wednesday despite internal dissent from hard-right conservatives and the Freedom Caucus.

      Republican senators chose South Dakota’s John Thune as their new leader, rejecting a challenge from Florida senator Rick Scott, who had the backing of key Maga figures Elon Musk and Tucker Carlson. Thune’s elevation comes after long-serving Mitch McConnell stood aside.

      Joe Biden met Trump at the White House, extending a courtesy to the president-elect that Biden was not offered in 2020 when Trump refused to acknowledge Biden’s election victory. Trump thanked Biden for welcoming him back to the Oval Office and said: “Politics is tough, and it’s [in] many cases not a very nice world, but it is a nice world today.”

      The president-elect met with House Republicans before going to the White House, and joked about seeking a third term, which would be constitutionally prohibited after his second term.

      Wednesday’s appointments leave a handful of roles to fill in Trump’s cabinet. Reuters reported billionaire banker and co-chair of Trump’s transition team Howard Lutnick had emerged as a serious contender against investor Scott Bessent for the role of Treasury secretary, the highest profile job without a name yet attached.

      The Democratic minority leader in the House, Hakeem Jeffries, said his colleagues had “over-performed the national political environment”, pre-empting the news that Republicans had retained the chamber. Elizabeth Warren argued Democrats should show they stand ready to “unrig this economy” as billionaires join the Trump administration. Warren was appearing at an event alongside fellow senator Bernie Sanders.

      Two Democratic state governors have launched an initiative aimed at “pushing back against increasing threats of autocracy and fortifying the institutions of democracy”. The Illinois governor, JB Pritzker, and the Colorado governor, Jared Polis, hope to form a non-partisan coalition with their new organisation, Governors Safeguarding Democracy.

      Dan Scavino, who on Tuesday suggested Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, was running out of time, has been named as assistant to the president and deputy chief of staff. Scavino’s provocative post on X has continued to fuel Australian anxieties over its relationship with the incoming president, whom Rudd in 2021 described as “a village idiot” and “not a leading intellectual force”. More

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      What’s behind the global political divide between young men and women?

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      As the Democratic party licks its wounds and prepares for Donald Trump’s return to the White House, a growing chorus of commentators is urging the party to confront a historic shift in voting patterns, which has seen Latinos, the working class and Black men all shift rightwards in 2024.But perhaps the cohort that offers the gravest warnings for the party’s future prospects is young men. In 2024, men aged between 18 and 29 turned out in force for Trump, with the Republican winning the demographic by 14 points, overturning a generational trend that has for decades seen young people favour left-leaning candidates.Experts variously put it down to a backlash against the #MeToo movement, efforts to achieve gender equality and the siloing of entertainment and news sources, but Trump’s victory in the “manosphere” is just one part of an unprecedented phenomenon across the world, in which the politics of a single generation has split across the gender divide.While votes are still being tabulated, last week’s election saw a chasm open up between the political preferences of 18- to 29-year-olds in America. Trump’s seismic win among young men was mirrored almost inversely by Kamala Harris’s huge, 18-point win among young women. Notably, that margin is more than double the gender gap in the overall electorate; Harris won female voters of all ages by just seven points.In this regard the US is not unique; political polarisation between the genders has been growing among young people across the globe. In South Korea’s 2022 presidential election there was a difference of just a few points in voting preference between men and women in every age range, except those aged 18-29.In Gen Z there was an almost 25-point difference when it came to voting for the conservative-leaning People’s Power party.The same patterns play out elsewhere: in the 2024 UK general election, almost twice as many young women voted Green than young men (23% to 12%). Conversely, young men were more likely to vote for Nigel Farage’s Reform UK (12% to 6%). Meanwhile in Germany, a sample of recent surveys showed men aged 18-29 were twice as likely to vote for the hard-right AfD than women in the same age range.Despite performing below expectations in the 2023 Polish elections, the far-right Confederation – which opposed vaccine mandates and mass migration, and was sceptical on the climate crisis – saw its strongest support among 18-29-year-olds, the vast majority of whom were men.The party’s leadership took an overtly misogynistic line, with one of its more prominent members, Janusz Korwin-Mikke, saying after the election that “women should not have the right to vote.”Echo chambers and the erosion of shared experienceA backlash against gender equality is one of the universal drivers of the polarisation between young men and women around the world, says Dr Alice Evans, senior lecturer in the social science of development at King’s College.“There is a growing concern among young men that maybe DEI [diversity, equity, and inclusion] is going too far,” she says, adding “some question if women’s gains are coming at the expense of them.”A 2024 Ipsos study bears this out. Taking samples from across the world – including Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Turkey – researchers found that, when it comes to gender equality, those aged 18-29 displayed the largest differences of opinion between the sexes.On the statement “a man who stays home to look after his children is less of a man”, 10% of baby boomer women and 11% of baby boomer men agreed. Among Gen Zs, however, there was an 11-point gap in opinion, 31% for men and 20% for women.According to some polling, the phenomenon is as much about a rightward shift from men, as it is about a leftward move by women. In September, Gallup polled adults under 30 in the US, and found that women were moving left on a number of issues.On issues such as the environment, gun control and access to abortion, Gen Z men and women had by far the largest gap in viewpoints.The pattern repeats in surveys around the world, showing young men and women with historically huge divisions in attitudes – the question is why?“It’s social media filter bubbles and cultural entrepreneurs,” says Evans, who has written about the issue at length.Gen Z has grown up in a fractured media environment that has seen the erosion of shared cultural experiences. Evans gives an example from her own childhood in England: “We only had four TV channels, all my friends were just watching BBC news, The Simpsons or Friends. There was very little choice so everyone watched the same thing.”Today though, media is consumed through smartphones and the choices across traditional platforms – as well as newer services such as Netflix, YouTube and TikTok – are nearly endless.“People can self-select into their preferences,” says Evans, “then the corporate algorithm kicks in to keep you hooked … feeding you information that other users like you have liked.”View image in fullscreenIts in these echo chambers that charismatic entrepreneurs thrive, says Evans.Joe Rogan is one of the most popular podcasters on the planet – his programme tops the charts in the US, as well as Australia, the UK and Canada – but his audience is over 80% male, according to YouGov.“You’re consuming this media, you’re listening to these perspectives, and whether it’s Joe Rogan or others, you come to trust them,” says Evans.Donald Trump faced criticism for the apparent narrow focus of his election appearances, eschewing a number of traditional media outlets for interviews on podcasts hosted by Rogan, Logan Paul and Theo Von. But experts say it was a strategy that may have helped him lock in a voting demographic that traditionally eludes rightwing politicians.“Young men are trying to understand their place in society that is rapidly evolving,” Daniel Cox, from the American Enterprise Institute told the BBC. “These are very real concerns and there’s a sense in the political realm that nobody’s advocating for them.”Prior to the 2024 US election, Hasan Doğan Piker, a YouTuber and video game streamer, warned that the Democratic party was falling behind the Republicans when it came to dominance of these online spaces.View image in fullscreen“If you’re a dude under the age of 30, and you have any hobbies, whether it be playing video games, working out or listening to a history podcast, every single facet of that is dominated by centre right … to Trumpian right,” he told the Pod Save America podcast.The siloing of spaces, the erosion of shared experiences and resentment of gender equality efforts are all leading to huge, intractable problems that go beyond the latest election cycle.Around the world, fertility rates are nose-diving, creating huge issues for economies as diverse as South Korea, Sweden and Australia. Governments across the globe have launched multi-pronged efforts to encourage couples to have children, with policies targeting childcare costs and housing shortages.Experts say the erosion of socialisation between the genders is starting in school. According to the Japanese Association for Sex Education, just one in five boys at senior high school have had their first kiss – the lowest figure since the organisation conducted its first survey of sexual behaviour among young people in 1974.But it’s in schools that the fightback against this growing isolation needs to begin, says Evans. It might feel like a drop in the ocean, but banning phones in schools and investing in local youth centres could help to turn the tide of polarisation.“Phones are out competing personal contacts,” says Evans, but if young people spend more time with the opposite sex, become friends and form relationships, they will start to see just how much they could have in common.” More

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      Trump announces Matt Gaetz as attorney general and Tulsi Gabbard for top intelligence post – US politics live

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      Donald Trump has chosen Matt Gaetz, of his most prominent defenders in Congress, to serve as attorney general.The appointment could put Gaetz in charge of Trump’s promised effort to retaliate against his political opponents, including officials who served in his previous administration but have since repudiated him. Trump announced the nomination, which must be confirmed by the Senate, on Truth Social:
      It is my Great Honor to announce that Congressman Matt Gaetz, of Florida, is hereby nominated to be The Attorney General of the United States. Matt is a deeply gifted and tenacious attorney, trained at the William & Mary College of Law, who has distinguished himself in Congress through his focus on achieving desperately needed reform at the Department of Justice. Few issues in America are more important than ending the partisan Weaponization of our Justice System. Matt will end Weaponized Government, protect our Borders, dismantle Criminal Organizations and restore Americans’ badly-shattered Faith and Confidence in the Justice Department. On the House Judiciary Committee, which performs oversight of DOJ, Matt played a key role in defeating the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, and exposing alarming and systemic Government Corruption and Weaponization. He is a Champion for the Constitution and the Rule of Law…
      Gaetz, a congressman representing a very conservative district in the Florida panhandle, became known nationally last year when he was a key player in the putsch that ousted Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House.Susan Collins, the moderate Republican senator of Maine told reporters she was “shocked” but the Matt Gaetz nomination.“I was shocked by the announcement — that shows why the advise-and-consent process is so important,” Collins said. “I’m sure that there will be a lot of questions raised at his hearing.”Matt Gaetz has been one of the most loyal backers of Donald Trump in the capitol, supporting Trump’s attempts to deny the results of the 2020 election. He voted with about 150 Republicans to overturn the results of the 2020 election.Along with members of the far-right group the Proud Boys, he took part in protests against the result of a Senate race in Florida.He also evoked language adopted by the Proud Boys at Trump’s hush money trial earlier this year, posting on social media: “Standing back, and standing by, Mr. President” along with a photo of him with Trump and other congressional Republicans.Hill reporters are gathering shocked and evasive responses from Republicans reacting to the Gaetz nomination.Senator Chuck Grassley stopped talking to reporters when asked for his reaction.House Appropriations chair Tom Cole avoided responding as well: “I know nothing about it.”Senator Ron Johnson: “The president gets to pick his nominees.”Matt Gaetz, the Florida congressman who Donald Trump just nominated to be his attorney general, has for years faced allegations of sexual misconduct.Last year, Gaetz said the justice department had closed an investigation that began after allegations emerged of the congressman having sex with a 17-year-old girl and paying for her travel. The House ethics committee earlier this year announced that it was beginning its own inquiry into whether Gaetz “engaged in sexual misconduct and illicit drug use, accepted improper gifts, dispensed special privileges and favours to individuals with whom he had a personal relationship, and sought to obstruct government investigations of his conduct”.That investigation has not yet been publicly concluded. Here’s more about it:Since he first arrived in Congress in 2017, just days before Donald Trump took office, Matt Gaetz has been one of his most vocal advocates on Capitol Hill.Now, Gaetz may lead the justice department, and ensure that prosecutorial decisions, which are normally made independently by the attorney general, are to Trump’s benefit.From a profile of Gaetz the Guardian’s Lauren Gambino published last year, shortly after he led the successful effort to oust fellow Republican Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House:
      “Florida Man. Built for Battle,” reads Gaetz’s bio on X, formerly Twitter.
      Gaetz followed his father into politics more than two decades ago. After serving in the Florida statehouse, Gaetz was elected in 2016 to represent a ruby-red chunk of the Florida panhandle.
      Since his arrival in Washington, the pompadoured lawmaker has built a political brand as a far-right provocateur, courting controversy seemingly as a matter of course.
      Like Donald Trump, to whom he is fiercely loyal, Gaetz is more interested in sparring with political foes than in the dry business of governance, according to his critics. On Capitol Hill, he has repeatedly disrupted House proceedings, including once barging into a secure facility where Democrats were holding a deposition hearing.
      In 2018, he was condemned for inviting a Holocaust denier to Trump’s State of the Union address. A year later, he hired a speechwriter who had been fired by the Trump White House after speaking at a conference that attracts white nationalists.
      Months after the January 6 attack on the Capitol, Gaetz embarked on an “America First” tour with Marjorie Taylor Greene, the far-right Georgia congresswoman, in which they amplified the former president’s false claims of fraud in the 2020 election. He also continued to attack Republicans critical of Trump, using language that reportedly alarmed McCarthy, who feared the lawmakers’ words could incite violence.
      Donald Trump has chosen Matt Gaetz, of his most prominent defenders in Congress, to serve as attorney general.The appointment could put Gaetz in charge of Trump’s promised effort to retaliate against his political opponents, including officials who served in his previous administration but have since repudiated him. Trump announced the nomination, which must be confirmed by the Senate, on Truth Social:
      It is my Great Honor to announce that Congressman Matt Gaetz, of Florida, is hereby nominated to be The Attorney General of the United States. Matt is a deeply gifted and tenacious attorney, trained at the William & Mary College of Law, who has distinguished himself in Congress through his focus on achieving desperately needed reform at the Department of Justice. Few issues in America are more important than ending the partisan Weaponization of our Justice System. Matt will end Weaponized Government, protect our Borders, dismantle Criminal Organizations and restore Americans’ badly-shattered Faith and Confidence in the Justice Department. On the House Judiciary Committee, which performs oversight of DOJ, Matt played a key role in defeating the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, and exposing alarming and systemic Government Corruption and Weaponization. He is a Champion for the Constitution and the Rule of Law…
      Gaetz, a congressman representing a very conservative district in the Florida panhandle, became known nationally last year when he was a key player in the putsch that ousted Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House.The Senate confirms nominees for director of national intelligence, a cabinet-level position created after 9/11 to oversee the intelligence community and liaise directly with the president.There is reason to think that Tulsi Gabbard might raise a few eyebrows in the Senate, even when it is controlled by Trump-aligned Republicans, as it will be from January.As a congresswoman from Hawaii, Gabbard visited Syria, met with its president Bashar al-Assad, and expressed skepticism about well-documented atrocities attributed to his forces during the country’s civil war. More recently, she has spent time attacking Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy. It’s all a turnabout from her days in Democratic politics, when she vyed unsuccessfully for the party’s presidential nomination in 2020 and backed Bernie Sanders’ candidacy four years prior. Here’s more about how her views have shifted dramatically:Donald Trump has named former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard as his nominee for director of national intelligence. Gabbard is another loyalist who frequently joined Trump at campaign events.Here’s what he had to say in announcing in picking Gabbard, who represented Hawaii from 2013 to 2021, and endorsed Trump after leaving the Democratic party:
      I am pleased to announce that former Congresswoman, Lieutenant Colonel Tulsi Gabbard, will serve as Director of National Intelligence (DNI). For over two decades, Tulsi has fought for our Country and the Freedoms of all Americans. As a former Candidate for the Democrat Presidential Nomination, she has broad support in both Parties – She is now a proud Republican! I know Tulsi will bring the fearless spirit that has defined her illustrious career to our Intelligence Community, championing our Constitutional Rights, and securing Peace through Strength. Tulsi will make us all proud!
      Donald Trump has just officially named Florida senator Marco Rubio as his nominee for secretary of state.News of the choice filtered out over the past day or so, but Trump had not made it official, until now. Here’s what he said:
      It is my Great Honor to announce that Senator Marco Rubio, of Florida, is hereby nominated to be The United States Secretary of State. Marco is a Highly Respected Leader, and a very powerful Voice for Freedom. He will be a strong Advocate for our Nation, a true friend to our Allies, and a fearless Warrior who will never back down to our adversaries. I look forward to working with Marco to Make America, and the World, Safe and Great Again!
      Joe Biden’s meeting with Donald Trump was attended by Susie Wiles, who the president-elect recently announced would serve as his White House chief of staff.Wiles, who co-managed Trump’s campaign, will be the first woman to hold role. Biden’s chief of staff, Jeff Zients, also attended.While Donald Trump appears to have mostly stayed out of the race for Senate Republican leader, the Maga hardcore were rooting for Florida senator Rick Scott.He unsuccessfully challenged Mitch McConnell for the leadership post two years ago, and his bid this year was similarly unsuccessful. In a statement released after John Thune won the race, Scott said:
      I may have lost the vote, but I am optimistic. I ran for leader with one mission: to fundamentally change how the Senate operates and upend the status quo so we can actually start representing the voters who put us here. When I announced, I said that we are in a moment where we need dramatic change. The voters confirmed that last week when they elected President Trump and Republicans took the majority in both chambers of Congress with a clear mandate.
      …
      While it isn’t the result we hoped for, I will do everything possible to make sure John Thune is successful in accomplishing President Trump’s agenda.
      When asked about comments made by Trump’s new pick for secretary of defense, Fox and Friends co-host Pete Hegseth, that “we should not have women in combat roles”, Jean-Pierre spoke to the “importance of gender equality, of women in the workforce”.She said the Biden administration does not agree with those views.Biden “looked forward to the conversation and appreciated the conversation,” Jean-Pierre said, adding that the two met for nearly two hours.“I think the length of the meeting tells you they had an in-depth conversation on an array of issues.”A reporter asked Jean-Pierre if there were any conversations between Biden and Trump about not accepting the results of the 2020 election, but she said it was now about “moving forward”.“There was an election last week and the American people spoke.” More

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      in US Politics

      ‘Democrats presented no alternative’: US voters on Trump’s win and where Harris went wrong

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      “It’s like being sucked into a tsunami,” said Vivian Glover, a Kamala Harris voter from South Carolina, about the realisation that Donald Trump had been re-elected as president.“The contrast between the two campaigns couldn’t have been more stark. On the one hand an intelligent, highly qualified public servant with a unifying message, and the opponent someone who epitomizes corruption, immorality, dishonesty, incompetence, racism, misogyny, tyranny and has clearly indicated his willingness to embrace authoritarianism.”View image in fullscreen“This election felt like a chance for real change, and I was inspired by the idea of having a female president,” said Sydney, 40, a teacher from New York. “I believed in her vision for a more inclusive and just America, and it’s difficult to let go of that hope.”Despite Sydney’s disappointment, Trump’s decisive victory and remarkable political comeback did not surprise her. “I think the biggest issue for a lot of Americans is simply the economy,” she said.Glover and Sydney were among many hundreds of US voters who shared with the Guardian via an online callout and follow-up interviews how they felt about the outcome of the presidential election, what had decided their vote and what their hopes and fears were for Trump’s second presidential term.Among those who had voted Republican, many said they had expected a Trump win, and that the polls had never properly reflected the atmosphere on the streets of their communities. They had voted for Trump, many said, because they felt he would handle the economy and international geopolitics better than Harris would have done, and because they wanted a crackdown on illegal immigration.Various Trump voters, among them young first-time voters, women and citizens with immigration backgrounds, said they had voted for the billionaire this time because they saw a vote for Trump as a “vote against woke” and against what they saw as leftwing extremism, a vote for “common sense”, and as a vote against “biased” media, which they felt had unfairly persecuted Trump for years and could no longer be trusted.Scores of Trump voters expressed outrage about Democrats including Harris and Hillary Clinton likening Trump to Hitler and calling him a fascist.Some male respondents said they had voted for Trump because they were tired of men being “vilified”, unfairly called “misogynist” and “blamed for everything”.Although Trump was far from perfect, many supporters said, his second term would hopefully lead to more peace globally, economic stability and an improvement to their financial situation, more secure borders, and a return to meritocracy and “family values”.Of those who said they had voted for the Harris-Walz ticket, many were shocked by the election result and had expected a Democratic victory, citing extremely tight polls and Harris’s perceived strong pull among younger people and women.Various Democratic voters blamed Trump’s landslide victory on a lack of education among his supporters, as well as on social media platforms such as X and YouTube, where the “manosphere” has become highly effective at undermining progressives, their policies and campaigns.Becky Boudreau-Schultz, 50, a receptionist and the mother of a teenage boy from Mason, Michigan, felt the Democrats had underestimated the sway of these platforms.Trump, she said, “put on a show” that sought to tap people’s fears about immigration and loss of independence.“His followers eat that up. Kamala ran on civility but, obviously, that is not America’s mood. Mainstream media seemed to warn people of Trump’s horrible potential but his supporters weren’t and aren’t watching.”Instead, she felt, voters were turning to “social media echo chambers that masquerade as actual news sources”.Many Democratic voters were highly critical of the Harris campaign, which, scores felt, had been out of touch with the average voter, did not sufficiently connect with concerns of young men and ethnic minorities, and had failed to address Americans’ most pressing worries. It had been a mistake, many said, that the campaign had centered on vague, abstract slogans such as “saving democracy” and “not going back”.“What I’m reading and watching suggests the Harris team and many others misjudged much of the electorate,” said Judith, a retired Harris voter from Vermont.“The population needed more attention on food prices, gas prices. Hearing how robust the economy is does not buy their groceries. The Hispanic and Black populations feared their job security would be threatened by allowing more immigrants into this country. These things mattered more than Trump’s reputation and criminal record. I get it, sadly.”View image in fullscreen“We lost it because we’re not speaking to the issues that Americans are so concerned about,” said 77-year-old Bill Shlala, from New Jersey, a Democrat who has voted Republican in some races over the years, and who worked in special education.“We’re not talking about, how do I not lose my house to medical bills? How do I afford to send my child to college? Joe Biden has attempted to correct that a little bit, especially with outreach to unions, but we became the party of the elites.“The Republicans and the extremists understand the angst of the American people, and they’re calling on that angst without any real plan. But then we presented no alternative.”Many Harris voters felt that the vice-president had not been a good candidate, but mostly reckoned that it had been too late to find another one, citing Biden’s late decision to pull out of the race.“Harris had an impossible job with minimal time to reach voters,” said Carla, 71, a retired professional in the legal sector from Ohio.“Biden should have never run for re-election. There would have been a different outcome if Democrats had had the time to run primary elections and pick a strong candidate.”Various people suggested that Tim Walz, the Minnesota governor, had been a poor running mate. Others defended Harris.View image in fullscreen“I feel Kamala Harris did an excellent job of campaigning,” said 81-year-old Pat, from Colorado, who holds a college degree in journalism and is retired. “But too many felt that ‘they were better off four years ago than now’.”Pat is now plagued by concerns about Trump firing experienced federal workers, deporting immigrants, exposing pregnant women to severe health risks, ignoring climate change and rolling back support for Ukraine.“I’m appalled. I’ll never understand why someone as vulgar and unhinged as Trump is so popular with voters, including my sons in Missouri,” she said. “I can only hope that his bark is worse than his bite regarding democracy, immigration and abortion.”Jack, a 19-year-old college student from Minnesota, was among a string of Democrats who said they had only reluctantly turned out for Harris, citing a lack of clear policy and the party’s move to the right on some issues, such as immigration.“This was my first election, and I voted for Kamala with minimal enthusiasm,” he said.“I don’t think Kamala was the right candidate, but this [loss] is owed to the complete strategic failure of the Dems in focusing on getting votes of independents and moderate Republicans. A [moderate] Democrat will lose to a real Republican every time.”View image in fullscreenHe was “not at all surprised that Trump won”, as the economy had “not improved for the average American on the ground”, he said.“I also believe this nation is too fundamentally misogynistic to elect a female president. We can elect a rapist before we can elect a woman.”“I completely reject the accusation that men like me voted for Trump because of misogyny,” said a male professional with Hispanic roots in his mid-40s from Florida who wanted to stay anonymous.“My wife and I did not vote for Trump because we could not live with a female president, but because we wanted Trump to be our president. We think he’ll do great things for our country and the world, and as a family with grandfathers on both sides who fought the Nazis in [the second world war], we are outraged by claims that Trump voters are fascists.“We are decent citizens who are very active in our community. We just want less crime, secure borders, a strong economy driven by entrepreneurial growth not state handouts, affordable prices, and fairness in the labor market. We believe President Trump will deliver on those.”Although he felt “vindicated” by the election result, he and his wife remained “afraid to come out publicly as Trump supporters”, he said. “We fear social and professional repercussions. That’s why the polls keep getting it wrong.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreen“I voted for Trump and consider myself a moderate,” said Hayden Duke, 45, a teacher from Maryland. “I’ve voted for all parties in the past.“I couldn’t be happier that we have rejected the Biden-Harris wokeness, weakness and lack of common sense which have destroyed our economy and allowed wars to take place all over the world. I have been called a Nazi, a fascist, a nationalist and more by supporters of Harris. Normal people are so tired of being lectured by these suffocating moral guardians, looking down on us and speaking down to us and shoving their viewpoints on everyone else.“This crowd has likened Trump to Hitler – but Hitler killed [millions of] Jews and others, Trump hasn’t killed a single person. They say Kamala Harris lost because of misogyny, but I’m ready for a female president. I voted for [would-be Republican presidential candidate] Elizabeth Dole all the way back in 2000.”Had Harris chosen the, in Duke’s view, the more broadly appealing Pennsylvania governor, Josh Shapiro, as her running mate, Duke felt she might have won Pennsylvania and possibly the election – an opinion that was shared by various people.Others took the opposite view. “The Democrats refused to listen to the public on Gaza which I think lost them support,” said Tom, 28, a higher education professional from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who “had a feeling” Trump would win. Having voted “unenthusiastically” for Biden in 2020, he did not vote at all in 2024.“I think the assassination attempt on Trump really solidified and unified his base, while the Democrats have gotten deeply fractured over Gaza and didn’t have strong messaging,” he said.“I don’t think that Kamala Harris ran a strong campaign. It was unclear what her values and policies actually were, other than ‘I am not Trump.’ I do not think that is enough for many people, but that’s what Harris was banking on – people rejecting Trump again. What was the Harris plan for healthcare? I don’t think she did enough to differentiate herself from Biden.”Tom was among a number of people who said they were actively looking into moving abroad now. “This Trump term is going to be terrible,” he said. “I want to finish my master’s degree and then look into moving to another country.”“This election proves that centrist, pro-war Democrats weren’t the answer,” said Margarito Morales, 40, from Austin, Texas, who works in tech and said he had voted for Harris. “Biden won the popular vote with over 80m votes, and now Trump won it with much fewer votes.”View image in fullscreenMany younger people, Morales felt, chose to abstain or to vote for Jill Stein in the absence of strong leftist policies that would have excited them, such as universal healthcare, student loan forgiveness or lowering the cost of going to college.“The Democrats went with the status quo, and it isn’t working. People didn’t feel inspired. People with immigrant parents did not know what may happen to their families under the Democrats,” he said, citing the party’s recent moves to tighten border restrictions.Several people who got in touch said they had backed Trump for the first time in 2024, despite having concerns about him and his Maga movement.A 25-year-old mechanic from Iowa who wanted to stay anonymous “disliked both candidates in 2020 – their policies, personalities, and campaigns.“This year,” he said, “I voted for Donald Trump.”A key point in his decision had been his financial stability, which has been crumbling over the past few years, he said.“I believe Donald Trump’s administration will do a better job helping the American people financially and improving international stability. I do, however, have concerns for young adults who are pro-choice, and those in the trans community whose rights may be under attack under the new presidency.”Milly, in her 40s, from Washington state, was another first-time Trump voter. “I voted for Obama twice, but the liberal movement in America has lost me, because it completely changed,” she said.“The DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion] movement has completely radicalized itself, from initially wanting to push back against actual sexual and racial discrimination to pursuing an absurd, deeply unfair equality-of-outcome agenda. These extremists are alienating so many people with pretty liberal views.”Being pro-choice, Milly said she was planning on lobbying the Republican party to soften its stance on harsh abortion bans in some states.“I still identify as a liberal, but I’m a liberal with limits: society’s norms can’t be overhauled entirely just to suit tiny minorities and extreme political fringe movements. I hope Donald Trump will bring common sense and realism back into American political discourse.”Jacqueline, 63, a retired photographer and writer from Arizona who described herself as disabled, fears that the new reality under Trump may become unsurvivable for people like herself who depend on the social security net, which she believes the new administration wants to get rid of.“We’re talking about social security for the elderly, for disability, for veterans, death benefits for widows, food stamps. I live in a very poor area. People can’t feed their families without food stamps. People like me, my neighbors, this whole community, many people that voted for them, will have no way to survive.”Another huge worry of hers is Trump’s possible environmental policy. “Climate change affects everything, and if we don’t fix that, nothing else matters. He’s going to reverse everything that the Biden administration has set up to mitigate climate change and to make the transition to renewable energy.”Jacqueline also struggles to wrap her head around the new reality that America now has a president with a criminal conviction.“If you’re a felon, you can’t get a good job, you have to put that on every job application, that label follows you around. But you can be president of the United States. It’s literally insane.”Josh, an engineer in his 50s from Pennsylvania, has an answer for people who cannot understand why more than 74 million Americans were not put off by Trump’s criminal record.“The people calling Trump ‘a convicted felon’ need to understand: many people like me voted for Trump not despite this kangaroo court conviction, but because of it. His trial was a shameful persecution of a political opponent by a Democratic prosecution. It fired me up.”JT, 28, a full-time employee from Texas, was one of various people who said they considered Trump “the lesser evil”, and voted Trump in 2020 and 2024, despite disliking the available candidates in both elections.“I voted for Trump based on two reasons,” he said. “I feel I was better off economically when he was in charge. And I’m originally from California, and watched as the Democratic party’s rule there made it so much harder for people like me to get ahead.”Alongside exploding prices, high taxes, and higher crime and homelessness rates, he pointed to California having become “way too focused on identity politics.“Harris is from California, and I don’t want the USA to become like California. I’m a mixed-race person of colour and have never liked identity politics. I don’t care about race or gender or orientation; I want results.”He wants stronger borders and immigration enforcement, considering it “insulting” that people like his foreign-born family had to wait for years in difficult circumstances before being able to immigrate legally while others cross the border illegally.“Harris fixated on democracy being in danger and abortion, ignoring the two huge concerns of economy and immigration,” he said.“I have a ton of concerns about Trump, mostly about his personality and lack of morals, his weird tirades and personal attacks. He outright lies, a lot. But as long as he is able to improve the economy like in 2016 and improve on the immigration issue, I’ll consider it a win.”View image in fullscreenElizabeth McCutchon, 61, a psychiatric nurse practitioner and mother of five, voted for Harris, but is married to a Republican.“The mistake of the Democrats has been to keep asking the question, ‘How could you?’ rather than, ‘What did we not understand about American voters?’” she said.“There are some Harris voters who are now saying they will have nothing to do with people who voted for Trump. I think this sort of behavior will be used by Trump voters to demonstrate how out of touch Harris voters are.“I don’t think Trump will provide the change that his voters were promised. But he is different than the status quo.” More