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      Harris voters mourn loss after sobering concession speech: ‘There’s nothing left’

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      The mood was calm and sober on the Howard University campus as people waited to hear vice-president Kamala Harris’s concession speech on Wednesday afternoon. An area that is usually the central hub of campus life, the Yard, was mostly filled with Harris campaign staff, media and members of the public.Harris appeared about 25 minutes after her scheduled time and opened with a message on unity, building community and coalitions. “My heart is full today,” Harris said. “Full of heart for my country, and full of resolve.“Hear me when I say that the light of America’s promise will always burn bright. As long as we never give up and as long as we keep fighting.”Harris encouraged young people to acknowledge their power and to believe in the impossible. “At this time, it’s necessary that people not become complacent,” she added, “but to commit to organizing and mobilizing.” Harris encouraged her supporters to embrace “the light of optimism” and of service.“Hear me when I say that the light of America’s promise will always burn bright. As long as we never give up and as long as we keep fighting.”View image in fullscreenHarris’s supporters expressed shock, grief and disillusionment as they reflected upon the harrowing hours since the election was called for Republican candidate, Donald Trump. Instead of feeling galvanized to build resistance movements, voters said that they needed time to rest and reset before thinking of next steps after the election.“It revealed to me the heart of us as a nation,” 47-year-old Janeen Davis, a county government employee said. “It’s taking my pride away. Being an Indigenous person, it hits me hard. Our democracy is built upon our Indigenous ancestors … and so much has been torn from the Indigenous community, and so now that that’s at stake, it’s like there’s nothing left.” Davis said that she was in fear of political violence from Trump supporters if his opponents resist his presidency now. “My personal opinion is because of how the transition happened last election,” Davis said, “the best thing that we can do is be still right now.”Patricia McDougall, a 63-year-old staff member at Howard University, said that she felt sad. She believed that, had she won, Harris would have supported immigrants and helped fight for women’s reproductive rights. “As an immigrant myself [from Belize], I feel bad about the people who are going to be left behind,” McDougall said. “I thought that she was going to move the needle and help people.”As an ambassador for the United Nations, McDougall expressed anxiety about Trump’s foreign policy moves in the future, adding that his “mouth destroys him.“We are all on edge to see what he’s going to do and how he’s going to do.”Davis was similarly concerned that Trump’s presidency may spell disaster for foreign relations. Since exit polls revealed how divided the electorate is, Davis warned: “A divided nation can’t stand, so it’s going to make us more susceptible to outside threats.”View image in fullscreenDespite her defeat, voters said that they were proud of Harris and her campaign team for what they accomplished in the months since inheriting Joe Biden’s campaign after he dropped out of the race during the summer. Nadia Brown, a political science professor at Georgetown University and a fellow Howard University alumna, had watched the election results pour in from the campus on election night. Returning to the scene after Harris’s crushing defeat was sobering, but she was in a place of acceptance and didn’t feel sadness.For Brown, she said that the election results posed “larger questions to ask around what the Democratic party needs to do to maintain the core voting bloc”. She observed that the concerns of young people and progressives who opposed Israel’s war on Gaza where more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed since last October were not taken seriously. Brown also called into question the Democratic party’s strategy, saying: “The base was not shored up before moving to swing voters, which were the Republicans who were never Trumpers.”Looking toward the future, Brown said that the Democratic party must reconsider its outreach strategy. “Black women in particular did a great job. I have no regrets or hard feelings about the way that Black women showed up,” she said. “But now it’s how [does the party] reach some of the other folks.”Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

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      US election live: Kamala Harris concedes to Donald Trump but vows to keep fighting for freedom and democracy

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      Kamala Harris made her concession to Donald Trump official, but vowed to keep fighting for the issues that she campaigned on.“While I concede this election, I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign,” the vice-president said.“The fight for freedom, for opportunity, for fairness and the dignity of all people, a fight for the ideals at the heart of our nation, the ideals that reflect America at our best. That is a fight I will never give up.”Harkening back to some of the promises of her failed campaign, Harris said:
      I will never give up the fight for a future where Americans can pursue their dreams, ambitions and aspirations, where the women of America have the freedom to make decisions about their own body and not have their government telling them what to do.
      We will never give up the fight to protect our schools and our streets from gun violence and, America, we will never give up the fight for our democracy, for the rule of law, for equal justice and for the sacred idea that every one of us, no matter who we are or where we start out, has certain fundamental rights and freedoms. That must be respected and upheld.
      Harris just wrapped up her speech by saying that even if the country struggles in the years to come, it will emerge stronger:
      There’s an adage an historian once called a law of history, true of every society across the ages. The adage is: only when it is dark enough can you see the stars. I know many people feel like we are entering a dark time, but for the benefit of us all, I hope that is not the case. But here’s the thing, America, if it is, let us fill the sky with the light of a brilliant, brilliant billion of stars.
      The light, the light of optimism, of faith, of truth and service … and may that work guide us, even in the face of setbacks, toward the extraordinary promise of the United States of America.
      Her husband, Doug Emhoff, then appeared at her side, and the couple waved at the crowd before heading offstage to the sound of Beyoncé’s Freedom, a staple at events in her unsuccessful campaign for president.With a nod to future elections that could help Democrats regain political power, Kamala Harris urged her supporters to stay engaged in the democratic process.“The fight for our freedom will take hard work, but like I always say, we like hard work. Hard work is good work. Hard work can be joyful work. And the fight for our country is always worth it,” Harris said.She also made a point of addressing young people, who broke for Donald Trump in surprisingly large numbers in yesterday’s election.
      To the young people who are watching, it is OK to feel sad and disappointed, but please know it’s going to be OK. On the campaign, I would often say, ‘When we fight, we win.’ But here’s the thing, here’s the thing, sometimes the fight takes a while. That doesn’t mean we won’t win. That doesn’t mean we won’t win. The important thing is, don’t ever give up.
      Many Democrats dread Trump returning to office, but Harris encouraged them not to be overcome by grief:
      So, to everyone who is watching, do not despair. This is not a time to throw up our hands. This is a time to roll up our sleeves. This is a time to organize, to mobilize and to stay engaged for the sake of freedom and justice and the future that we all know we can build together.
      Kamala Harris made her concession to Donald Trump official, but vowed to keep fighting for the issues that she campaigned on.“While I concede this election, I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign,” the vice-president said.“The fight for freedom, for opportunity, for fairness and the dignity of all people, a fight for the ideals at the heart of our nation, the ideals that reflect America at our best. That is a fight I will never give up.”Harkening back to some of the promises of her failed campaign, Harris said:
      I will never give up the fight for a future where Americans can pursue their dreams, ambitions and aspirations, where the women of America have the freedom to make decisions about their own body and not have their government telling them what to do.
      We will never give up the fight to protect our schools and our streets from gun violence and, America, we will never give up the fight for our democracy, for the rule of law, for equal justice and for the sacred idea that every one of us, no matter who we are or where we start out, has certain fundamental rights and freedoms. That must be respected and upheld.
      Kamala Harris said she had spoken to president-elect Donald Trump, and would work with him to peacefully transfer power.“Now, I know folks are feeling and experiencing a range of emotions right now. I get it, but we must accept the results of this election,” the vice-president said.“Earlier today, I spoke with president-elect Trump and congratulated him on his victory. I also told him that we will help him and his team with their transition and that we will engage in a peaceful transfer of power.”That would be a shift from when Trump lost to Joe Biden in 2020, and tried for weeks to block the Democrat from taking office, culminating in the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.Harris then thanked everyone who worked for her campaign, which lasted just over three months.“To my beloved Doug and our family, I love you so very much. To President Biden and Dr Biden, thank you for your faith and support. To Governor Walz and the Walz family, I know your service to our nation will continue, and to my extraordinary team, to the volunteers who gave so much of themselves to the poll workers and the local election officials. I thank you. I thank you all,” Harris said.Kamala Harris acknowledged the disappointment of her election loss to Donald Trump yesterday, but called on her supporters to “keep fighting”.“My heart is full today. Full of gratitude for the trust you have placed in me, full of love for our country and full of resolve,” the vice-president said.“The outcome of this election is not what we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for, but hear me when I say, hear me when I say, the light of America’s promise will always burn bright, as long as we never give up, and as long as we keep fighting.”Kamala Harris has just walked on stage to make her concession speech before a crowd of supporters in Washington DC.She is speaking at her alma mater, Howard University. Her campaign had its election night party there yesterday, but as it became clear that Donald Trump was winning, Harris canceled a planned address that evening.She conceded to Trump in a phone call earlier in the day, an aide said.Tim Walz and his wife, Gwen, were just spotted in the crowd at Howard University.The Minnesota governor was Harris’s running mate in her unsuccessful bid for president.Bernie Sanders, the independent senator and leading progressive voice in Congress, says Democrats’ failure to embrace policies that would help the average American led to the party’s terrible performance in yesterday’s election.“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic party which has abandoned working-class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right,” said Sanders, who was re-elected to a fourth term representing Vermont yesterday.Sanders caucuses with Democrats in the Senate and campaigned for Kamala Harris, but has broken with Joe Biden over his support for Israel, and encouraged him to adopt progressive economic policies.In his statement, Sanders encouraged Democrats to learn lessons from a debacle that saw Donald Trump defeat Harris, and the GOP regain control of the Senate:
      Today, despite strong opposition from a majority of Americans, we continue to spend billions funding the extremist Netanyahu government’s all out war against the Palestinian people which has led to the horrific humanitarian disaster of mass malnutrition and the starvation of thousands of children. Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign? Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful oligarchy which has so much economic and political power? Probably not.In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions.
      There’s a large crowd gathered at Howard University to see Kamala Harris speak, and among the group is former House speaker Nancy Pelosi.She won re-election last night to her heavily Democratic district centered on San Francisco, but has handed leadership of the House Democratic caucus to Hakeem Jeffries of New York, who also won another term yesterday.Kamala Harris is due to acknowledge Donald Trump’s presidential election victory in a speech to supporters at Howard University in Washington DC.The vice-president should be taking the stage at her alma mater in a few minutes. She has already conceded the election to Trump in a phone call earlier in the day, according to an aide.Republicans currently control the House, and appear favored to continue holding the majority, Cook Political Report finds.But it doesn’t look likely that the GOP will expand their already tiny majority by much, and with counting ongoing, there’s still a chance that Democrats claw their way back to control:If there is any good news to be had in an election that saw stinging defeats for Democrats at the presidential level and in the Senate, it may be found in the House of Representatives, and specifically the races that have yet to be called in California.Just moments after the polls closed in the Golden state, the Democratic stronghold was called for Kamala Harris and the party’s candidate for Senate, Adam Schiff, was declared the winner.But despite a clear majority of blue votes at the top of the ticket, zooming in on the state’s sprawling list of local races showcased deeper divisions, with many contests remaining too close to call.Among them are important seats that could help determine which party controls the House:

      As of Wednesday morning, incumbent Republican Mike Garcia was up just two points over Democratic challenger George Whitesides with 67% of votes reported in the district north of Los Angeles.

      In the seat left open by Democratic representative Katie Porter after her run for Senate – an area considered “Reagan country” that includes conservative-leaning Huntington Beach – Republican Scott Baugh and Democrat Dave Min are neck and neck with 71% of the vote reporting.

      Representative Ken Calvert, the longest-serving House Republican from California, is up one point over Democrat Will Rollins with 69% reporting.

      Incumbent Republican David Valadao has a stronger grip on his seat with 55% to Democrat Rudy Salas’s 45%, with just over half of the votes recorded.

      The rematch between Republican representative John Duarte and Democrat Adam Gray – whom he narrowly beat in 2022 – is close again with Duarte at 51.4% to Gray’s 48.6% with about half of the Central valley district votes tallied.

      Republican representative Michelle Steel leads over her challenger, Democrat Derek Tran, with 52.5% to his 47.5%, but the AP hasn’t yet called the race.
      There are also a slew of initiatives put to voters in the state that are still being decided. The “no” votes are leading on Prop 6, which prohibits involuntary servitude as forced prison labor, Prop 32, which increases the minimum wage to $18 an hour, and Prop 5, which lowers vote thresholds required to approve bonds for affordable housing and public infrastructure.The count can take weeks in California, where there’s a strong reliance on mail-in ballots, which are sent out to all registered voters.Among those who gathered at Howard for the vice-president’s concession speech was Joanne Howes, a founding member of Emily’s List, an influential fundraising group that supports Democratic female candidates who back abortion rights.“Terrible,” she said when asked how she was doing. “I’ve been at this a long time and this time I really thought we were going to do it.” At 80, Howes said she was less hopeful now than she had ever been that she would see a female president.“I am so angry at white women. I thought they were going to get it this time,” said Howes, who is white. “And those white women who voted for those ballot measures and then went to vote for Trump – figure that out.”After appointing the justices who overturned Roe v Wade, Donald Trump was found liable for sexually abusing E Jean Carroll. Despite a campaign to remind women that their vote was a private matter that did not need to be shared with their husbands, national exit polls showed white women chose Trump by a sizable margin.“We’re going to feel sad and sorrowful, but then we have to get up again,” she said. “We can’t just accept that our democracy is over.”When he was first elected president in 2016, Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton by less than one percentage point of the vote in the three “blue wall” states: Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.It was a frustrating result for Democrats, leaving many with the feeling that, if only Clinton had handled her campaign slightly differently, she would have been president.Democrats are still digesting Kamala Harris’s defeat last night, but it has become clear that voters were decisive in choosing Trump over the vice-president. As the below chart shows, he improved his margins in the blue wall states, and turned back Harris’s efforts to win Georgia, as Joe Biden had in 2020, and North Carolina. We still don’t have the results for Nevada and Arizona yet, but he’s leading the count in those states, too.The chart is also a good reminder of how strong Democrats once were in the blue wall, and in Nevada. Have a look:Democratic congresswoman Elissa Slotkin will be Michigan’s next senator, the Associated Press reports.It’s yet another sigh of relief for Democrats in a battleground state that gave its electoral votes to Donald Trump yesterday. Though they have already lost their majority in the Senate, Slotkin’s victory for the open seat being vacated by Democrat Debbie Stabenow means they have fewer seats to retake to gain the majority in future elections. More

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      2024 US elections takeaways: how female voters broke for Harris and Trump

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      Gender had promised to be one of the biggest stories of the 2024 election. With abortion one of voters’ top issues, Donald Trump’s well-documented history of misogyny and a female presidential candidate of color on the ballot, Democrats banked on women showing up in force to defeat him. But Trump’s stunning victory in both the electoral college and the popular vote dashed those hopes – and scrambled the narrative around how gender, race and other markers of identity informed Americans’ votes.Based on available exit polling, which remains preliminary, here are five early takeaways on how gender shaped the 2024 elections.1. Women voted for the Democratic candidate, but by smaller marginsWomen did indeed show up to support Kamala Harris, but in smaller numbers than her Democratic predecessors. While Hillary Clinton won women by 13 points in 2016 and Joe Biden by 15 in 2020, Harris secured them by just 10 points, CNN found.2. White women are still voting for the Republican candidateAlthough women as a whole have historically voted for Democrats, white women have not. Instead, over the last 72 years, a plurality of white women have voted for the Democratic candidate only twice, in 1964 and 1996. On Tuesday, they once again went for Trump – just as they did in 2016 and 2020. But Harris made inroads with the group; she lost them by only 5 points, according to CNN. (In 2020, they broke for Trump by 11.) More surprisingly, Trump’s lead among white men also shrank, from 23 points in 2020 to 20 in 2024.3. Trump did better with young women than he did in 2020The Trump campaign leaned into targeting young men, as the former president publicly palled around with male YouTubers and podcasters, such as Joe Rogan, who make little space for women. This effort paid off: exit polling indicates that there was a canyon-wide 16-point gender gap between young men and women, which is an increase from 2020. While women between the ages of 18 and 29 preferred Harris 58% to 40%, their male peers chose Trump 56% to 42%. However, compared to his last run, Trump did better with both young men (41% of them voted for him four years ago) and young women (33% in 2020). 4. Harris suffered significant losses among both Latino women and menLatino men, in particular, veered hard to the right. In 2016, Clinton won Latino men by 31 points; by 2020, their support for Democrats had cooled somewhat, as Biden won them by 23 points. On Tuesday, Trump won this group handily, by 10 points, according to exit polling performed for the Washington Post and other outlets. Meanwhile, Harris won Latina women by 24 points, a victory that pales in comparison to Clinton’s 44-point lead in 2024.5. Black women are the most reliable Democratic votersLong the Democrats’ most stalwart supporters, Black women are still the backbone of the Democratic party. Harris won them by 85 points – a bigger lead than any other gendered and racial group measured by CNN. Apart from the contest for president, Delaware and Maryland both elected Black women, Lisa Blunt Rochester and Angela Alsobrooks, to the Senate — making the next Senate the first one where two Black women will simultaneously serve together.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

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      Harris concedes election to Trump. Here’s how to watch her full speech

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      Kamala Harris will deliver a speech conceding defeat in the presidential election to Donald Trump this afternoon. Earlier today, she called Trump to congratulate him on his electoral victory.Here’s what to know.Where will Harris deliver her concession speech?Continuing a longstanding US tradition, Harris called Trump to congratulate him on recapturing the White House. Joe Biden also issued congratulations and “expressed his commitment to ensuring a smooth transition”, according to the White House.Harris will appear at Howard University, her alma mater, in Washington DC to deliver a concession speech.On election night, supporters gathered on the historic campus were in a celebratory mood earlier in the evening, but as the likelihood of a Democratic victory dimmed, the mood grew somber.Harris was scheduled to address the crowd on election night, but did not appear. Instead, the campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond took the stage to address supporters.Harris also launched her unsuccessful 2020 campaign for the Democratic nomination at Howard and used the campus to prepare for her August debate against Trump.When will she speak?Her speech will take place at 4pm ET.The New York Times reported that Harris was scheduled to call Trump this afternoon to concede. The concession call is not a legal requirement in the US election, nor is the concession speech.In past elections, when has the losing candidate conceded?In 2016, Hilary Clinton gave a concession speech on Wednesday morning. “Donald Trump is going to be our president,” she said in Manhattan. “We owe him an open mind and a chance to lead.”In both 2012 and 2008, the election was called for Barack Obama before midnight.In 2020, Trump refused to concede the US election to Joe Biden. He has not admitted publicly that he lost.How to watch Harris’s concession speechMajor news networks will probably air the speech live. CBS will stream the speech, and CNN will probably make the speech available on its YouTube channel.The Guardian will have a live feed of the speech and a team of reporters covering it live in our election blog.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionWhat did she say on election night?Harris made no public comment after polls closed on election night, beyond encouraging voters on social media to stay in line at their polling locations.Harris was expected to speak to supporters on election night. However, as results came in and it became clear her path to victory had disappeared,Richmond addressed the crowd at her election night party: “We still have votes to count. We still have states that have not been called yet.”He confirmed Harris wouldn’t be speaking, but said the campaign would “continue, overnight, to fight to make sure that every vote is counted, that every voice has spoken”.What to know about Trump’s victory speechAppearing with his family, close aides and his running mate, JD Vance, before supporters in Florida last night, Trump called his victory the “greatest political movement of all time”.“There’s never been anything like this in this country and now it’s going to reach a new level of importance, because we’re going to help our country heal,” Trump said.“We’re going to fix our borders. We’re going to fix everything about our country … I will not rest until we have delivered the strong, safe and prosperous America that our children deserve, this will truly be the golden age of America.”What happens next?Harris will preside over a joint session of Congress in January to certify the results of the election. Trump will be sworn in as the 47th US president on 20 January 2025.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

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      Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and other business leaders congratulate Trump

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      Business leaders were swift to offer their congratulations to Donald Trump on his election victory, less than four years after they criticized him for his role in the January 6 insurrection.Some of tech’s business leaders, including Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Apple’s Tim Cook all publicly congratulated Trump for his win.“Big congratulations to our 45th and now 47th President on an extraordinary political comeback and decisive victory,” Bezos said in a statement. “No nation has bigger opportunities.”“Congratulations to President Trump on a decisive victory. We have great opportunities ahead of us as a country,” Zuckerberg wrote on Threads. “Looking forward to working with you and your administration.”“Congratulations President Trump on your victory! We look forward to engaging with you and your administration,” Cook wrote on Twitter/X.The influential Business Roundtable, a powerful lobbying group with more than 200 members, who are the chief executives of companies such as JPMorgan, Walmart, Google and Pepsi, said in a statement: “Business Roundtable congratulates President-elect Donald Trump on his election as the 47th President of the United States.”“We look forward to working with the incoming Trump Administration and all federal and state policymakers,” the group said.Billionaire Mark Cuban, who endorsed Kamala Harris, was one of the first to congratulate Trump just after 1am ET.“Congrats @realDonaldTrump. You won fair and square,” Cuban wrote. “Congrats to @elonmusk as well.”Elon Musk, Trump’s highest-profile business backer, celebrated with a post on X declaring victory for himself. “It is morning in America again,” he wrote. Trump has floated giving Musk an influential role in his administration.The reaction presents a stark contrast to how the leaders responded to Trump after the 2020 election. Cook had called the insurrection “a shameful chapter in our nation’s history”, while Zuckerberg said: “I believe the former president should be responsible for his words.”Bezos, meanwhile, had congratulated Joe Biden for his victory four years ago with a post. “Unity, empathy and decency are not characteristics of a bygone era,” he said on Instagram, posting a picture of Biden and Kamala Harris.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIt’s something of an about-face that was seen leading up to the election. Trump had started to brag that executives such as Google’s Sundar Pichai and Zuckerberg were calling him, seemingly trying to rebuild relationships that had been strained during Biden’s presidency.Bezos has had a particularly fraught relationship with Trump. But in October the Bezos-owned Washington Post chose not to endorse any candidate in the US presidential election. The Post had planned to endorse the vice-president.While coalitions of former executives had endorsed Harris, and said that many CEOs were probably going to vote in support of her, the business community appears poised to transition to a second Trump term. By Wednesday afternoon, US stock markets were soaring on news of Trump’s victory.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

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      The Guardian view on the return of President Trump: a bleak day for America and the world | Editorial

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      This is an exceptionally bleak and frightening moment for the United States and the world. Donald Trump swept the electoral college and is on course to take the popular vote – giving him not merely a victory, but a mandate. If many voters gambled on him in 2016, they doubled down this time. Presented with a choice between electing the first black, female president on a promise of a sunnier future, and a racist, misogynist, twice-impeached convicted felon hawking hatred and retribution, they picked Mr Trump.The stark divide between two Americas persists. But polls did not predict the scale of this victory. Only one president has previously won two non-consecutive terms. In 2021, Mr Trump seemed briefly to have lost his own party. Now he has increased his vote share across the country and multiple groups of voters. This – even more than the two assassination attempts en route – will convince him of his invincibility.No party has kept the White House when so many voters have felt the US is going in the wrong direction. As vice-president, Kamala Harris was shadowed by incumbency when electors wanted change. Under Joe Biden, the US economy had a remarkable recovery. But it didn’t feel that way, and people voted accordingly. Mr Trump positioned himself as the change candidate.Ms Harris ran a polished but truncated campaign: Mr Biden’s refusal to pass the torch sooner looks all the worse today. Yet the Democrats need to look deeper. Despite the stakes, many Democratic voters failed to turn out. There is a gender gap, but 52% of white women still voted for Mr Trump. Latino men, in particular, moved towards him: the racial divide remains stark, but may be closing somewhat while the educational gap expands. Many voters relish Mr Trump’s willingness to break the system, because they feel it is already broken for them.Prejudice encouraged voters to see Mr Trump as a more effective leader than Ms Harris, along with a wrongful conflation of authoritarianism and strength. Many of his voters prioritised the economy. But they still knew they were picking a would-be autocrat who has vowed mass deportations and retribution against political opponents and journalists; who was described by his former top military commander as “fascist to the core”; who tried to overturn the will of the people in 2020 and sparked an armed insurrection.We are not going back. But what lies ahead looks worse. His fact-light, erratic, nakedly transactional approach won’t change. This time he has control of the Senate and very possibly the House of Representatives; a blank cheque from the supreme court; and a renewed faith in his supremacy and in pandering to voters’ basest instincts. There will be few “adults” to restrain him. His victory address offered a vision of a court rather than a cabinet, with Elon Musk as a new American oligarch. He tactically repudiated the Project 2025 roadmap, but expect his supporters to pursue their programme.Expect, too, the rollback of LGBTQ+ rights and the pardoning of the January 6 rioters. He does not need to fulfil every promise to do more than enough. Easily avoidable diseases could run rampant without an actual ban on vaccines. He does not have to deport millions to destroy families and foment racial hatred. Tariffs threaten trade war and higher prices at home.Ukraine faces being strong-armed into a bad deal with Vladimir Putin. In Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, who just sacked his defence minister and rival, Yoav Gallant, will be celebrating. Across the world, the far right is emboldened; US allies are rightly anxious. Mr Trump’s pledge to withdraw from climate accords and bolster fossil fuels would end all hope of keeping global heating to below 1.5C, experts believe.An already treacherous world is becoming more so. For many in the US and beyond, the overwhelming emotion today will be despair. But the decision must be to recommit to defending democracy and all of those imperilled by Mr Trump’s return.

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      Why did voters abandon Kamala Harris? Because they feel trapped – and Trump offered a way out | Aditya Chakrabortty

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      Since we’ll hear a lot, again, about “populism”, let’s remember, again, that 19th-century US populism had a healthy strain of leftwing politics. Defending workers, riling up bankers, decrying the “cross of gold” and economic conservatism: look past his Bible-bashing, and William Jennings Bryan was a precursor to Franklin Roosevelt. Yet for much of this election year, the populists’ modern-day successors in the Democrats have served up an anti-populism: telling voters they were wrong.Americans were told they were wrong to see the corrosion of Joe Biden’s abilities, and wrong to think that his replacement should not be decided in a giant backroom stitch-up. They were wrong not to enjoy the US economic miracle, and wrong not to worry about the future of democracy. Black and brown people and students were wrong to expect the party to oppose the bloodbath in Gaza. Latinos were ungrateful to desert the party of racial equality, while Black men were boneheaded not to back a Black woman. Everyone was wrong not to lap up the rallies opened by Beyoncé and Usher, the skits on Saturday Night Live and that clip of Barack Obama rapping. Why couldn’t they just feel the joy?For reasons I’ll explain in a moment, I’m no fan of explanations that begin and end with the bogeyman of “populism”. They almost always wind up with well-lunched commentators ventriloquising the opinions of people they’ve never talked to and in whose worlds they’ve never set foot. Look at the exit polls and you see a materialist explanation for what’s just happened: two out of three US voters report their economy is bad. And they have an excellent point. As I wrote last month, look at the data over the long run and two big trends stand out.First, for the vast majority of US employees – whether middle class or working class, teacher or shop assistant – wages have flatlined. Not for four or even 20 years – but for most of the past half century. Strip out inflation, and average hourly earnings for seven out of 10 employees have barely risen since Richard Nixon was in the White House.I can’t think of a more flammable political economy than a country with a few very rich people where most workers only get by because of low gas and food prices. Then what happens? A second blow. Covid peters out, the world comes out of lockdown and low-wage America is doused in that most combustible of economic substances: inflation. The entire system goes up – and Donald Trump spots his chance.Faced with the flames, what would be a left-populist response? It wouldn’t be to resort to pedantry, to correct angry voters by showing them the aggregate figures – but that’s what many Democrat supporters did. Nor would it be to roll back all the benefits extended over the pandemic: the improved child tax credit, Medicaid and unemployment insurance. But that’s what Joe Biden did, even as he shovelled billions into infrastructure. The electoral result was that working- and middle-class voters peeled away from the Democrats. Kamala Harris won the most affluent voters, while Trump took those earning between $50,000 (£39,000) and $100,000 (£77,000). The two tied for those on $50,000 and below. So much for Harris being part of the most pro-worker government since the 1960s.Just as the electorate professed fury with the entire political and economic system, she and the Democrats made themselves the system’s defenders. They weren’t change but more of the same. They worried about the future of “democracy”; they warned about disrupting free trade. Harris’s slogan of “we’re not going back” said it all: a campaign defined by being anti-Trump rather than for anything. A strategy intended to woo “moderates” left nearly everyone cold.Harris started her campaign differently, by promising to hunt down price-gouging corporates. That policy was popular, but there was little else. She went policy-lite, so as to present Trump with less of a target. Among the supporters she wheeled out this autumn was the billionaire Mark Cuban. In a country where the richest 0.1% own nearly 20% of all wealth – almost as much as 90% of Americans put together – this is almost the definition of anti-populist politics.We probably won’t hear much about billionaires over the next few days. If the commentariat’s form from 2016 is anything to go by, the sketch will be of angry left-behinds and rednecks rallying to a strongman. Never mind that last night’s exit polls showed Trump as personally less popular than Harris, or that more than half of voters judge his views to be “too extreme”. Not to mention that Trump is easily the richest man ever to serve in the White House, with a personal net worth of about $5.5bn (£4.3bn). A marketing man, skilled at targeting discontent, Trump does not follow his crowds. Rather, he is led by the money men around him: the fossil fuel executives, the shadow bankers, the crypto bros and the world’s richest man, Elon Musk.Mitt Romney and George W Bush could always rely on some stuffed shirts from the Fortune 500 to hand over a few tens of thousands. But Trump’s donor class is very different. They include men like Stephen Schwarzman, head of the world’s largest private equity firm, Blackstone, billionaire investor Nelson Peltz and Silicon Valley’s David Sacks. They’re not company men building relationships but, as Trump styles himself, dealmakers. This lot have shelled out a lot more to get in Trump (Musk alone has spent an estimated $100m), and expect their money’s worth. “They’re less concerned about the photo op and a visit to the White House,” as one former bagman for Trump told the New Yorker. “They want to essentially get their issues in the White House.”Trump has reportedly lined up Musk to become his “secretary of cost cutting”, while in April, the US’s next president demanded oil executives give him $1bn to beat the Democrats. In return, he said, he’d let them do a lot more drilling. Slashed regulations and lower taxes are Trump’s way of keeping donors on side. Last time he was in the White House, he brought in $1.5tn of tax cuts that meant the richest 400 families in the US paid a lower tax rate than their secretaries, nannies, cleaners and anyone else in the working class.You can expect a lot more like it over the next four years. Trump will almost certainly plunder from the budgets for social security and Medicaid. The tech bros will suckle on government subsidies, while the suits from private equity get to set government policy.However this politics dresses itself, it’s not populism. Try: theft – taking from the poor to give to the rich.

      Aditya Chakrabortty is a Guardian columnist

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      Why did Trump win, and what comes next? Our panel reacts | Panelists

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      Moustafa Bayoumi: ‘Between hate and nothing, hate won’So, it will be Trump, after all. The very idea of another Trump presidency is devastating. His entire campaign consisted of unbridled race-baiting, woman-hating and fascist-in-waiting messaging, yet still he prevails. This is what succeeds in this country?The answer, it’s now clear, is a resounding yes. Should I be surprised? There are long and painful histories of racism, misogyny and fascism in this country (the Nazis even studied the US when crafting their regime). But, unlike any other nation’s election, this American tragedy will reverberate around the world. We must do all that we can to prevent a Trump presidency turning into even more of a death sentence not just for American women seeking abortions, but also for Ukrainians, Lebanese people and especially Palestinians.Hindsight is easy, of course, but some of us have been warning the Democrats for months about the limitations of the Harris campaign. The Democrats appeared more interested in courting disaffected Republicans, including war criminals such as Dick Cheney, than even merely dialoguing with their progressive flank. They refused to allow a Palestinian American to take the stage at their convention. Meanwhile, American bombs are dropped daily on Palestinians in what is widely considered a genocide, and Harris has had little to say.In fact, Harris probably had little to say about a lot of issues, so much so that the news site Axios labeled her the “‘no comment’ candidate”. The Republicans ran their campaign as a party of hate; the Democrats ran as a party that stood for almost nothing. Between hate and nothing, hate won.This must be the most profound wake-up call the Democratic party has ever heard. They must stop trying to be moderate Republicans and instead stand for equal justice, working people and human rights for everyone. Saying that they do just isn’t enough.The Democrats thought all the hate emanating from the Trump campaign was simply an emotion that they could neutralize by their expressions of “joy”. But what if hate isn’t an emotion? What if it’s an ideology? The answer to that question is what we, and the rest of the world, are about to find out. Pray for us.

      Moustafa Bayoumi is a Guardian US columnist
      Ben Davis: ‘Harris was brought into a terrible situation’American democracy has fallen apart. That an authoritarian rightwinger will take power is the symptom rather than the cause. What brought us to this point, is the cataclysmic, decades-long breakdown of working-class institutions and civil society. The only path forward is to rebuild somehow.Trump gained or held steady with every demographic, even left-trending groups like white college-educated voters and women. He gained most with young, less politicized voters and voters of color of all stripes. How has this happened?Working-class organization, civil society and the basic institutions that have held the country together have disintegrated. There are very few places where people talk to anyone outside their co-workers – during work – and a small number of friends. We don’t know our neighbors. We don’t have unions. This is a society where trust erodes to an extreme degree, and politics is practiced at the level of the individual rather than the community.Kamala Harris did not run a terrible campaign. She was brought into a terrible situation. Joe Biden’s hubris cost her deeply. But she failed in two directions. She shed young voters, Arab and Muslim voters, and Latino voters who had previously favored the left by running an aggressively bipartisan, centrist campaign, ignoring the active genocide in Palestine supported by the United States.But this didn’t work either. The median voter, the bipartisan moderate voter, rejected her.Americans don’t have organization. And with that, they don’t have active solidarity or a structured worldview. They believe a man who played a businessman on TV can press a button and stop inflation. The voting patterns we have seen with young voters, voters of color and all sorts of voters left behind by our country are striking. Their grievances are real. And Democrats have been unable to offer a solution.

      Ben Davis works in political data in Washington DC
      Lloyd Green: ‘Biden racked up decades-high levels of inflation’Joe Biden and Kamala Harris refused to internalize their limited mandate. On election day the US punished them, returning Donald Trump, a convicted felon, to the White House. And before the Democrats cast half the country as benighted, they ought to look closely in the mirror.In office, Biden racked up decades-high levels of inflation at the same time as openly musing about being more consequential than Barack Obama – not the metric Americans were looking for. As much as Biden-Harris saw Dobbs and democracy as silver electoral bullets, voters without four-year degrees were unimpressed.But it doesn’t end there. Despite Biden’s growing deterioration, he pursued re-election – until it was too late. Meanwhile, his team openly trashed Harris to anyone who would listen. All heard that bell’s peal.On the campaign trail, Harris exhibited joy but failed to show sure-footedness. She clobbered Trump in debate but bobbed and weaved when confronted by interviewers. Her inability to separate herself from her boss coupled with her selection of Tim Walz as her running-mate probably doomed her bid. Think incredible lightness of being.Culture remained a battleground. In 2020 and 2022, Democrats nearly destroyed themselves over “defund the police”. Fast forward to 2024: Harris declined to say where she stood on a Proposition 36, a California ballot measure supported by small businesses that sought to impose felony charges and stiffer sentences for certain theft and drug crimes. The proposition prevailed overwhelmingly; Harris did not.

      Lloyd Green is an attorney in New York and served in the US Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992
      Arwa Mahdawi: ‘Harris did not sufficiently break from Biden’Joy will come in the morning, fired-up Democrats enthused at the Democratic national convention back in August. It did not. The unthinkable happened in the middle of the night. Trump is back and he’s back with a vengeance.A Trump revenge tour will bring carnage at home and abroad. Netanyahu was already doing whatever he liked under the Biden administration – but we also know he was angling for a Trump victory. For over a year now Palestinians have been grieving; now it seems likely that the West Bank will be annexed and the misery in Gaza, already unbearable, will intensify.And I don’t need to tell you what will happen with women’s rights at home. Overturning Roe v Wade was just the beginning. The right’s war on women is entering a terrifying new phase.How did we get here? How did the US elect an adjudicated and alleged sexual predator over a woman again? This will be dissected for weeks but the bottom line is this: the US was desperate for change and the Harris campaign squandered their chance to meaningfully represent a new path for the country. Harris did not sufficiently break from Biden and Americans did not want a repeat of the last four years.The Harris campaign tried to find a path to victory by moving to the right, ignoring progressives and courting Republicans by parading around Liz Cheney. It didn’t work. And yet the lesson one imagines the Democratic party will draw from this loss is that they must move even further to the right.Things are bleak. But political change isn’t something that only happens every four years at the ballot box. The amount of organizational energy I’ve seen in the last couple of months has been astounding. We must keep this energy up. The fight isn’t over.

      Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist
      Bhaskar Sunkara: ‘The Democrats must return to their populist New Deal roots’Unlike in 2016, many of us were bracing ourselves for this outcome. But how exactly did Donald Trump manage to win the White House a second time?It certainly wasn’t on the merits of his campaign. Trump was less coherent than in 2016, didn’t deliver the same potent appeals to workers, and embraced unpopular billionaires like Elon Musk.But he seemed to have this election handed to him. To start with, there was Joe Biden. The headline features of “Biden’s economy” were strong as far as GDP growth and jobs went, but Biden was unable to effectively communicate his domestic successes and take advantage of his bully pulpit as president. As a result, 45% of voters, the highest number in decades, said they were financially worse off than they were four years ago.Good policies don’t translate to good politics without an effective voice behind them and the president was unable to head off worries about inflation and immigration. The failures caused by his declining ability manifested itself most dramatically at the first presidential debate and Harris was forced to run from behind when she became the presumptive nominee.Harris herself ran a competent campaign, but was limited by the very nature of today’s Democratic coalition: it’s increasingly the party (in both style and substance) of professional-class people. Even though Harris herself shied away from it, the Democrats as a whole are still associated with identitarian rhetoric and relied on cross-class issues like abortion – which turned out to be less salient than the economy – to drive turnout.The type of majorities that can actually transform American politics won’t be found until Democrats return to their economic populist, New Deal roots. That means naming elites as enemies and avoiding cultural radicalism that appeals to very few and alienates working-class minority communities.This isn’t Harris’s loss; it belongs to her whole party. And the whole country will pay the consequences.

      Bhaskar Sunkara is the president of the Nation, founding editor of Jacobin and author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequalities More