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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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      Effects of Republican Senate majority will reverberate through the courts

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      Democrats knew they faced an uphill climb in holding their 51-49 Senate majority on Tuesday, with a map that tilted heavily in Republicans’ favor.But as recently as Sunday, they held out hope that they could maintain control of the upper chamber. They offered cautious optimism that the Democratic incumbent Jon Tester could edge out the Republican Tim Sheehy in Montana, and they felt comfortable with the Democratic senator Sherrod Brown’s chances in Ohio.In the end, Tester and Brown both lost along with the Democrat Glenn Elliott in West Virginia, representing three pick-ups for Republicans. As of Wednesday afternoon, Republicans had secured at least 52 of the Senate’s 100 seats, with the possibility of additional wins in battleground states.Republicans’ new Senate majority will give the president-elect, Donald Trump, far more leverage to enact his legislative agenda and, crucially, confirm judicial and executive nominees.To be clear, Republicans’ legislative prospects will largely depend on whether they can win full control of Congress. The House was still too close to call on Wednesday and would probably remain so for days, as California began the long process of counting millions of mail ballots. If Democrats win a narrow majority in the House, their conference will almost certainly act as a blockade for much of Trump’s agenda.But even without a victory in the House, Trump and Senate Republicans’ partnership could have long-lasting impacts on the country’s courts and laws, given that the upper chamber confirms the president’s judicial nominees.Trump has already nominated three justices to the supreme court, where conservatives hold a six-three majority. With Trump in office, the two oldest conservatives on the court – Clarence Thomas, 76, and Samuel Alito, 74 – may choose to step down to give him the opportunity to fill their seats. In the event that Senate Republicans confirmed Trump’s nominees to replace them, he would become the first president since Dwight Eisenhower to successfully appoint five members of the supreme court.If he has the chance to select more supreme court justices, Trump would probably favor younger nominees who could sit on the bench for decades, given that justices serve lifetime appointments. That possibility underscores a chilling reality for many left-leaning Americans: even though Trump is limited to only serving two terms, the country may be dealing with the repercussions of his presidency far into the future.During his first term, Trump and Senate Republicans prioritized confirming as many conservative judges as possible. Over his four years in office, the Senate confirmed 220 of Trump’s judicial appointments, according to the conservative Heritage Foundation. In comparison, Barack Obama saw 160 judicial confirmations over his eight years in office.After Trump’s flurry of judicial nominations, Joe Biden made it a top priority to match his predecessor’s record. As of Wednesday, the Senate has confirmed 213 of Biden’s judicial appointments, with more possible in the final weeks before the new Congress is seated in January.Because of Trump and Biden’s track records, the new president will inherit the fewest number of federal judicial vacancies in more than three decades, NBC News has reported. But even if the pace of judicial confirmations slows during Trump’s second term, the Republican majority in the Senate will still provide a rubber stamp on other nominations.Trump has made clear that he intends to overhaul the federal government and perhaps even reclassify tens of thousands of non-partisan roles as political appointments. To get his cabinet members and lower-level administration officials confirmed, Trump will need the support of the Senate, and Republicans appear eager to help advance his plans.Although Senate Democrats have lost their majority, their decision to leave the filibuster intact may benefit them in the new session of Congress. During Biden’s early presidency, Democrats had considered amending the filibuster, a legislative mechanism that effectively raises the threshold for passing bills from 51 votes to 60 votes. If Republicans win the House and full control of Congress, Senate Democrats may need to rely on the filibuster to stymie Trump’s agenda.With their party shut out of power for at least the next two years, Senate Democrats will soon turn their attention to the 2026 midterms. But considering senators serve six-year terms, it could take far more than just two years to undo the damage that Tuesday wrought for Democrats.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

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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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      Will Donald Trump destroy US democracy? Unlikely | Cas Mudde

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      The most authoritarian and racist campaign of my lifetime just won Donald Trump a return to the White House. It even was the most popular Republican presidential campaign since 1988. There go four decades of academic research on far-right politics, which has confidently claimed that openly racist far-right parties could not win elections. While it is too early to explain Trump’s shockingly large victory, there is one thing I know for sure: Trump 2.0 will be nothing like Trump 1.0. When Trump returns to the White House on 20 January 2025, he will bring his own people, have a clear plan and face no internal opposition.When Trump won in 2016, he was largely a one-man band. Except for his close family, he had no powerful individuals and organizations that were loyal to him. Hence, he relied on the infrastructure of the Republican party and establishment conservative organizations like the Heritage Foundation. His first administration should therefore be seen as a coalition government, between Trump and the Republican establishment – at that time, personified by Mitch McConnell, then the powerful Senate majority leader. It was mainly successful in policies that the two camps shared – notably, lower taxes, deregulation, and judicial replacement – and much less so in policies that only Trump really cared about, like “the wall” and the “Muslim ban”.Today, Trump is in a much more powerful position. There are few powerful counterweights left within both the US right wing and the broader US political system. The Republican party already controlled the supreme court and has retaken the Senate. Although the House is still in play, it is likely to stay in Republican hands given the size of Trump’s win. Finally, he has a vice-president who is blindly loyal to him.Trump is also in complete control of the Republican party. After Ron DeSantis’s unsuccessful challenge in the midterms, only two years ago, opposition to Trump has largely disappeared within the grand old party. Critics like Liz Cheney have been replaced by Trump loyalists, while challengers like DeSantis and Nikki Haley have since kissed Trump’s ring again. McConnell is literally a shadow of himself, immobilized by health issues and unable to oppose Trump even within his own Senate faction. The new Senate majority leader will undoubtedly be a Trump supporter, just like the current House majority leader, Steve Scalise.Similarly, the broader “conservative” infrastructure has changed fundamentally. Not only have most organizations radicalized, but they have also been joined by a host of new, well-funded pro-Trump organizations, often founded and run by former members of the Trump administration. So, even though the Heritage Foundation may play a lesser role in Trump’s second transition team, the organization has become solidly far right and pro-Trump under its new president, Kevin Roberts. Moreover, it will compete with new pro-Trump groups like the America First Policy Institute, primarily bankrolled by Texas oil money. And for middle- and low-level personnel in both the administration and the bureaucracy, the new Trump administration can draw on a large pool of younger Americans, well-versed in far-right ideology and loyalty to Trump by organizations like Turning Point USA.Finally, this time Trump has a plan. Although he distanced himself from Project 2025 in the campaign, and it is very likely that he never read the lengthy report, most of the people expected to take up key positions in his new administration are closely tied to the project and Trump himself has supported most of the key policies. In addition to the usual rightwing pet projects, like deregulation and lower taxes, it includes Schedule F, which would slash legal protections for tens of thousands of bureaucrats so that they can be fired “at will” – a policy that Trump already introduced in the last days of his first administration and has promised to introduce again on his first day back in office. With the combination of Schedule F and an army of young loyalists, Trump could finally transform the “deep state” into a blindly loyal, if possibly much smaller and therefore less effective, apparatus.Does this mean that Trump will destroy US democracy, like his “friend” Viktor Orbán in Hungary? Unlikely. Not because Americans are more democratic than Hungarians, which is a doubtful assumption anyway, but because the US political system is much more complex than the Hungarian political system. Largely set-up to prevent tyranny, the US political system is extremely complex and rigid. Most importantly, it is almost impossible to change the constitution, which has been at the heart of Orbán’s transformation of the Hungarian system. This does not mean that Trump cannot significantly weaken liberal democracy, but he will have to do it with weaker instruments (like executive orders) and with significant judicial pushback (although probably less from the US supreme court than from state and local courts).This will undoubtedly comfort the many college-educated white men in blue states, who disproportionately produce the news and opinions in the US media, but it will do little for those of us living in Republican-controlled states. Most importantly, it will provide little comfort for the millions of Americans who are already marginalized within the country, from the LGBTQ+ community to people of color and women.While the far right’s plans for mass deportations or a federal ban on abortion might not come to fruition, or at least not to the extent that its most fanatic supporters hope, marginalized groups will face an even more hostile state while enjoying even less protection from an increasingly embattled judiciary and media. And, while they can hope for a Democratic victory in 2028, it will be more difficult than in 2020, as this time the elections might still be free but they will no longer be fair.

      Cas Mudde is the Stanley Wade Shelton UGAF professor of international affairs at the University of Georgia, and author of The Far Right Today More

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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

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      in US Politics

      Roars of delight from the Maga faithful as Donald Trump does the unthinkable

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      The news came at 1.20am. Playing on a giant TV screen, Fox News declared that Donald Trump had won the all-important state of Pennsylvania. The room erupted in roars and shrieks of joy. “It’s over!” shouted one man, turning to hug a stranger. “Fuck Joe Biden!” shouted a young bro in a black Maga hat. “Fuck her!”The crowd broke into chants of “USA! USA! USA!” – for them, a positive affirmation. For the rest of the world, it may have sounded like the ugly threat of a superpower bully it no longer understands.This was the scene at Donald Trump’s election watch party, a lurid spectacle in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Tuesday night and the early hours of Wednesday morning. The unthinkable had happened. Once seemingly down and out, Trump, a twice impeached convicted criminal, appeared to have fought his way back to the White House.“I think that we just witnessed the greatest political comeback in the history of the United States of America,” said Senator JD Vance, now set to be vice-president.That may well be true. But to at least some of Trump’s critics, it will go down as the moment America elected its first fascist president.The people in the room scoffed at such a description. They welcome Trump’s tough stance on immigration and policies they believe will make the economy thrive. They believe Trump has been the victim of Democratic hoaxes and sabotage for years. Now it was payback time.The party was held in a somewhat nondescript convention centre. Inside a cavernous exhibition hall of blacks and greys, a giant “Trump will fix it!” banner hung on one wall and “Dream big again” banner hung opposite. People chatted, drank, milled around and helped themselves to a buffet of cheese and wine and other snacks.The guests were blonder, more tanned and more bejewelled than average. There was a blond woman with a gold necklace, gold and diamond bracelet and red leather dress; a 16-year-old African American girl in a Maga cap; a man in a checked suit and red Maga cap; a young Black man in a double-breasted grey suit and a Maga cap; a woman in a long red dress with floral tattoos climbing her right arm and a Maga cap.View image in fullscreenThree red, two white and three blue lights were suspended above a stage against the backdrop of a deep blue curtain and a giant Stars and Stripes. There were about 50 US flags on poles. Before them a blue lectern boasted: “Trump will fix it.”Two giant TV screens flicked between election coverage on CNN and Fox News. When Kamala Harris won Colorado and Illinois, the crowd booed. But as Trump picked up states, they erupted in cheers. The fog of uncertainty that had dominated this election was slowly lifting. A surge of confidence was palpable. The Maga fans began to believe their man was going to win.At 12.46am, the TVs showed an announcement from Washington that Harris would not be delivering an address. Immediately the Village People’s YMCA boomed from loudspeakers as the screens showed Trump pumping his fists at various rallies – an object of ridicule for his detractors; a sign of affection here.For those who has been present at Trump’s party in New York in 2016, there was a distinct sense of deja vu. History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.People gathered in front of the stage, forming a sea of red caps. Prominent among them was Blake Marnell, a rally regular who wears a suit styled after Trump’s wall. For a few minutes he held up a phone on which a message scrolled: “Trump will win!” Meanwhile a man studied the New York Times on his phone, anxious for updates.Then came the Pennsylvania announcement and bedlam ensued. Ethan Kirkegaard, 25, a property developer, said: “This is magical. We’re creating history right here. We’re on the right side of history, I truly believe. We’re so close to a victory. We just need a few more states to come through and I think we’re going to pull it off.”At 1.48am, the TV screens displayed: “Fox projects Trump elected 47th president.” There were more screams of delight. A group of young men in Maga caps hugged each other. “Let’s fucking go!” someone shouted. More chants of “USA! USA! USA!” Tricia Weldon, 52, clutching a drink, said: “This is history. I’m so excited. I feel like it’s a surreal moment.”At 2.24am the crowd’s patience was rewarded when Trump – wearing his customary dark suit, white shirt and long red tie – took the stage. The crowd joined in with his regular theme song God Bless the USA and raised a forest of phones to shoot photos and videos. “We love you, Trump!” one yelled.Melania Trump stood near her husband and was joined by Barron, the former president’s youngest son, whose pale white face contrasted with his father’s orange complexion. Trump’s older children – Don Jr, Eric, Ivanka and Tiffany – were all on stage too.“I want to thank my beautiful wife Melania!” Trump said. She smiled and waved. He praised her new book and went over to hug and kiss her. She kept smiling.Trump delivered a relatively low-energy speech for a man who, shadowed by criminal convictions and investigations, had just landed the ultimate get-out-of-jail card: the American presidency.“It’s time to put the divisions of the past four years behind us,” the uniquely divisive Trump said. “It’s time to unite.” The architect of the January 6 insurrection claimed again without irony: “This was also a massive victory for democracy and for freedom.”But the remarks were also freighted with grim omens for the second Trump administration. He gave a shout-out to Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, who has become one of his most high-profile supporters. “We have a new star,” he said. “A star is born: Elon.”Trump also lavished praise on vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert Kennedy Jr, promising that he would help “make America healthy again”. The crowd chanted “Bobby! Bobby!”He left the stage to the familiar strains of YMCA. People danced and punched the air. Barron turned briefly and gave a farewell wave.It was a different universe from the mood for millions of Americans who will wake on Wednesday with ashen faces and sick stomachs, struggling to understand that Trump was not an aberration after all. His political resurrection is complete.The world, too, will be reeling. It has long known the most powerful nation on earth committed war crimes from Vietnam to Iraq. Many will now take the view that has also committed a crime against decency and democracy itself. More

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      in US Politics

      US election 2024 live: Donald Trump says ‘we made history’ as he closes in on victory with win in Pennsylvania

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      On stage in West Palm Beach, Trump declared victory and pledged to bring a “golden age” to the United States.“This was a movement like nobody’s ever seen before, and frankly, this was, I believe, the greatest political movement of all time. There’s never been anything like this in this country, and maybe beyond,” Trump said.“And now it’s going to reach a new level of importance, because we’re going to help our country. We’ll help our country … we have a country that needs help, and it needs help very badly. We’re going to fix our borders. We’re going to fix everything about our country. And we made history for a reason tonight, and the reason is going to be just that we overcame obstacles that nobody thought possible, and it is now clear that we’ve achieved the most incredible political thing.”He continued:
      I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honor of being elected your 47th president and your 45th president, and every citizen, I will fight for you, for your family and your future. Every single day, I will be fighting for you and with every breath in my body, I will not rest until we have delivered the strong, safe and prosperous America that our children deserve and that you deserve. This will truly be the golden age of America.
      Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, says Athens “looks forward to further deepening the strategic partnership between our two countries,” in a post on X congratulating Donald Trump on his election victory.At a time of regional turmoil, the centre right leader highlighted the need to continue working closely on geopolitical issues.Nato-member Greece has increasingly emphasised its role as a “pillar of stability” in the eastern Mediterranean – a role that in turn has been highlighted by the Middle East conflict.Hours before ballot boxes opened in the US, Mitsotakis said that while the presidential elections were of “particular importance for the entire international community” it was “absolutely necessary for Europe to come of age geopolitically. The time has come for Europe to re-energize itself by launching policies that go off the beaten track”.The comments have been interpreted as speaking to the nervousness many in Europe will feel about a Trump comeback.The video team have shared the below clips of Donald Trump supporters gathered at a watch party in Florida earlier erupting in celebration as Fox News called the 2024 race.The Associated Press, which the Guardian relies on for projections, has not yet called the election overall.Israel’s president Isaac Herzog has described Donald Trump as a “champion of peace” as senior figures in Benjamin Netanyahu’s government welcomed the prospect of the return of the former president to the White House.In a post to social media Herzog said:
      Congratulations to president Donald Trump on your historic return to the White House. You are a true and dear friend of Israel, and a champion of peace and cooperation in our region.
      I look forward to working with you to strengthen the ironclad bond between our peoples, to build a future of peace and security for the Middle East, and to uphold our shared values.
      Earlier, the Israeli prime minister Netanyahu himself offered congratulations, saying a Trump victory “offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America”.Israel’s newly appointed defense minister, Israel Katz, said he believed that a Trump presidency will “bring back the hostages” and defeat Iran, posting:
      Congratulations to president-elect Donald Trump on his historic victory. Together we’ll strengthen the US-Israel alliance, bring back the hostages, and stand firm to defeat the axis of evil led by Iran.
      Two far-right members of the Netanyahu cabinet, finance minister Bezalel Smotrich and national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir both used social media messages to invoke blessings from God on Trump, Israel and America. The two of them head parties which are for the exansion of Israel’s illegal settlements on the land of the occupied West Bank.Qatar’s Emir, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, also offered congratulations to Trump, saying:
      I wish you all the best during your term and look forward to working together again to strengthen our strategic relationship and partnership, and to advancing our shared efforts in promoting security and stability both in the region and globally.”
      Qatar has been one of the nations working most closely with the US and Egypt in attempts to broker a ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas. Hamas is believed to still be holding about 100 hostages seized from Israel on 7 October 2023, many of whom are thought to have been killed.Hamas, which launched the 7 October attack last year, leading to Israel’s sustained military assault on Gaza, has also reacted to the US election.Reuters reports senior official Sami Abu Zuhri said Trump would be tested on his statements that he can stop the war within hours as US president, and told the news agency: “We urge Trump to learn from Biden’s mistakes.”Charles Michel president of the European Council, which represents the leaders of the 27 EU member states has congratulated Donald Trump.The prime minister of Ireland, which is the European HQ to some of the US’s most important companies, has congratulated Donald Trump.“The people of the United States have spoken and Ireland will work to deepen and strengthen the historic and unbreakable bonds between our people and our nations in the years ahead,” said Simon Harris.Ireland’s relationship with the US is one of its most important economically and politically given its role over the peace deal in Northern Ireland.Foreign investment from the US is the backbone of the country’s economy with US multinationals including tech companies Google, Microsoft and Intel, employing 300,000 people in Ireland and contributing 50% of the country’s corporate tax.Here’s a video of Donald Trump speaking on stage in West Palm Beach, Florida, earlier where he pledgedto bring a “golden age” to the United States.The leader of the UK’s Liberal Democrats party has called a likely Donald Trump election victory “a dark, dark day for people around the globe” and described the Republican as a “destructive demagogue”.Ed Davey, who leads the third largest political party in the UK parliament, wrote on X:
      This is a dark, dark day for people around the globe. The world’s largest economy and most powerful military will be led by a dangerous, destructive demagogue.”
      In a statement recently released by the party, Davey added:
      The next president of the United States is a man who actively undermines the rule of law, human rights, international trade, climate action and global security.
      Millions of Americans – especially women and minorities – will be incredibly fearful about what comes next. We stand with them.
      Families across the UK will also be worrying about the damage Trump will do to our economy and our national security, given his record of starting trade wars, undermining Nato and emboldening tyrants like Putin.
      Fixing the UK’s broken relationship with the EU is even more urgent than before. We must strengthen trade and defence cooperation across Europe to help protect ourselves from the damage Trump will do.
      Now more than ever, we must stand up for the core liberal values of equality, democracy, human rights and the rule of law – at home and around the world.”
      The president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has congratulated Donald Trump and urged him to work with her on a “transatlantic partnership”.Von der Leyen said the EU and US were “more than just allies”, but shared a deep bond “rooted in our shared history, commitment to freedom and democracy, and common goals of security and opportunity for all”.She said:
      Let us work together on a transatlantic partnership that continues to deliver for our citizens. Millions of jobs and billions in trade and investment on each side of the Atlantic depend on the dynamism and stability of our economic relationship.”
      Behind the scenes von der Leyen’s team has been preparing for a Trump victory for months, including by drawing up lists of US imports to Europe to target with tariffs, if Trump imposes punitive duties on European goods to the US.Donald Trump has won Michigan’s Saginaw county, a bellwether that bodes well for his chances of flipping the Great Lakes state Joe Biden won four years ago.Trump is leading with 84.2% of the votes counted, picking up 50.9% support to Kamala Harris’s 47.7%. In 2020, Biden beat Trump by winning 49.4% of the vote compared to the Republican’s 49.1%. The county supported Trump in 2016, when he won Michigan overall.The Associated Press has not yet called Michigan, but Trump currently has a lead of just under five percentage points over Harris.Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte has congratulated Donald Trump and said he showed “strong US leadership” in his first term in office that strengthened the alliance.In a statement Rutte said he looked forward to working with Trump “to advance peace through strength through Nato”.Rutte, who took office last month, referred to the challenges facing the alliance without a direct reference to the war in Ukraine.He said:
      We face a growing number of challenges globally, from a more aggressive Russia, to terrorism, to strategic competition with China, as well the increasing alignment of China, Russia, North Korea and Iran.
      The veteran Dutch politician, reputed for knowing how to handle Trump, praised the US president-elect, while seeking to convince him of the value of the alliance.India’s prime minister Narendra Modi joined the ranks of world leaders congratulating Donald Trump on his presumed victory. In a post on X, Modi offered “hearty congratulations to my friend Donald Trump”, alongside several photos of the two men tightly embracing each other and holding hands.Modi, who has been Indian prime minister for a decade, was seen to have a close relationship with Trump during his first term in office, and Trump has repeatedly referred to “my friend Modi”.As it looked like Trump was claiming victory on Wednesday, Modi said he was “looking forward to collaboration” between the US and India and added:
      Together, let’s work for the betterment of our people and to promote global peace, stability and prosperity.”
      At the Republican watch party in Las Vegas, the crowd is giddy.The bar at the Ahern hotel is packed with excited, bleary-eyed supporters. In a city known for its flair and theatrics, many supporters are dressed up in their most flamboyant Maga gear. A man wearing a rubber Trump mask and a star-paneled cape draws laughs and cheers.Sari Utschen, 57, was wearing a homemade dress that was embroidered with the word “Trump” down the front in huge block letters, and string of LED lights draped like a scarf.“I feel relieved. I feel joyous,” she said.Utschen said she used to vote with Democrats in the 80s and 90s, but finds that the party has gone too far to the left in recent years. “I’ve been red-pilled,” she said, laughing. Over the past four years, she said: “I felt like we were being bamboozled under Biden. Nothing made sense.” More