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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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      Biden’s home town says farewell to ‘Scranton Joe’: ‘We were very proud of him’

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      There’s the President Joseph R Biden Jr Expressway that winds off the interstate into the center of Scranton. Then there’s Biden Street, tucked along one side of the square that houses the towering stone courthouse and the sparkling electric city sign downtown. Then there’s Biden Way, an honorary thoroughfare at the intersection of North Washington Avenue and Fisk Street, where the 46th president was born and lived until he was 10.At Hank’s Hoagies, just down the street from Biden’s childhood home in the Green Ridge section of Scranton, there is a life-size cutout of Biden and shelves of presidential memorabilia. The 46th president is also a member of the restaurant’s hall of fame.Yet for all the deep connection between Joe Biden and this scrappy Pennsylvania city, the president’s visit here on the final weekend of the campaign was relatively muted. He visited two union halls to stump for Kamala Harris, bringing his granddaughter Natalie on stage at one and singing Happy Birthday to a union worker at another.View image in fullscreenBiden may have represented Delaware in the US Senate for more than three decades, but he has always made it clear that he is a son of Scranton. For a president who has staked his presidency on defending the soul of the nation, Scranton, the small city nestled in the mountains of the Wyoming valley in what might be the most important swing state in the nation, has served as his moral compass. His adopted nickname, after all, is “Scranton Joe”.“He has represented our area, our city, and our county in a way that really, to me, is indescribable with such grace and such honor and such dignity,” said Bill Gaughan, a Lackawanna county commissioner who led the effort to rename a street in the city in honor of Biden. Asked what he thought Biden meant when he talked about “Scranton values”, Gaughan said: “I would describe it as similar to how the president describes it. When you get knocked down, people in Scranton pick you back up.”The first time Biden visited as president and drove on the expressway that bears his name, the president turned to Gaughan and told him how proud Biden’s mother would have been to see the sign.View image in fullscreen“We love him. He’s a good man,” said Rosalie Mesko, 85, who lives in Biden’s old neighborhood and said she remembered him and some of his friends from when they were kids. “We were very proud of him. I think he did a good job. He remembered Scranton.”Mary Hazzouri, who has lived in Biden’s old neighborhood for 20 years, said she would get excited every time she would hear him reference a landmark in Scranton. Asked what she thought Biden meant when he talked about Scranton values, she said: “I just feel like we’re middle class. Small town. Everybody knows everybody. Church and little things like that. It’s just a family-oriented town.”Every Friday, a small group meets at a local church to pray for the office of the presidency, said Marie Jordan, a photographer who grew up a few houses down from where Biden did. Jordan showed a reporter a photograph collage she had made of thousands of people who had visited Scranton.A woman walking her dog in front of Biden’s old house, a modest three-story colonial, said she didn’t remember Biden, but that they were the same age and went to St Paul school around the same time.“His family sounds like our family growing up,” she said. “It’s nice to see a kid from Scranton, St Paul’s, go to the White House.”This election, Scranton wasn’t just a symbol; it was a political battleground.View image in fullscreenBarack Obama carried Lackawanna county in 2012 by nearly 28 points. In 2016, Hillary Clinton carried it by 3.4 points, underscoring how much Democrats had been slipping with white working-class voters. In 2020, Biden carried it by a little more than eight points – a performance Harris would have needed to match or improve to carry Pennsylvania. She wound up carrying it by about three points.Downtown on Biden Street, a storefront window has signs for Republican candidates, including Trump. The block where Biden grew up is sprinkled with lawn signs mostly for Democrats, but there are a few for Trump.A man out for an afternoon walk wearing a black “Make America great again” hat said he did not think Biden lived by the hardworking Scranton values he was said to stand for. But asked whether he was proud to have a son of Scranton in the White House, the man, who declined to give his name, said: “Of course.” Then he walked off.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

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      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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      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

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      Today is a day of despair for America. We are plunged into an anticipatory grief | Moira Donegan

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      Today is a day of despair, and it would be futile to tell those who fear and grieve for what is to come in America that they will be OK. It would also be dishonest: many of us, in truth, will not be OK.Donald Trump appears to have decisively won the American election. He and his Republican allies have promised mass deportations that will ruin lives and sunder families; they have threatened to dismantle the Affordable Care Act and appoint the anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F Kennedy Jr to a position of authority on public health. They have pledged vast cuts to social security and Medicare, the persecution of dissidents and violent suppression of Trump’s political enemies. There will almost certainly be a nationwide abortion ban and this will further degrade women’s citizenship, rob them of their dignity, steal their dreams and ruin their health.For those of us aware of what Trump is capable of, this morning has plunged us into a cold kind of anticipatory grief. There are people in America who are reading the news with worry, who are bracing themselves for crackdowns and unrest, and who will, inevitably, be confirmed in their anxiety; who will discover that they have even more to fear from the coming administration than they now know. I’m thinking of all the ordinary Americans who are alive now, thriving or struggling in this declining country, who will have their lives destroyed or cut short by what is coming.For many, Trump’s victory will remind them of nothing so much as his 2016 upset over Hillary Clinton. Once again, his vulgarity, corruption, pettiness, narcissism and bigotry have been rewarded, at our expense; once again, the nation will be plunged into chaos as his vanity, greed, incompetence and anger take precedence over the national interest; once again, a violently and grossly misogynist man has been elevated to a position of superlative power over a flawed but competent, hardworking woman.But 2024 is not 2016. It is worse. In his first term, Trump’s incompetence was often an impediment to the worst of his agenda; no longer. Institutions, both in the government and in civil society, worked to slow or resist his program; now, many of them seem all too willing to participate, with universities and NGOs eager to launder Trumpism into respectability and the billionaire-controlled media eager to cut deals, suppress unfavorable coverage and minimize his misdeeds. And if in his first term Trump’s impulses were sometimes mitigated by moderates and institutionalists in his administration, by now those people have all been purged. He is surrounded by incels, bigots, conspiracists and sadists, and they are much better prepared to use the organs of the state to pursue their hateful aims. Trump himself even has the promise of broad criminal immunity, a recent gift from the supreme court that will enable his authoritarianisms in ways we cannot yet anticipate.But Trump’s victory, and his return to the White House, will not only be a catastrophe because of what they will mean for America’s future. They are also a horror for what they will do to our past. The last eight years, four under Trump’s governance and four under what American politics has become due to his influence, have prompted tremendous struggle and suffering. The groups he disparages – from immigrants, to women, to disabled people, to those from “shithole countries” – will be humiliated again by his return and betrayed by the countrymen who refused to vindicate their dignity with a vote against him. The people who have been harassed and threatened and attacked by his supporters have now seen their countrymen treat the violence that has been done to them with what they will read as indifference at best, and approval at worst.The historically marginalized among us – those who are Black, or trans, or female – have struggled to make their worthiness and citizenship meaningful in spite of the hatred and hierarchy that Trump has championed. This was the aim of the Women’s Marches, of #MeToo, of Black Lives Matter, which were in part rebukes to Trumpism, and symptoms of the desire for a different America, one that is less cruel to its citizens and more worthy of its stated ideals of liberty and justice for all. They dreamed of turning this country into a free nation of equals; instead, they must now settle for the smaller dream of keeping themselves safe from the worst of what is to come. Trump’s return to the presidency makes these bygone years of activism seem, in retrospect, like a humiliating exercise in futility.Does America deserve Trump? In the years since he rose to power, one theory posits that he is merely the manifestation of the nation’s unexorcised demons – a vestige of the racism that allowed this country to build its economy off the backs of the enslaved, of the casual relationship to violence that allowed it to build its territory and its global hegemony through violent conquest and coercion, of the grubby love of money and shameless disregard for principle that have always motivated our rapacious economy. In this version of the story, Trump is not merely a morbid symptom, but something like America’s comeuppance, a punishment for our sins. Living under his rule takes on the grim appropriateness of one of those ironic punishments in the underworlds of classical mythology, or in the hell of Dante’s Inferno. It is a feature of this horror that those who suffer most under his rule are usually those who are least culpable for these trespasses. Because we never really atoned – not for slavery, not for empire, not for the slaughter and dispossession of Indigenous Americans or the war and exploitation of foreign countries – this is what we now must endure: a figure who brings these cruelties home and who mocks our self-flattering delusion that we ever were, ever could have been, anything else.And yet there remain so many Americans who hope for this country to be something else, if only because they will not survive it otherwise. In the coming days, those who tried to prevent this outcome will turn on one another. Liberals and leftists will point fingers; various Harris campaign staffers will be named responsible for failed strategies in this or that state; someone will make a racist bid to scapegoat Arab Americans and the Uncommitted movement; and many people, smug and insulated from the worst of what is to come, will say that the Democratic party spent too much time campaigning on abortion rights issues.There is plenty of blame to go around. But for the most part, this finger-pointing will be a distraction, a way of putting off the confrontation with what is coming. Instead, I hope that we can turn our attention to the most vulnerable among us: those Trump has antagonized and ridiculed, those who are less safe today than they hoped they might be yesterday. It is those targeted groups who need us, our solidarity and careful attention. In turning to them, we can keep alive in ourselves some small part of the America that Donald Trump seeks to destroy.

      Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist More

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      in US Politics

      Starmer congratulates Trump and says ‘we stand shoulder to shoulder’ – UK politics live

      by

      Good morning. Keir Starmer has just issued a statement congratulating Donald Trump on his election victory, which now appears all but certain. Starmer said:
      Congratulations President-elect Trump on your historic election victory. I look forward to working with you in the years ahead.
      As the closest of allies, we stand shoulder to shoulder in defence of our shared values of freedom, democracy and enterprise.
      From growth and security to innovation and tech, I know that the UK-US special relationship will continue to prosper on both sides of the Atlantic for years to come.
      There will be plenty, plenty more UK reaction to the US election to come. I’ll be covering it here.And it is an important day in UK politics too, with Kemi Badenoch taking PMQs for the first time since her election as the new Conservative party leader.Here is the agenda for the day.Noon: Keir Starmer faces Kemi Badenoch at PMQs.2.30pm: Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, gives evidence to the Commons Treasury committee about the budget.If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. I’m still using X and I’ll see something addressed to @AndrewSparrow very quickly. I’m also trying Bluesky (@andrewsparrowgdn) and Threads (@andrewsparrowtheguardian).I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.Kemi Badenoch, the new Conservative leader, and Priti Patel, the new shadow foreign secretary, have not yet issued a statement following Donald Trump supporting victory. Badenoch has not been as overtly pro-Trump as some Tories, like Liz Truss and Boris Johnson, but it is fairly clear where her sympathies lie. In a GB News hustings during the Tory leadership debate, asked if she favoured Trump or Kamala Harris, she replied: “I like both of them equally.” But she also laughed, implying it was a diplomatic answer, not a truthful one. She has also said she is a “huge fan” of Elon Musk, Trump’s richest and most influential supporter.But one Conservative MP, the rightwinger Nick Timothy, has been commenting on Trump’s win in detail. He has put a series of posts on social media highlighting the challenges raised for Labour. A lot of these are questions they will probably be asking in Downing Street this morning.
      I’m not into America-brained punditry but the US election poses questions of our government.
      1. Trump has made clear America will not subsidise European defence any longer. The Govt has refused to put a timeline on an increase in defence spending. What’s it’s plan? (1/n).

      2. American subsidies and the enormity of its equity market have drawn British talent and businesses across the Atlantic, even under Joe Biden. What is the response?
      3. Trump will adopt a more confrontational approach to trade with China. How will we handle that?

      4. We don’t know his Ukraine policy but it’s likely Trump will push for a deal. Does our Government back a deal or is its Ukraine policy independent?
      5. Trump will take a hard line towards Iran. Our Government won’t even proscribe the IRGC. What’s the policy?

      6. In the UN the UK has recently voted with European countries not America on eg Iran. Will that change?
      7. The constant in Trump’s career is his concern about the US trade deficit. If he goes protectionist with British produce, goods and services, what’s our response?

      8. On the many other issues that arise between the two countries – eg security cooperation, extradition, diplomacy – what’s the plan to ensure good relations?
      9. Who will be our next ambassador in DC? Labour blocked a skilled diplomat in Tim Barrow and have flirted with options including Mandelson, Miliband and Baroness Amos, who thinks we should consider paying reparations to Caribbean countries.

      11. How wise was it to appoint Lammy to this position when this election result was always a possibility?
      12. How wise was it to send armies of Labour activists to fight against Trump in the election?
      The Green party says Donald Trump is a “bigot, bully and liar”, and that people around the world must fight the “politics of hate” he represents. In a statement from the party, Carla Denyer, the co-leader, said:
      A dangerous bigot, bully, and liar is once again set to become the leader of the most powerful country in the world. A climate change denier, a proud racist and misogynist, and a man who has sought to subvert elections and incite insurrection.
      On this dark day, we stand in solidarity with all US citizens who fear a convicted criminal and a fascist in the White House. And we stand with all those around the world who dreaded this moment and must now live with its consequences, including those in Gaza and Ukraine.
      Together, those of us who believe in democracy must work together to overcome authoritarianism and the politics of hate.
      Another Labour politician who has criticised Donald Trump strongly in the past is Emily Thornberry, shadow foreign secretary when Jeremy Corbyn was Labour leader and now chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee. In an interview on the Today programme this morning she said Trump’s victory (or apparent victory – he still has not officially hit 270 electoral college votes) was “disappointing”, and that it made the world “unpredictable”.When it was put to her that she described him as a “racist, sexual predator” when he visited the UK during his first term as president, she replied:
      Well, he is. But he is the president of the United States, and we need to work with him.
      Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, has put out a statement saying people in the capital will feel “anxious” about the results of the US presidential elections. He said:
      I know that many Londoners will be anxious about the outcome of the US presidential election. Many will be fearful about what it will mean for democracy and for women’s rights, or how the result impacts the situation in the Middle East or the fate of Ukraine. Others will be worried about the future of NATO or tackling the climate crisis …
      The lesson of today is that progress is not inevitable. But asserting our progressive values is more important than ever – re-committing to building a world where racism and hatred is rejected, the fundamental rights of women and girls are upheld, and where we continue to tackle the crisis of climate change head on.
      During Trump’s first term as US president, Trump publicly criticised Khan on various occasions, prompting Khan to respond robustly.The most detailed account of Keir Starmer’s private dinner with Donald Trump in New York in September (see 8.44am) appeared in an article by Tim Shipman in the Sunday Times at the weekend. Here is an extract.
      Twice during Sir Keir Starmer’s first dinner with Donald Trump at the end of September, the former president turned to the prime minister and said: “You’re a liberal, so we won’t always agree but we can work together.” At the end of the meal, he looked at Starmer and said: “You and I are friends.” Starmer’s team breathed a sigh of relief. With America set to choose a new commander-in-chief, personal relationships could define the future of the transatlantic alliance.
      An even bigger hit with Trump than the buttoned-up Starmer, however, was David Lammy, the foreign secretary. Lammy laughed in the right places at Trump’s jokes and the former president personally offered him a second portion of food, a moment of both levity and symbolism as a man accused of neo-fascist tendencies bonded with the descendant of slaves.
      Lammy, who attended Harvard Law School and has relatives in the United States, is given to the kind of back-slapping bonhomie that goes a long way in Washington. “David gets American politicians,” said one diplomatic source.
      The Stand Up to Racism campaign says it is organising a “No to Trump” protest at 6pm tonight at the US embassy in London. Weyman Bennett, co-convenor of of the group, said:
      Trump is a racist who gives every fascist and far-right activist a boost. His last presidency saw millions march against him. We are coming out to oppose him – and his racism, sexism, bigotry and Islamophobia again.
      Other organisations supporting the protest include the Stop the War Coalition, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and the Abortion Rights CampaignUK growth would be halved in the event Donald Trump wins the US presidential race and imposes the swingeing new tariffs he has threatened, a leading thinktank warned in a report published as the US election results starting coming in. Larry Elliott has the story.Opposition party politicians have scope to criticise Donald Trump in a way that members of a government that will have to deal with the Trump administration do not, and that is evident from the Liberal Democrats’ reaction to Trump’s election victory (which still have not been officially confirmed, but which seems very certain).Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, released a statement shortly after Keir Starmer’s (see 8.32am) saying that Trump declaring victory was a “dark, dark day” for the world and that it made fixing the UK’s relationship with the EU “even more urgent”.
      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.
      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.
      Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, told the Today programme this morning that Donald Trump would be “a genuine radical”. Farage, who counts Trump as a friend and who is in the US to attend Trump’s election day party in Florida, said:
      What you are going to see from this Trump administration, and I’m guessing that Elon Musk will be the man that is tasked to do it – is there will be a big fightback against the administrative bureaucratic state which is far too big, far too powerful and actually very undemocratic.
      He also claimed Trump was “bringing Americans together”.
      What is very interesting about the Trump movement is that it’s critics call it all sorts of nasty names, the truth is in many ways it’s bringing Americans together.
      David Lammy, the foreign secretary, has posted a message on social media congratulating Donald Trump.
      Congratulations to @realDonaldTrump on your victory.The UK has no greater friend than the US, with the special relationship being cherished on both sides of the Atlantic for more than 80 years.We look forward to working with you and @JDVance in the years ahead.
      Lammy is one of several senior Labour figures who made very critical comments about Trump in public in the past. Lammy’s comments included describing Trump as a “neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath”, a “profound threat to the international order” and a “dangerous clown”.Kamala Harris has not conceded yet in the US presidential contest, and Donald Trump has not quite secured the necessary 270 electoral college votes needed to make him president. But Downing Street sent out a message from Keir Starmer congratulating Trump anyway at 8.16am. By that point other word leaders, like the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and the Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, had already offered Trump their congratulations and Starmer will have decided that it was best not to hang around.Most Labour MPs are horrified by Trump’s politics. But Starmer knows he has to work with him and as Labour leader in opposition he was scrupulous about talking about him respectfully, and as PM he has made an effort to cultivate a good relationship, calling him to express support after the assasination attempt and arranging a private ‘get to know you dinner’ when he was in New York for the UN general assembly meeting recently.Good morning. Keir Starmer has just issued a statement congratulating Donald Trump on his election victory, which now appears all but certain. Starmer said:
      Congratulations President-elect Trump on your historic election victory. I look forward to working with you in the years ahead.
      As the closest of allies, we stand shoulder to shoulder in defence of our shared values of freedom, democracy and enterprise.
      From growth and security to innovation and tech, I know that the UK-US special relationship will continue to prosper on both sides of the Atlantic for years to come.
      There will be plenty, plenty more UK reaction to the US election to come. I’ll be covering it here.And it is an important day in UK politics too, with Kemi Badenoch taking PMQs for the first time since her election as the new Conservative party leader.Here is the agenda for the day.Noon: Keir Starmer faces Kemi Badenoch at PMQs.2.30pm: Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, gives evidence to the Commons Treasury committee about the budget.If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. I’m still using X and I’ll see something addressed to @AndrewSparrow very quickly. I’m also trying Bluesky (@andrewsparrowgdn) and Threads (@andrewsparrowtheguardian).I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog. More

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      in US Politics

      The thought of a Trump presidency is eating me alive | Francine Prose

      by

      I’m neither the calmest nor the most anxious person. But as Donald Trump’s presidential victory seems more certain by the minute, I feel sick to my stomach with worry. I hoped to go to sleep on election night knowing Harris had won, and that we were safe. But that is not what was in store for us.The anxiety I’m feeling right now started months ago. During the lead-up to the 2024 presidential election, my hair began falling out and one of my eyelids started twitching. Classic signs of stress, said a doctor friend. On Halloween, talking with a colleague, I realized that we looked and sounded the way people look and sound outside the intensive care unit, as they wait to learn whether a friend or relative will survive.The survival we were worried about was that of our democracy. Our flawed democracy, I should say. No one can pretend we live in a nation of equals, that there aren’t massive income and racial disparities. No one imagines the rich and poor have an equal say about who runs for office or makes decisions about healthcare and education. No one dreams that either presidential candidate will stop funding war in the Middle East.Regardless of who is funding our political campaigns, no one is going to run for office on a platform that proclaims: I promise the American people that I am going to fight to protect our precious oligarchy!So let’s call it democracy. Because the alternative is so much worse.We understand the alternative. We know what a dictatorship is. The millions killed by Hitler, the millions killed by Stalin. The Argentinean military dropping prisoners out of helicopters. The replacement of laws and rights with the whims of the dictator. The dehumanization of the other, the whipping up of the majority to see the minority as vermin, as vectors of “poisoned blood”. The normalization of violence as part of the political process. The mutual admiration of one dictator for another. The silencing of every voice except that of the dictator and his inner circle. The idea that the old couple next door, with their funny accents, raising their grandson, are criminals who must be arrested and dumped across the border. The delight in racist humor, that jolly dog-whistle of hatred.The imprisonment and execution of those who disagree with the government is one of the most common threats we’d heard during the campaign. Any system, even ours, could murder its Alexei Navalny. In Pittsburgh I met a writer, Abdelrahman ElGendy, who spent six years in prison for taking part in a demonstration against Egypt’s military government. And what if the dictator decides against birth control or equal rights for women? What if misogyny is so open and prevalent that a woman’s laughter is described as a witch’s cackle?And what if the dictator loses his mind – along with the nuclear code? What if the dictator surrounds himself with power-hungry sociopaths, as so many dictators have? What if the dictator decides that the sick and old, the infirm and poor are a drain on the economy?These are snowflake fears, I know, but buttressed by sturdy historical facts. The most eloquent account of the prelude to a dictatorship was written by Gabriel García Márquez, in an essay, Death of a President: The Last Days of Salvador Allende, published in Harper’s, in 1974.All you have to do is read about the rally at Madison Square Garden on 26 October 2024. A comedian told nasty jokes about Puerto Rico, the sex lives of Latinos, the cheapness of Jews, the sluttiness of powerful women. A prominent speaker said, “America is for Americans.” In 1939, 20,000 people attended the rally of the German American Bund, also in Madison Square Garden. One of those speakers said that if George Washington were alive, he would be friends with Adolf Hitler.Regardless who wins the 2024 election, the campaign has been a snapshot – however blurry in places – of our country. And it’s not a pretty picture. The divisions are going deeper, or perhaps just more open. In our peaceful rural neighborhood, someone has posted a campaign sign at the entrance to the long narrow lane that leads to the peaceful town cemetery.Dictators are not about bridging divides. They prefer divisions. They like people hating other people. They like people fearing that the country is in danger from maniacs who want to defund the police and offer welcome baskets to busloads of narcos and serial killers. We’ve been encouraged to picture migration as a scene from World War Z (2013), zombies scaling fortifications, swarming the cities of the living.People have been saying that the would-be dictator was not really going to do what he threatened during the campaign. Economically, it was a nonstarter. Deport the undocumented agricultural workers, and a tangerine will cost $20! But I kept thinking of something that the journalist Masha Gessen wrote in the aftermath of the 2016 election: believe the dictator.Added to our dark fantasies about the future are the pre-existent realities lately getting new scrutiny. The refusal of two major newspapers to endorse a candidate reminded us (surprise!) how much of our media is run by billionaires calculating, to the penny, the potential profit and loss, depending on who wins. Officials with significant roles in our governments turn out to have price tags as low as an airline upgrade. For most of my life, I’ve felt more or less reassured by the existence of the supreme court, but that bedrock trust is gone.Things are a mess. We want the country to get better, and we fear it could get worse.People in other countries have apparently been obsessed with the 2024 US elections. They understand what’s at stake. Even from afar they can see why we have been sleeping badly at night and being on edge during the day.

      Francine Prose is a former president of PEN American Center and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences More