The 2024 United States General Election has been described as the media event of the decade. This will no doubt be the case until the 2028 Election. From the hall of University College, which hosted an all night watch party, the results began to roll in.
The race for several weeks has seemed too close to call. Although the pollsters (and the betting markets, notably polychain) had been speculating that Trump – Vance 2024 had taken the lead, the Democrats encountered some final hope two days ago with a shock prediction from a reputable pollster, Selzer, suggesting that Iowa was leaning disproportionately for Harris.
Despite all the gossip, the hype and the increasingly polarizing political campaign, since the very beginning of the evening it seemed that the election would be down to a few dozen thousand votes in the 7 key swing states that the two campaigns had identified. With 8AM looming, those votes are still being counted, each ballot containing Harris’s last chance of a second wind.
For all of the high drama of the election, with the probable announcement of Pennsylvania for Trump, it is becoming apparent that the 34 times indicted Ex-President will return to the White House.
While there almost certainly will be legal challenges in this election, this time they likely will come from the Democrats (although Trump’s ally Elon Musk, was reportedly collecting contingency allegations of electoral malpractice on X, formally Twitter). What is most shocking about this election is the unprecedented increase in popular support for Trump. Immigration and abortion, the constitutional right to which was removed under a Trump appointed Supreme court – many states also holding polls on the matter – are considered key aspects of this election. Turnout, or the lack thereof, especially among women, will no doubt come to be considered a key area for understanding these results.
While the Republican campaign was expecting to build support among key conservative demographics, especially younger white men, the Trump Campaign’s success in “sunbelt” southern seats seems to have relied upon the continued and growing support for Trump from certain Latino groups. In northern states, we can expect extensive analysis of the results, as the campaigns attempt to discern how the over 3 billion dollars spent on the election influenced voters. It would be amiss not to mention voter suppression, and other democratically suspect tactics that have been deployed this election, broadly by Republicans. The extent of this, and of potential foreign influence in the 2024 race, will remain to be explored.
While ballots remain to be counted and there will be a rocky road to the full formal ratification of the election results, it seems almost a certainty that Trump will be the President of the United States and serve a second term. He will encounter two houses of Congress that have a strong Republican presence not seen in recent years, with the Republicans retaking the Senate. Meanwhile, as the Democrats begin to consider their future, having put their faith in Harris – Walz 2024, America will be wondering a similar, if potentially more existential question.
University college is one of the oldest in Oxford, and America is one of the oldest democracies. As we begin to consider the implications of a second Trump presidency, especially in the face of the controversial Project 2025 aligned with the Republican Campaign, America’s democracy may well be facing a period of questioning how long it will yet last.
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