Gaza. And people will continue denying and ignoring that just like they have for the last year leading up to this.
Agree with all of this.
Tons of people are struggling financially. The cost of housing, food, energy, etc. has skyrocketed, and there is a perception (rightly or wrongly) that a Harris victory would be “more of the same” and a Trump victory would lower the cost of living.
I think it’s more “You say Trump will persecute and kill anyone who isn’t white? Anyone who isn’t Straight and Christian? Will strip women of the vote and personhood? You say he likes Hitler! Wonderful1 Sign me up! Let’s start the killing!”
Of course you do.
People tend to vote for a candidate they think seems presidential. A white male seems more presidential than a woman of color to way too many people. If you can’t bring yourself to vote for Trump and aren’t willing to acknowledge your own sexism and racism, it’s easier not to vote at all.
As far as I am aware, Biden wasn’t an option on the ballot.
Answer to the OP: The votes aren’t all counted yet. It’s going to be very near 50/50, the mail-in ballots just haven’t arrived yet.
Also, somebody hateful, greedy, bigoted, arrogant and cruel also seems “presidential” to them. A “strong leader”.
There’s a great deal of overlap between fascism and toxic masculinity.
Sure he was. The burden of a vice president is they have to own the policies of their president. Harris had to run on the track record of the Biden administration.
Harris refused to meet with Netanyahu. She was pretty clearly in saying that she wasn’t going to follow what Biden is doing.
Given that, you would seem to be claiming that the average Democrat forms their opinion on politicians based on some vague and irrational feeling that comes from a mix of gossip, rumor, and Instagram stories, rather than evidence-based reasoning? Say it ain’t so!
For the first three months of Harris’ candidacy I was despairing that she didn’t have a chance because of the racist and sexist character of the American electorate. When it became clear that she wasn’t running on her race or gender, I started to turn into the wife in this scenario. I forgot about the brick wall she was facing and began to believe that reason would prevail. Nope. I have no idea how many more generations it will be before America is ready to elect a black woman to the Oval Office, but it won’t be in my lifetime. Maybe a woman, maybe.
As for the high 2020 number, another factor is likely that many more voters in the country got a ballot mailed to their homes that year. Many people who never get off the couch to vote nonetheless might have voted, raising the participation rate for that one election.
I think the simplest explanation is that in 2020, the memories of how awful a Trump presidency was, was still fresh in everyone’s minds (it was still ongoing,) so 16 million more Democrats showed up to vote.
Then in 2024, the memories of the awful Trump presidency had faded and instead people were blaming Biden and Harris for problems. That led 16 million Democrats to not show up to vote.
You think everyone who votes Democrat is a Democrat? If you only had to rely on those that strongly identify as Democrats then things would be much easier. A lot of people don’t feel that strongly about politics or have dislike for parties in general. Biden got those people to vote for him. It looks like many stayed home for Harris.
Trump’s massive record of failings were fresh in voters’ minds in November 2020 driving a lot of irregular voters and people disillusioned with their selection in 2016. With four years of distance, and notwithstanding investigations and convictions that have mostly added up to a bucket of wet spit as far as many voters are concerned, and combined with a Democratic candidate that had a campaign that was mostly based on “Vote for Kamala because Trump is awful” but did little to address actual concerns of voters or are struggling economically despite what all of the indicators say, add a few points for misogyny and racism, and then throw in the Biden Administration response to the genocide in the Gaza Strip is to send Israel more weapons and money undercutting progressive and Arab-American voters (even if Harris wasn’t consulted and didn’t concur with it), and you get back about the same level as Hillary Clinton (maybe slightly more when all votes are counted).
Stranger
Yeah I don’t disagree with that.
A recent question in the polls only thread asked if $32 was too much to pay for a single large two topping pizza. The president gets blamed for bad things that happen during their watch. People remember that $32 pizza a lot clearer than what Trump did in 2017.
The people for Gaza probably voted for Harris. Trump isn’t an upgrade.
The big shift is the successful takeover of the worker protection racket that the Democrats held for 200 years, while losing the (tiny number of) rationalists that formed the core of the Republican party for the same period.
This probably deserves another thread, and perhaps I will start it once I’ve put some ideas on paper, but my big question is this:
“Other than not being Donald Trump, what did Kamala Harris offer the average voter?”
What is the Democrats “big idea”? “Democracy” is a great buzz-word, but it’s not a plan to improve the lives of the average voter. “Reproductive Rights” are important, but many voters have been able to address that in their states through direct action, and any voters for whom that is the primary driver are already in their camp.
Bill Clinton had a strong economic plan based on free trade and tax reform. Barack Obama had health care reform. Harris had… housing incentives? Student loan forgiveness? Keeping Bidenomics on track? More free trade?
Democratic ideas, especially economic ones, are simultaneously anemic and unpopular. They need a new, simple, and powerful populist economic agenda focused on tax reform and health care - issues they typically poll well on.
Yes - although I might quibble with “racket” (but not too much). Democrats stopped believably arguing that they were the party supporting the working man (and yes, I mean to be gender-specific). So working men have stopped voting for them. Winning them back will be very difficult, and it’s increasingly hard to win a national election (and likely impossible to control the Senate) without them.
Here in solid blue New Jersey it was the closest race in 32 years. Harris only took the state by 5 points. Biden took it by 16 points.
“The people for Gaza” likely abstained or made protest votes, at least in Michigan. This clearly wasn’t the decisive factor but the broad assumption that “black and brown people” will bloc vote for whatever candidate the DNC fields is a terribly naive one that leads people to repeatedly overestimate support for Democrats.
Stranger
What are these people thinking, that the US should launch a war against Israel or what?