Ultimately, former US President Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 national election last week for another four-year presidential term in the White House was overwhelming.
Before the Nov. 5 election, national polling gave Vice President Kamala Harris a slight edge over Trump, perhaps one or two percentage points, according to the survey.
Harris, the Democratic nominee, and Trump, the Republican, were virtually deadlocked, according to surveys, in seven key political conflict states that election analysts considered critical to the election outcome.
Trump, however, won all seven states, giving him a lopsided lead in the state-by-state count of Electoral College votes, 312 to 226, which determines the outcome of U.S. presidential elections. The number needed to clinch the presidency is 270. He won all seven battleground states by margins ranging from just under 1 percent in Wisconsin to more than 6 percent in Arizona.
On January 20, 2025, Trump, 78, will become the nation’s 47th president and the first president to win two non-consecutive terms since Grover Cleveland in the 1890s. He is the oldest president-elect in U.S. history .
Trump also won the popular vote, the first Republican candidate to achieve such success since former President George W. Bush in 2004.
While the final ballots are still being counted, Trump is already the clear winner, garnering nearly 75 million votes so far, compared to just under 71 million for Harris, a 50.5% advantage. at 47.9% for Trump.
Trump’s 2024 vote total was about the same as the 74 million he received in his 2020 election loss to Democratic President Joe Biden, but the vote count for Harris was around 10 million less than that obtained by Biden.
American pollsters often like to say that their surveys are only a snapshot in time and are not necessarily predictive.
But in Trump’s three presidential elections since 2016, his level of support has been consistently underestimated in polls, no matter how many times pollsters have tried to adjust their published results to account for a vote Trump hidden from people unwilling to tell, even to anonymous investigators. that, yes, when they went to the polling centers or voted by mail, he was their choice.
Exit polls showed female voters favoring Harris and the Trump men. More educated voters went for Harris, while those without a college degree voted for Trump, but nearly two-thirds of Americans do not have a college degree.
In mustering his majority vote, Trump cut two traditional Democratic constituencies, black and Latino voters.
According to the Associated Press’ VoteCast survey of voters, 16% of Black voters supported Trump in 2024, double his 2020 campaign. In comparison, 83% of Black voters supported Kamala Harris, up from 91%. who supported Biden in 2020.
Democrats also lost ground among Latino voters, with 56% voting for Harris in 2024, compared to 63% for Biden in 2020. Support for Trump increased from 35% four years ago to 42% this year.
