Chris Hayes: The final 2024 election tally is almost in. It should end the MAGA mandate myth.
Chris Hayes: The final 2024 election tally is almost in. It should end the MAGA mandate myth.
There’s going to be a reckoning about the distance between what the swing voters who gave Trump this majority were voting for and what they’re about to get.
Summary
Donald Trump narrowly won the 2024 presidential election, securing the smallest popular vote margin for a victor in modern U.S. history, with just 1.6% over Kamala Harris.
Despite his win, Democrats performed unexpectedly well in down-ballot races, flipping Senate seats in swing states Trump carried and maintaining the House balance.
Republicans lack a clear mandate as Trump’s plans for deportations, ending birthright citizenship, political retribution, and tariffs clash with voters’ hopes for economic relief.
There’s likely to be backlash as voters realize the gap between what they wanted and what Trump plans to deliver.
I'm pretty Liberal but:
Republicans lack a clear mandate
Is utter bullshit. Republicans were handed very clear victories. Narrow, but clear. All western democracies sent a clear message, the current state of affairs is not good. Every western NATO country that had elections unseated the incumbent government.
Trump’s plans for deportations, ending birthright citizenship, political retribution, and tariffs
This is Trump's fluff that the powers that be will entertain until they hold up more pressing priorities for the Republican party. My take on each one is:
- Deportations — That's going to happen. They've played the blame game too long on it. But it's likely that the admin will find it's Elian Gonzalez moment, wave that as victory and then put the whole thing in the rear view. As "the worse case" has serious economic effects that won't fly high among the others in the party without some Congressional stomach for expanded H-2A, which detracts from more pressing concerns for them.
- Ending birthright citizenship — That's not happening. It is stupid that we're even talking about this. Denaturalization, maybe, but nixing the 14th Amendment? No. The momentum isn't there, people have bigger fish to fry.
- Political Retribution — The people he's targeting aren't idiots and have access to a wide variety of legal counsel. Trump's under the impression that it'll cause them the same amount of headache he had in 2021 to 2024, but the reality is Trump picks shitty lawyers because only shitty lawyers want to represent Trump. Trump routinely doesn't pay people and that's made his legal issues magnify by 10,000 fold. Everyone else doesn't have nearly the same headaches Trump has with legal affairs and it's mostly because Trump stiffs people. Other people actually pay their lawyers.
- Tariffs — I mean it's likely to happen. It'll be a FAFO moment for Trump for sure. But if it gets out of hand, his party might be able to reach concessions with Democrats to end any declaration of an emergency Trump tries to use to authorize the tariffs without Congress. It's going to suck, and I will absolutely enjoy the schadenfreude that comes from it but not really enjoy the jacked up prices of things, but I mean things suck as is. So if it get twice as bad as it is now, I'll only care about half as much as I do now. We all just refuse to address the crux of the issues with inflation so we'll just keep on, keeping on. All of us are too busy blaming political people for inflation to really solve the issue, so maybe in another ten years or so everyone will finally chill the fuck out and we can work on the actual issues. But I'm not holding out hope.
There’s likely to be backlash as voters realize the gap between what they wanted and what Trump plans to deliver.
That's almost a given. It's one of the reasons Republicans are trying to get their ducks in a row for the 119th Congress. But with the narrow majority in the House, it will only take one or two asshats from the Freedom Caucus to fuck it up. And I absolutely feel that they're going to do their usual asshattery at least once during the session. Mike Johnson isn't some visionary, he does well to plan his lunch for the day. With all the to-dos the GOP has, it's going to run into the too much water going down a narrow drain issue.
It's one of the reasons the transition team is trying to break things out into sole EO, requiring law, and direction. It's also the reason Trump doesn't want to deal with the 300 day window on his appointments. He wants them hitting the road right away. People want to think Trump wants recess to avoid hearings. Trump just wants recess appointments so that they can get to work on day one, avoiding the hearings is a nice bonus. They have a lot of things they want to get through and it only goes so fast and they're pretty much betting on midterms being hard to them.
But all that said, THIS:
Republicans lack a clear mandate
Is utter trash. They swept the fucking floor. Us Democrats need to take the L, look around, and figure a path for midterms to make a wide enough push in both chambers. But it ain't going to happen just running around and yelling "TRUMP BAD! TRUMP BAD!" Democrats need to provide a clear policy agenda that is easy to articulate.
All good points, and in particular I dislike the about face this article takes. We've consistently pointed out the republicans losing the popular vote yet taking the presidency, but when they do actually win the popular vote and the presidency we’re like “well not really good enoigh…” This article is just blowing smoke up liberal asses. They lost, and they lost hard. The SCOTUS, congress, and the presidency are all captured. The damage that can be done is pretty much unlimited.
“Mandate” is also a ridiculous term. Nobody has won by a landslide to indicate a mandate.
This whole article is sour grapes and glosses over the reality of the situation while exaggerating victories.
When Republicans win at all they consider it a mandate. That's who they've been for decades.
I wish the press would stop talking about "mandate" like it's something that matters. Trump won and will be president. He'd be exactly the same level of president if he'd won by 1 vote or 200 million. Mandate is meaningless legally, and doesn't matter nearly as much psychologically as the media apparently wants it to.
They want it to so you don't struggle when they come in without lube.
I don't know if the author is coping or if they actually believe this.
Despite his win, Democrats performed unexpectedly well in down-ballot races, flipping Senate seats in swing states Trump carried and maintaining the House balance.
Uh... They lost the Senate what the fuck is this guy even talking about?
The senate is weird. It's possible to lose seats even if your party gets more votes overall. 6 years ago was the Trump midterm so democrats did well. This meant a disproportionate number of senators up for reelection this year were either vulnerable democrats or safe republicans. So overall losing only 3 seats is not bad in that context.
Lost the Senate and "maintaining the House balance" is a funny way to say "lost the House, again".
Just take your fucking licks Democrats and learn from it, rather than trying to reframe losing all branches of the Federal government as some sort of secret strategic long-term winning plan.
My county flipped blue. Democrats didn't even have someone running for the house seat here, it was uncontested.
They probably wouldn't have won, but they didn't even try...
Who gives a fuck if you have a mandate if you won a trifecta? In 2 years, maybe some working class voters will realize they were sold magic beans and put a check on their power but mandates are a bullshit concept. Exercise power when you have it.
What backlash? He still was voted in despite him saying exactly what he would do… This is what the country wanted sadly. We are in for some dark times.
Less than 50% of those who voted. And I doubt even all of those wanted Trump's agenda, many either didn't understand or didn't believe he would do some of the things he says.
So I disagree that the country as a whole wanted this. Obviously most did not.
If they truly cared they should have voted. The ones that didn’t vote are passively for this as well. They saw the same things as everyone else and thought it’s fine.
Less than 50% of those who voted.
That's unfortunately/fortunately the only ones that count. The ones that didn't want this, but didn't want this bad enough to actually get out and vote can continue to do so in silence.
Debatable. You overestimate how engaged and attuned the average person is.
All told Trump is up about 2m votes and Harris down 7m compared to Biden in 2020.
This is not a massive increase in support for Trump but it is a significant drop in support for the Dems that lost them the election.
The mandate "myth" is irrelevant. They won all 3 parts of government , they got their mandate.
In the UK we had Brexit and it was extremely close at 48% to 52%. Yet ever since all we ever heard about is how it was decisive and people treat everyone in the UK as if we're pro Brexit. In our elections the tories got 42% of the vote yet massive majorities so dictated what we did.
In short the problem is not the number of voters, it is the electoral system. In the US system if you win enough votes in the right places you win decisively. That seemed like a good system when there was a consensus. Not so good when there is division.
The solution in the US is the same as the UK - electoral reform is needed. The problem in the US is the same as the UK - no one will deliver that as the parties that win power are the ones who benefit from the rigged system.
You think they have a single fuck to give about mandates? They've got the power - they're itching to use it. Good luck everyone.
Donald Trump narrowly won the 2024 presidential election, securing the smallest popular vote margin for a victor in modern U.S. history, with just 1.6% over Kamala Harris.
Wouldn't that have been Bush in 2000 at -0.51%?
Edit: I guess that was the unpopular vote margin.
Trump also had a negative margin in 2016.
More liberal cope? JFC people, liberals got their ass handed to them again, as usual. They simply lack the ideas and will to win.
Whatever. Prepare to defend yourselves against the fascists. Or don't. Far as I'm concerned, I'm on my own from here on out.