National Review Online
Wednesday, November 06, 2024
Donald Trump is returning to the White House, and,
in the context of our evenly divided politics, in convincing fashion.
This is an extraordinary personal and political
vindication for Trump, who overcame his election loss in 2020, his disgraceful
conduct in the aftermath, a concerted effort to prosecute him into political
oblivion, and unremittingly hostile press coverage.
Trump swept the key battleground states and is
well-positioned to win the popular vote, an achievement that eluded him in
2016. This time, his coalition was broader and more diverse. Once again, he
achieved crushing margins in rural areas, while narrowly winning in the suburbs
and making notable inroads among Hispanic voters, African-American men, and
young people. This led to gains all around the country, from suburban Virginia,
to the border regions of Texas, to the Bronx.
The appeal of Trump’s working-class politics has crossed
racial and ethnic lines and led to a more robustly multiracial GOP coalition.
Meanwhile, Senate Republicans have taken the majority with some room to spare,
and the chances are good, although we may not know for weeks, that the GOP will
hold the House, too.
The big night is a tribute to Trump’s compelling
political persona and the acumen of his campaign, which sought out these voters
and succeeded in getting them. For most Republicans, Trump’s legendary
status has only grown over the last 24 hours.
It’s important to keep in mind, though, that the
necessary predicate of this achievement was the failure of the Biden presidency
and the lunacy of contemporary progressivism, as well as the manifest
inadequacies of the incumbent’s emergency replacement as nominee, Kamala
Harris. Biden promised to be a competent, normal, and unifying president, and
was none of the above. He blew up the border, botched the Afghanistan
withdrawal, and presided over a period of elevated inflation.
In an act of extraordinarily poor judgment, he decided
last year to run again for president, despite his marked decline. When
Democrats felt they could no longer ignore his condition after the first
debate, he was subbed out for Harris, who was poorly suited for the vice
presidency, let alone a presidential campaign and the White House. She never
convincingly achieved separation from all the woke positions she took in 2019
and 2020 or from President Biden.
She ran as the most pro-abortion major-party candidate in
history, and hoped that Dobbs and warnings of Trump’s alleged
fascism could get her over the top. Neither issue got the traction she needed,
while Trump skewered her on prices and the border and her support for trans
radicalism. In the end, given an effective choice between Trump’s record and
Biden’s, voters chose the former.
An enduring dynamic in politics is that every victory is
seeded with the potential for hubris and therefore a fall. Given his remarkable
comeback, Trump will surely be even less inclined to heed advice, but he should
realize that he still isn’t personally popular and his victory was largely a
repudiation of Joe Biden. Maintaining support as president will depend on
delivering results. Prosecutions of opponents for political reasons would be
wrong and self-destructive, and sweeping tariffs would be costly and
disruptive. That said, Trump can achieve much good, from securing the border,
to unleashing the fossil-fuel industry, to deregulating, to building up our
defenses, to appointing more exceptional judges, to extricating DEI programs
from the federal bureaucracy.
When on his best behavior during the campaign, Trump said
that success as president would be the best revenge. The country, and his
administration, would be best served if he makes that his rule for the next
four years.
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