In the early hours of Nov. 6, Trump's victory was clear. With the popular vote, all contested swing states and Congress, the Republican Party won in a landslide. Trump's victory sent a shock wave around the country. The fear of deportations, increased attacks on LGBTQ+ people and on the rights of women, Black people and the working class are all being felt in different ways this week.
As of writing this article, the numbers point us to the fact that this was a deep loss for the Democrats. They hemorrhaged support, losing roughly 8 million votes from 2020, while Trump gained approximately 1.5 million votes. This tells a story, less of a mandate for Trump and the Republicans, and more of a rejection of the Biden/Harris administration and the Democrats.
Why? The Democrats have presented themselves as the responsible managers of this society. As a choice between order versus chaos. The problem is, they are managers of a system in collapse. And they are managing a system in decline for the majority of people. Of course people will turn away from them. This can look like voting third party, voting for the Republicans or staying home.
Is the American population irredeemably bigoted? No doubt, the racism that is at the foundation of this country is alive and well today. The sexism that is fundamental to this system and normalized in our daily lives played a role.
However, this cannot explain everything.
In exit polls, people of all different racial lines claimed that one of their main concerns was the economy. Trump's gains among women, Latinos and Black men cannot be explained simply by calling all of those voters sexist and racist. The Harris campaign did little to distinguish itself from an economy that is unaffordable and insufferable to most people.
At the same time, many measures that run against the Republican agenda passed. Voters in Missouri and Alaska passed a minimum wage of $15 an hour with paid sick time and voted for Trump. Abortion protection referendums passed in seven out of 10 states.
On top of all of this, Harris maintained the Biden administration's firm support of Israel and did nothing to stop enabling the genocide in Gaza beyond hollow words and meaningless talk of red lines.
The overall response of the election was to reject the status quo. Working class people — all of us: immigrants, Black and brown people, women, LGBTQ+ people — are under attack from both parties. The Republicans are in a position to escalate the class war waged against us. The Democrats' cries that “we're not them” will never be enough to defend our rights that are at stake.
