[jahnu]

Question from a European who doesn’t deeply understand your partisan politics: what specifically should they have done differently? My probably wrong understanding was that people were still angry about the inflationary consequences of dealing with the pandemic and didn’t believe it was tapering off, didn’t believe that unemployment was low, didn’t believe that real wages were increasing. How could they have combated that?

[jajuuka]

As a more general point, 2024 saw many establishment governments switch across the world. My hypothesis is that many people around the world were still craving a pre pandemic lifestyle and world. And that was expressed as anger at the current government regardless of how they handled covid and the aftermath. Others have brought up specific issues but I think there is some connective tissue for people across the world because amount of similar sentiment from different cultures. There is no silver bullet though. Multiple events, policies, and statements factor into a major election win or loss.

[jajuuka]

I didn't mean any of this. I am so sorry. Please forgive me and flag this for deletion.

[jonfw]

Generally speaking, people thought that government spending led to massive inflation, and the republicans have stronger rhetoric around cutting government spending.

[otterley]

> republicans have stronger rhetoric around cutting government spending

All they have is rhetoric, because their record with respect to actually doing it is not strong. Government deficits increased under every Republican administration in recent memory. They talk the talk, but never walk the walk.

[jonfw]

I totally agree that republicans are irresponsible with the deficit. But americans don't seem motivated by the deficit, they seem motivated by inflation.

Inflation and the deficit don't have a 1:1 relationship. For the same dollar of debt, you'll see more inflation from social service spending than you will from tax cuts.

[threatofrain]

Republicans are responsible for making their constituents happy in some way at least, directly or indirectly. Voters can say they want cutting, Republicans can cut, but when does that translate to better life? There has to also be spending.

[alanwreath]

So true. You can apply this to limiting federal government. The GOP used to all be about states rights to self government. It’s so reversed that it feels like that’s never been the case.

[krapp]

The GOP was never actually about that. They were only ever about states rights to govern themselves according to conservative Christian principles. They have always opposed states' rights to support social welfare, abortion, gun control, environmental programs, immigration, etc.

[jmye]

Dems have repeatedly ceded that ground and our joke of a "free press" refuses to challenge the notion. So whether it's true or not is ultimately irrelevant. Everyone (including and especially Republican voters) just let's them say it.

[readitalready]

That had nothing to do with it. Her support for Israel caused her to lose, if you actually look at polls that analyze her election loss.

[tsunamifury]

And in reality shifted labor markets and supply chain was the issue and the FED in 22 raised interest rates to 'regress labor back to their natural position'.

Never forget: the FED did this more than any republican or democrat and their new stated position is to ensure not the enablement of the population but keeping the labor pool 'in their place.'

This, beyond everything else, changed america the most in recent history.

[triceratops]

I don't know that higher interest rates are necessarily anti-labor. Low interest rates result in rapid asset inflation and labor usually owns fewer assets.

[tsunamifury]

No but the direct statements from the FED itself that it was trying to hurt labor and reduce average household spending was very clear

[triceratops]

Fed, not "FED". It isn't an acronym.

The point I was making was labor has something to lose in any interest rate environment.

[tsunamifury]

[flagged]

[gwbas1c]

You're asking the wrong questions.

The bigger issue is that the US system of voting is set up so that:

1: Most elections predictably go to one party or another.

2: Most representatives are chosen by small minorities who vote in primaries.

The Presidential election is almost always close to 50-50, and due to peculiarities in how it works, is chosen by small regions. Basically, Google "Electoral College." Essentially, most states will always predictably elect a Republican or Democrat, so the election is chosen by states that are hard to predict. (For example, if you live in a state that always votes for the Republican candidate, trying to convince people in your state to vote Democrat won't make a difference because all of your states votes will always go to the Republican.)

Furthermore, because American news is always very critical of current leaders, if a president holds power for 8 years, people will always want change and always vote for the other party. It has little to do with the merits of the current President. People who hate Trump will hate everything he does, even when he does good things. People who hate Biden will hate everything he does, even when he does good things.

I've heard Poland has similar issues, FWIW.

[CoastalCoder]

> Question from a European who doesn’t deeply understand your partisan politics: what specifically should they have done differently?

For what it's worth, I think a lot of us Americans have realized that we don't understand the partisan dynamics either.

Many of us are very confused about the ongoing support for Trump. There's clearly a huge chasm in mindsets, and personally I've made little headway in forming a plausible mental model that explains it all.

[mindslight]

Go tune into reactionary talk radio for a taste. Really listen to what they're saying and just let it wash over you. I'll do this occasionally on long drives by myself when I'm out of range of familiar radio stations.

The problem isn't so much differing values in terms of specific policies, but rather a deep chasm of anti-intellectualism that makes them mistrust anyone but their ingroup partisan preachers. Even if you are coming from a place of mostly agreement about some issue, and appealing to values they purportedly have, the minute you start deviating from anything the preachers have said you've immediately put yourself into the "other" camp where their only conclusion is that you "don't understand" or are even trying to trick them.

Those partisan preachers had at least been owned by US business interests, preaching policies that hurt individuals while helping entrenched corporate interests (eg the decades of shipping industry to China). But at this point it seems they've been bought by foreign interests hence the new trend of supporting the wholly destructive policies of trumpism.

[starkshift]

There’s no one single thing of course, but there are themes

A couple generally unifying themes:

1. People that for the most part want to be left alone and not messed with 2. People that don’t want to be talked down to

[user____name]

Those points could apply to all and every political situations everywhere.

[notahacker]

tbf, people who actually believed that Trump was the candidate of leaving stuff alone are unusually deserving of being talked down to...

[gmac]

Right wingers have a whole different set of moral values that strike me (as someone more on the left) as _immoral_ values. Look up moral foundations theory by Jonathan Haidt and others. I’ve found this in one sense useful (so _that’s_ why Republicans react to ${ISSUE} the way that do!) and in another depressing (how do you _deal_ with people who think that doing what they’re told to do by an authority figure is intrinsically a moral virtue?).

[cagenut]

really? or is it just that you don't like the answer so you keep trying to find another one.

what historical examples of this very common pattern did you read up on?

[groundzeros2015]

I do not believe their failure was purely poor economic timing. This sounds similar to the “Hilary and an unlucky night” narrative.

[rudolph9]

A lot of people were sick of the status quo. For better or worse, Trump represented change. Obviously, there are many more factors that contributed, but in my opinion, this is where the momentum was.

[arjie]

tl;dr A US political party is more like a European coalition government than a European political party.

US political parties try to form tents that various subgroups can join under. Usually, some sort of compromise is formed among the various participants. One break down in the Democratic Party tent was over Israel/Gaza, another was over pro-tech/anti-tech. Simultaneously, there were factional wars over redistribution and immigration in both parties. These are two such but perhaps not even the biggest two such things. Inflation and government spending were another. And Biden's competence was also in question.

Every faction is likely convinced their own support is what would have turned the tide because it is somewhat true, except for the property that they're linked. e.g. pro-Gaza positions are also usually anti-tech so depending on how much you aim to get more Gaza supporters you also lose pro-industry people. There are many things like that.

A US politician will therefore try to walk the line of support to get elected. For example, you'll see a substantial change in Sen. Elizabeth Warren's positioning over time. Notably, she is currently actively attempting to reduce housing construction by corporations - a position she has not been historically associated with - because this polls very well among Americans (who, for the most part, believe that building new expensive housing makes all housing cost more).

[Kapura]

The biggest international incident, on the tip of all democratic voters' tongues, was Israel's continued genocide in Gaza. For that specific issue, there was virtually no daylight between the Republican and Democratic line.

I would argue that the Democrats could have created a separation between themselves and the other side by saying they would stop selling arms to genocidiers, and thereby secure the crucial anti-genocide vote; anecdotally, many of these folks sat out the election, or wrote in another candidate instead of voting for one of two sides who would let massacres of civilians continue.

[dec0dedab0de]

I think Kamala should have flipped on the second amendment then gone on all the podcasts and called trump a nerd for being sober and not liking guns.

Or at the very least, try to target anyone that didn't already support her. This last election was the first time I didn't get targeted by the democratic presidential nominee at all. I did not see one positive ad for Kamala the entire election, I still don't really know anything about her. Normally I'm sick of them a month into the campaign. It kind of felt like a snub, as if they were telling me they didn't want my vote. I could imagine someone else using that as the reason to vote for Trump.

That said, I only ever vote 3rd party because I believe they work together to keep each other in power, and that a vote for either is a vote for both.

[renewiltord]

You only ever vote 3rd party but you wanted them to try to target you? Seems like their targeting tech was actually working in your case.

EDIT to reply: That category, yes, but within that category it makes sense specifically to exclude your subcategory: the ones who would never vote for either me or my opponent. You are essentially irrelevant to my outcomes and I'd be wasting money and time paying attention to you.

[dec0dedab0de]

Wouldn't it make more sense to target everyone who doesn't routinely vote for your party?

[bot403]

Not if you can split that group further into people that you can convince to change and people you can't convince.

[hsuduebc2]

Well. We know that some platforms promoted the gop significantly more that dems. The same companies that now enjoy protection while licking the boots. If you take that into consideration with the fact that she is just not really interesting, I'm not really surprised thet you didn't noticed her.

[dec0dedab0de]

I did see plenty of anti-trump ads coming from her campaign, but I think that was a huge misstep. Everyone already knew who Trump was and already had an opinion on him that they weren't going to be able to change. They should have used their considerable resources to tell us about her.

[hsuduebc2]

If being anti something is your main point, then it's just sad. I'm not even sure if it is needed, if you are candidate against him then logically you are against him. I'm not really sure how liberal parties can compete with strong man politics, promoting. Making straight forward points as a individual is much easier that promoting something as party in todays main channel which are social media.

[khazhoux]

Simple: Biden should have never run for re-election. I loved the guy but his physical decline couldn’t be denied.

A proper primary would have most likely resulted in a dem president (and most probably Newsom).

[rjrjrjrj]

The Democrats didn't have a primary, so I'm going to vote for the criminal/fabulist/sex pest who is also obviously declining.

I find it difficult to buy that logic. The inescapable conclusion is that a large number of Americans are ignorant, gullible, and cruel.

[nec4b]

Trump doesn't pretend to be whatever he is. That is literally what sets him apart. The Democrats accuse the opponents of being undemocratic while they themself don't have primary and have a candidate selected by their elite. There are plenty of "criminal/fabulist/sex" pests on the other side too.

[rjrjrjrj]

The criminality and pathological lying is what sets him apart. Not just from Democrats, from all presidents in recent memory.

[groundzeros2015]

yes. If people who often vote dem are not motivated to show up that hurts their chances.

Low turnout means the party isn’t that excited about their candidate leading

[user____name]

The best politicians understand the value of being perceived as authentic. Pushing the VP at the last minute and pretending nothing was wrong just felt incredibly stilted and insincere. Politicians like Trump are popular because they "tell it like it is" and not the media trained evasive responses you typically get from politicians.

I would have voted for a partially sentient dung heap over Trump, which at the current rate is probably in the cards as a next GOP candidate.

[greiskul]

Absolutely. For more progressive democrat voters already been harbouring bad feelings around the legitimacy of the establishment candidate from previous elections. The two party system already loses a ton of the feeling of choice and participation in Americans. The primary is the escape valve. It is supposed to be when people that care about politics get to argue about policy, direction, etc. Even if you don't agree with the final candidate, you feel like you helped shape the direction of the process. By skipping this, even if there were other circumstances, it feels like a huge turn off for that base of the party.

And then for other democrats, the feeling when you have an unpopular president like Biden was seen at the time is to go anti estabilishment. But Kamala was Bidens VP. She couldnt run an anti estabilishment campaign when she was part of the estabilishment.

If there had been a primary, whoever was the candidate, even if it was Kamala herself, would have been much better positioned for the General Election.

[krapp]

You don't hold a "proper primary" when you have the advantage of incumbency. You run the incumbent (especially against a candidate they've already beaten) or the VP - the two most famous people in the party. All Harris had to do was read the room and she would have won.

Literally every other possible option would have been a nobody with none of the advantages Biden or Harris had and would have only risked splitting the ticket, whereas every Republican was already going vote for Trump. I can't think of a worse way for the Democrats to fail than that... except for the way they actually failed.

And I mean Trump's physical and mental decline is far worse than Biden's ever was and no one seems to care.

[khazhoux]

> And I mean Trump's physical and mental decline is far worse than Biden's ever was

Incorrect. Trump 2024 was as looney as Trump 2016 and all the years in between, so that doesn't qualify as mental decline. He'd lost some spring in his step but overall was physically in much the same shape as 8 years prior. Meanwhile Biden went from active cyclist to a slow elderly gait. It was plain to see.

> You don't hold a "proper primary" when you have the advantage of incumbency.

Following that traditional playbook in the face of his obvious physical condition, is why we have today's SCOTUS, DOW, Trump Kennedy Center, ...

[krapp]

Both Trump and Biden had their issues, but Trump has lost far more than "some spring in his step," the man is sundowning publicly, barely coherent, and it's obvious some serious medical condition is being covered up by his staff. Anyone seeing him can tell he's far worse off than Biden ever was. "Active cyclist to a slow elderly gait" versus "appeared to have a stroke on camera." Trump literally shat himself in public.

Again, it's baffling that it's only a problem when it's Biden.

>Following that traditional playbook in the face of his obvious physical condition, is why we have today's SCOTUS, DOW, Trump Kennedy Center, ...

Trump's SCOTUS picks happened during is first term. It seems like you're just ranting now.

The fact is Kamala Harris could have won. At the end, the race came down to a fraction of a percent difference between her and Trump. Following the traditional playbook would have worked if only Kamala Harris would have walked away from supporting an active genocide. The lesson of Trump is as much about the right's success as the left's failure. Not of policy, but strategy. The right simply holds the line as the left constantly self-sabotages, giving up real power for the sake of moral victory.

It doesn't help that the "Leftist" party in American politics (at least the only relevant party) is anything but. The success of leftist politics in the US requires a complete restructuring of an inherently fascistic and white supremacist system and culture to break the two party system, campaign finance reform, ending first past the post and the electoral college, and tons of other things. Years-long projects laying out the political and cultural infrastructure. That isn't something you can solve with a panic vote for a third party candidate a couple of months before the election, or by just opting out.

[khazhoux]

You’re obviously right about SCOTUS. I guess there I was more thinking about the even-longer conservative lock-in with his next appointee.

But I really do disagree on the physical decline though. Put simply, the things people see are: weight, posture, quickness and stability of movement, strength of voice, hair, face (and a few others).

If you compare T16 vs T24, and B16 vs B24, the B delta is much bigger on any of those factors.

Everyone(ish) hits a cliff where they start quickly getting weaker, gaunt, frail, shorter, slower. Where you look at a picture from the year before and think “wow they looked young by comparison just a year ago.” Biden hit that cliff, Trump somehow hasn’t

[krapp]

Trump's posture is terrible. Numerous people have noticed the way he leans, can't stay standing, and the way he walks all suggest signs of fronto-temporal dementia. His movement is unstable. His face droops like he had a stroke. His speech is slurred and confused. His face and hands are covered in weird bruises. He falls asleep in meetings. He wanders off.

Many, many people have noticed Trump's obvious decline. I don't know why you haven't. You're either trolling or you're blind.

[gdilla]

Biden admin was leaps better than this crap we have but he didn't assuage white fragility - that's the republican brand.

[gottorf]

Generally speaking, it's better to not assume that everyone with political views opposing yours has them out of racism, or whatever other personal defects you might imagine.

In reality, the nonwhite vote share for Trump went up for almost every group in 2024 vs. 2016. "White fragility" was probably not their top concern.

[arjie]

Much of what people say has always been strange about politics. It doesn't seem to be rooted in fact so much as in wanting to dunk on someone.

I remember when Roe v Wade was being overthrown and people would talk about how this was how "Men try to control Women's bodies" or something like that. The reality around that time was that the gender differences were a few percentage points[0]. Since then a gender gap has widened[1] but notably among Republicans. Voters for the Democratic party barely differ on abortion attitudes based on gender.

0: http://pewresearch.org/religion/2022/05/06/americas-abortion...

1: https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2026/03/12/do-abortion-...

[gdilla]

i never said everyone with opposing political views has them out of racism, i'm saying it just plays well. Way too many of the white voting share went to the eating cats and dog racism that we saw play out. Cuz it works. That is america.

[rayiner]

Trump lost white vote share from 2020 to 2024. His entire change in margin came from non-whites: https://data.blueroseresearch.org/hubfs/2024%20Blue%20Rose%2.... See page 4.

That’s frankly remarkable given that people say things like “white fragility” openly. I can’t fathom why white people would want to belong to a party that normalizes that.

[largbae]

I'll bite as an independent: I believe that "they" could have reverted to Clinton(Bill) or Obama's moderate stances in regards to border/immigration and gender/identity politics and maintained a sweeping majority.

If the Democrats had disclosed Biden's decline and held a primary this likely would have sorted itself out.

[mikrl]

As a Canadian I strongly felt it was GG to the Democrats when they didn’t run a second, competitive, knives-out primary for VP Harris.

For the second time, the party apparatus coalesced around a candidate who was ultimately trounced by someone wrongly considered unelectable.

Even if it was just theatre in the end, having a dramatic primary where the VP won would have made her look stronger and given her a chance to claw back some of the swing voters.

[bryanlarsen]

Or could have made her look worse because of the mud slinging between the candidates in the primary debates. You know that any criticism of a candidate by her competitors would have been trumpeted and distorted by Trump.

[spankalee]

Can you describe how Harris's policies there meaningfully differed from Bill Clinton's or Obama's?

[cogman10]

> what specifically should they have done differently?

Kamala squandered a lot of good will and enthusiasm when she needed it the most. When Biden dropped out there was a lot of real excitement about something different.

It really wouldn't have been hard for her to spend time touting some of the best parts of the Biden admin like Lina Khan. But that sort of messaging was unpopular with the donors.

Putting forward actual policies to make things better would have also helped, even if they were just carbon copies of the biden policies. The way she campaigned there was, frankly, really weak. Giving a tax break to home owners and copying Trump's "No tax on tips" line really did not look good.

It was also pretty apparent that while Walz was doing a pretty good job making Trump and Vance look bad, the Kamala team pulled him in for being too alienating. Kamala distanced herself from her own VP pick and instead decided to campaign with Liz Cheney, a well known republican who's father was good ole war crimes cheney. Neither are particularly popular with either Democrats or Republicans.

The Kamala campaign spent a large amount of time trying to win over disaffected trump voters. That was a disaster. No amount of "I'm tough of transnational criminals" would convince a crown that's currently cheering on ICE to cheer on Kamala.

In the end, she did a lot to kill the enthusiasm of the base. She spent just too much of the limited time she had trying to make the case that she is appealing to republicans. Who, of course, all thought she was a super woke radical leftist (she was not).

Gaza was another huge issue that Kamala's campaign ignored and never addressed. A lot of people believe this is why the DNC autopsy hasn't been released as it likely played a large role in the depressed voter turnout for Kamala.

In the end, the problem with her and her campaign is she ran the Hillary Clinton campaign playbook. Far too much time trying to remind people that Trump is bad and far too little time making the case for why she's better.

This isn't all her fault. Biden is a big asshole for running for a second term. There has been leaks that his staff knew full well that he was a train-wreck and that his polling was really bad. I think they thought that the early debate would ultimately prove that he was capable of winning which, as we all know, was one of the biggest train-wrecks of a modern presidential campaign. But also, there's absolutely no chance that Biden didn't know he was dealing with cancer going into 2024. That's not something a President is unaware of. Especially not getting to stage 4. My conspiracy theory was that a major reason he disappeared towards the end of his term is that he was dealing with cancer therapy. It wouldn't shock me to know that he had chemobrain while debating trump.

[readitalready]

The specific issue that caused her to lose the election was her support for Israel. It was the largest reason that Biden 2020 voters didn't vote for Harris in 2024, per polls that specifically analyzed the causes of her loss. (not polls that took general moods or ideas)

Had she dropped support for Israel, she would have been president.

And going forward, there will never be a Democratic president that supports Israel's continued existence. The Democratic base is fully against Israel. We're just waiting for the politicians to catch up.

Edit: man some of you REALLY don't want Israel to be blamed for anything. Anyways, here's one poll clearly showing it was her support for Israel that cost her the most votes: https://www.imeupolicyproject.org/postelection-polling

[jjtheblunt]

> The specific issue that caused her to lose the election was her support for Israel.

I'm american and I've never heard that.

I've only heard her total unwillingness to be interviewed without a script.

Perhaps what one hears varies across the country, of course.

[moogly]

> I'm american and I've never heard that.

It's been in the news for a while.

https://www.axios.com/2026/02/22/dnc-2024-autopsy-harris-gaz...

[jjtheblunt]

upvote : thanks for the link.

i meant actually "hear" as in from the large number of americans i see weekly.

[readitalready]

I wouldn't expect everyone to know everything. But I follow all the polls. YouGov are some of the best.

[Herring]

Man after my own heart. I'm a statistician, and the data-free narratives on HN sometimes make me want to pull my hair out.

[jjtheblunt]

no kidding

[jjtheblunt]

good info: thanks as i'd not seen that (very randomly)

[2muchcoffeeman]

Which is crazy.

Democratic voters would rather have someone opposed to their values in power and make worse the issue they supposedly care about.

[otterley]

> And going forward, there will never be a Democratic president that supports Israel's continued existence. The Democratic base is fully against Israel. We're just waiting for the politicians to catch up.

Are you willing to put money on that?

[otterley]

Why would she lose the general Presidential election based solely on her pro-Israel stance, if Trump also had a pro-Israel stance at that time (and still does)? That explanation doesn't make sense.

[bayarearefugee]

Elections in the US are mostly decided by who can drive turnout.

It isn't that the people who would have voted for Kamala (if not for her stance on Israel) voted for Trump instead, they just didn't vote at all.

I wish potential voters like that put a little more effort into harm mitigation but history shows they dont.

[moogly]

One of the most baffling things in modern history for sure. But some people did believe he would "bring peace to the Middle East".

[readitalready]

It's because it's important to make sure anyone in office that supports Israel loses, EVEN IF their opponent also supports Israel.

The job of the voter is to make sure elected officials are held accountable. Remember, the voter decides based on what was already done, not what they say MIGHT be done in the future.

[otterley]

> Remember, the voter decides based on what was already done, not what they say MIGHT be done in the future.

How does that explain the outcome of Presidential elections that follow term limits? Donald Trump had no meaningful political record prior to the Republican primaries in 2015--and he was pro-Israel in his first term as well.

[2muchcoffeeman]

Stop thinking voters are rational.

I remember the pro Palestine groups were threatening to not vote for Kamala if the Dems didn’t push for a cease fire or whatever. All while the other side was Trump.

They didn’t go, “maybe we should do our best to prevent a worse situation“.

Even back then I had a gut feeling something like this would have cost the Dems the election.

[readitalready]

People really need to stop saying Trump is worse than Kamala/Biden on Palestine.

Biden and the Democrats erased Palestine. There is nothing anymore that Trump could do about it. He can't resurrect the dead. Everything happened because of Democrats, not Trump.

Voters are very rational. They know that Democrats were the bad guys. It's why they currently have a 17% approval rating.

Let's all focus on removing the rest of the Democrats from power and replace them with true anti-Israel candidates. That's the only hope for a modern society.