Some Initial Thoughts on a Brutal Defeat

Trump can no longer be dismissed as an aberration

This is very hard to write. I have known this was a possibility for a long time. I knew this race was a coin flip for months. But I hadn’t truly reckoned with four more years of Donald Trump in the White House until last night.

I know most of you reading this are angry, scared, frustrated, and in shock. I share all of those reactions. I am heartbroken that Kamala Harris won’t be our next President. She would have been a great president. I was so looking forward to telling my daughter that America had just elected its first woman president. I am dreading the conversation about why we didn’t.

It will take a long time to reckon with all of this election's consequences. There will be massive impacts on life at home and abroad. I will have a lot to say about how this happened and, more importantly, where the Democratic Party goes from here. I will have a more fully formed analysis later, but here are my initial, unvarnished, sleep-addled thoughts on the absolutely brutal result.

1. We are Witnessing a Political Realignment

In 2016, we could avoid wrestling with the electoral implications of Trump’s victory. It was easy to weave a narrative about a reality TV buffoon stumbling ass-backward into the presidency because of Russian interference, Jim Comey’s bad timing, and a political media unduly obsessed with Clinton’s email habits. The political trends that helped Trump win in 2016 were in fuller force in 2020. Trump got more votes, turned out more voters, and made real gains with Latinos. Because he lost, Democrats could once again dismiss the gains Trump’s movement had made.