Donald J. Trump has become president-elect of the United States of America once again. In a narrowly projected race against his Democratic opponent Kamala Harris, he was able to secure a solid victory in the end which was less contested than polls suggested. Besides strong mobilization effects of core Republican voters, Trump gained surprising support among two key voting groups: first and young voters and Latino men. From a European perspective, it is hard to predict what a second Trump term will look like when it comes to the future of U.S. foreign policy. But indicators suggest an even more radical agenda when it comes to economic and military decisions than during his first term.
A blog by Robin Haug. With special thanks to Franziska Riel and Merritt Fedzin
Every U.S. presidential election seems unique in its own right, that is until the next one pushes boundaries once again four years later. But it is fair to say that this campaign season was unique it its very own way. In between many unprecedented developments – with the late Democratic nominee switch from Harris to Biden or the assassination attempts on Donald Trump, just to name two of them – Donald Trump won once again. He will become the 47th president of the United States. How did he manage to secure his second term? What were successful indicators to his campaign? What predictions can be made for the future of U.S. foreign politics? And what are the implications for Europe?
Election results – surprising support for Trump
Donald Trump will return to the Oval Office for a second term. The man who entered the political stage almost 10 years ago as an outsider at the age of 70 and who has reshaped the Republican party gets his chance to finish what he started in 2016. With his reelection, Trump will be remembered not only as the 45th, but also as the 47th President of the United States.
Superficially, one could see a lot of similarities between his successful elections in 2016 and 2024. He was the undisputed candidate since the first day of the Republican primaries and his campaign was purely built upon polarization, tapering and open discreditation of his opponents. Nevertheless, his campaign had some major flaws this time. His entire campaign was designed to discredit President Biden. Trump characterized Biden as an unfit and senile elder statesman. After Harris entered the race, the Trump campaign struggled to adapt its strategy, which allowed for Harris to quickly rise in the polls and pose a significant challenge for the Trump team. Furthermore, his campaign only fundraised a third of what both his Democratic opponents did.
Despite Harris’s initial surge, Trump was able to turn the table and eventually secure the majority in the Electoral College. Three major observations can be made that deliver explanations to his victory. Firstly, he was able to strongly mobilize the Republican base and made sure that key Republican electoral groups went to vote for him, e.g. the voter turnout among white Evangelicals voting for Trump increased by 5 percentage points up to 81% in comparison to his 2020 campaign. He was also able to secure many rural votes (compare table 5), establishing a huge mobilization margin in his favor. He even extended his lead by 3 percentage points over his first victory in 2016 and doubled the margin to Harris when compared to his loss against Joe Biden in 2020 among the rural population votes.
Secondly, Trump surprisingly performed well among two voter groups. First of all, first and young voters. Trump significantly increased his support among young voters between 18 and 29 and was able to close the gap to his opponent to only -11 percentage points in this voting group (compare table 4). Also, Latino men showed massive support for Trump this time. Trump secured a margin of +12 percentage points over Harris within a voting group which supported both Democratic candidates in 2016 and 2020 by margins of +31 and +23 percentage points (compare table 3). It will be interesting to watch in upcoming elections whether this observation becomes a larger trend or remains a unique perspective here.
Thirdly, Trump was more on the ground where it really mattered. As of the end of October, Trump engaged in 71 events since September 1st, giving him the advantage of doing close to a quarter more events in the final stage of the race than Harris did. He did 10 more campaign events, close to a third more rallies and doubled his media appearances over his opponent. In Pennsylvania alone, Trump made 16 appearances between September 1st and October 23rd whereas Harris made it to 11 events. Like it or not, but a visible and engaging candidate has been and will always be a core reason for a successful campaign.
U.S. foreign policy under Trump – 2016 reloaded?
One learning from the first Trump presidency has been that he seems to be unpredictable and that he has a favor for authoritarian strong leaders like Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping. He isolated the U.S. with economic and military measures by raising tariffs for non-U.S. products and questioning U.S. military support for European allies and NATO. Can the world expect the same for his second term? The answer seems to be yes, but much more radical.
Economically, his foreign trade perspective did not change at all. He openly argues in favor of higher tariffs, especially for Chinese products, to stop dumping wages on American workers and to protect manufacturing jobs. This time, he even sees tariffs as a larger tool to create more income for the federal government to counter overspending or to create new public investment opportunities. Therefore, his tariff proposals are even higher and more restrictive than during his first term.
Militarily, Trump’s second term may become even more isolationist than his first one. During that one, he openly challenged NATO as a military organization that guarantees European security through a limitless U.S. paycheck. However, he never substantially moved forward in withdrawing the U.S. from the alliance. Currently, it is unpredictable what his second term will mean for the alliance, especially in the wake of the ongoing Russian war on Ukraine. Trump has repeatedly stated that Putin would have never invaded Ukraine if he still would have been President and that he could end the war within 24 hours. He also openly considered cutting all US military support for Ukraine, which could cause Ukraine to lose the war to Russia. If that is what he means by ending the war quickly, Europe should be concerned for its own security.
In the end, Trump’s second term needs to be seen as the ultimate wakeup call for Europe to become more independent in economic and military matters. Still, Europe could have been aware of this since Trump’s first election in 2016, given the observed continuum of his politics.
Robin Haug has been a member of Polis180 since 2021. He currently is the head of the regional program The America(n)s and was elected in March 2024. Robin studied Political Science with a focus on International and European politics and concentrated his research and studies on the United States of America and the transatlantic partnership from early on. Furthermore, he works for the Social Democratic Party Germany in the federal state of Hesse as a political organizer and consultant for political campaigns and events.
Image via unsplash.com
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