The 2024 presidential race will end in a few days.

Whatever the outcome, history will be written.

Vice President Kamala Harris would be the first woman to serve as President of the United States.

Donald Trump would be only the second president in history to win another term in the White House after losing an initial re-election bid, and did so after being the first former president to be convicted of a crime .

“We inevitably hear every four years that this is the most important election of our lifetime, but there is no doubt in my mind that this is the most important election of my lives, and probably the most important since 1860, when Abraham Lincoln was elected the presidency and the fate of the country hung in the balance,” said ABC News presidential historian Mark Updegrove.

Updegrove attributed the historic nature of the race not only to the track records of Harris and Trump but, more importantly, to the stakes for American democracy and diplomacy.

“I have never in my life seen such a stark difference in what the candidates stand for and the policy positions they have articulated,” Updegrove said, noting that Trump’s approach to these issues is a stark departure than that of any other modern American leader. .

This all follows an unprecedented campaign for both parties.

President Joe Biden announced his re-election bid in April 2023 and easily won every state primary. But a historic presidential debate with Trump in late June derailed his campaign after a poor performance fueled Democratic concerns over his age.

Biden abandoned the race at the end of July after weeks of pressure from his own party. He immediately endorsed Harris (the first Black and South Asian woman to be vice president) to take her place at the top of the ticket, and she officially claimed the nomination following an early online delegate voting process. august.

Harris, on stage in Chicago, said they were all engaged in a “fight for America’s future” in his acceptance speech.

“It’s exceptionally rare for presidential candidates to swap roles in the middle of a campaign, period,” said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston. “It was a crazy time for an already crazy cycle.”

“His appointment itself was historic,” Rottinghaus added. “If she wins, it will break down the barriers that the nation has been fighting to break since the 1920s. For a nation that has been most challenged in terms of race relations, nominating and then electing a black woman is, in every way , progress.

Harris herself, however, has not made her race or gender a focal point of her campaign.

“It’s smart because voters aren’t so much interested in making history as they are in being happy with the direction the country is going, and they feel very mixed,” said Jim Kessler, co-founder of the group center-left think tank Third Way.

ABC News chief White House correspondent Mary Bruce during the final week of the campaign asked Harris directly what she thought about the story she might write.

“I am fully aware of my gender and race,” Harris responded. “And I know that will be very important in terms of the glass being broken. But I don’t expect anyone to vote for me because of my gender or my race. It has to be because I deserve their vote with a plan to improve their lives.

Across the aisle, Trump announced his third bid for the White House in November 2022.

Since then, he has faced four criminal indictments, one of which resulted in a guilty verdict by a jury of his peers in New York for falsifying business records in connection with secret payments made to a star. adult cinema in the last days of 2016. campaign. (Trump promised to appeal).

Trump also faced a Republican primary with more than a dozen challengers, including his former vice president, but most dropped out before the Iowa caucus and Trump won all but two state primaries. Trump accepted the GOP nomination in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, just days after he was shot in the ear during a assassination attempt.

“He is a model of resilience and defiance, reemerging despite two impeachments on January 6, criminality and consistent disregard for democratic norms during his presidency and as a candidate,” Updegrove said.

If he were to win, he would be the first former president since Grover Cleveland in 1892 to win a second, non-consecutive term.

How will the history books write about the 2024 campaign?

“The Democrats were hungry for a victory and, despite an otherwise well-behaved incumbent president, they needed to significantly energize their position,” Rottinghaus said. “On the Republican side, Trump co-opted the Republican Party in a way that made his nomination inevitable. I don’t think we’ve ever had a situation like this in the modern era.”