Former President Donald Trump won a second term in the White House, defeating Vice President Kamala Harris in a race that showed concerns about the economy trumped those about reproductive rights and democratic norms .

With a victory in Wisconsin, Trump secured the 270 electoral votes needed to clinch the presidency.

This victory validates his resolute approach to politics. He attacked his Democratic rival in deeply personal terms – often misogynistic and racist – painting an apocalyptic picture of a country overrun by violent migrants. The crude rhetoric, coupled with an image of hypermasculinity, resonated with angry voters — particularly men — in a deeply polarized nation.

“I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honor of being elected your 47th president and your 45th president,” Trump told a crowd of cheering supporters in Florida even before his victory was confirmed.

In state after state, Trump outperformed what he did in the 2020 election, while Harris failed to do as well as Joe Biden did in winning the presidency four years ago. Upon his return to office, Trump will also work with a Senate that will now be in Republican hands, while control of the House has not yet been determined.

“We’ve been through so much together, and today you came in record numbers to achieve victory,” Trump said. “It was something special and we’re going to pay you back,” he said.

The results cap a historically tumultuous and competitive election season that included two assassination attempts on Trump and the choice of a new Democratic nominee just a month before the party’s convention. Trump will inherit a series of challenges when he takes office on Jan. 20, including increased political polarization and global crises that test America’s influence abroad.

His victory against Harris, the first woman of color to lead a major party, marks the second time he has defeated a rival in a general election. Harris, the current vice president, rose to the top of the rankings after President Joe Biden left the race, alarmed by his advancing age. Despite an initial surge of energy around her campaign, she struggled under a tight deadline to convince disillusioned voters that she represented a break with an unpopular administration.

Trump is the first former president to return to office since Grover Cleveland regained the White House in the 1892 election. He is the first person convicted of a crime to be elected president and, at 78, the longest-serving person elderly woman elected to this position. His vice president, Ohio Senator JD Vance, 40, will become the highest-ranking member of millennials in the US government.

There will be far fewer checks on Trump when he returns to the White House. He plans to quickly implement a sweeping program that would transform nearly every aspect of American government. His GOP critics in Congress were largely defeated or retired. The federal courts are now filled with judges he appointed. The U.S. Supreme Court, which includes three justices appointed by Trump, issued a ruling earlier this year granting presidents broad immunity from lawsuits.

Trump’s language and behavior during the campaign prompted growing warnings from Democrats and some Republicans about the shocks his return to power would bring to democracy. He repeatedly hailed strong leaders, warned he would deploy the military to target political opponents he called “enemies from within,” threatened action against media outlets for their unfavorable coverage and suggested suspending the Constitution.

Some of those who served in his first White House, including Vice President Mike Pence and John Kelly, Trump’s longest-serving chief of staff, have either refused to support him or issued dire public warnings about his return to office. presidency.

While Harris focused much of her initial message on themes of joy, Trump channeled a powerful sense of anger and resentment among voters.

He took advantage of frustrations over high prices and fears about crime and migrants entering the country illegally on Biden’s watch. He also highlighted wars in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to portray Democrats as presiding over — and encouraging — a world in chaos.

It’s a formula that Trump perfected in 2016, when he presented himself as the only person capable of solving the country’s problems, often borrowing the language of dictators.

“In 2016, I declared that I am your voice. Today I add: I am your warrior. I am your judge. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your punishment,” he said in March 2023.

That campaign often veered into the absurd, with Trump amplifying bizarre and debunked rumors that migrants were stealing and eating pet cats and dogs in an Ohio town. At one point, he kicked off a rally with a detailed story about legendary golfer Arnold Palmer in which he praised his genitals.

But perhaps the defining moment came in July when a gunman opened fire at a Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. A bullet grazed Trump’s ear and killed one of his supporters. His face stained with blood, Trump stood up and raised his fist in the air, shouting “Fight!” Struggle! Fight!” A few weeks later, a second assassination attempt was foiled after a Secret Service agent spotted the barrel of a gun in the greenery while Trump played golf.

Republican Donald Trump addressed his supporters after winning crucial states on election night.

Trump’s return to the White House seemed unlikely when he left Washington in early 2021 as a diminished figure whose lies about his defeat sparked a violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. He was so isolated at the time that few people outside his family bothered to attend the farewell he staged for himself at Andrews Air Force Base, accompanied by a 21-gun salute. artillery shots.

Democrats who controlled the House of Representatives quickly impeached him for his role in the insurrection, making him the only president to be impeached twice. He was acquitted by the U.S. Senate, where many Republicans argued that he no longer posed a threat because he had left office.

But from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, Trump – aided by some elected Republicans – has strived to maintain his political relevance. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the California Republican who led his party in the House of Representatives at the time, visited Trump shortly after he left office, essentially validating his continued role in the party.

As the 2022 midterm elections approach, Trump has used the power of his support to assert himself as the undisputed leader of the party. His preferred candidates almost always won their primaries, but some were ultimately defeated in elections that Republicans saw as within their reach. These disappointing results are due in part to the backlash over the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision that revoked women’s constitutional right to abortion, a decision supported by Trump-appointed justices. The midterm elections sparked questions within the Republican Party about whether Trump should remain the party’s leader.

But if Trump’s future was uncertain, that changed in 2023 when he faced a wave of state and federal charges for his role in the insurrection, his handling of classified information and election interference. He used these accusations to portray himself as the victim of government overreach, an argument that resonated with a Republican base increasingly skeptical – if not downright hostile – toward institutions and structures of government. established powers.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who challenged Trump for the Republican nomination, lamented that the indictments “sucked all the oxygen” out of this year’s Republican primary. Trump easily won his party’s nomination without ever participating in a debate against DeSantis or other Republican candidates.

Here’s a look at which candidates will be frontrunners after the 2024 elections.

As Trump dominated the Republican race, a New York jury found him guilty in May of 34 counts in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election by paying hush money to a porn actor who said the two had sex. He faces sentencing later this month, although his victory raises serious questions about whether he will ever be punished.

He was also found liable in two other civil cases in New York: one for inflating his assets and another for sexually abusing columnist E. Jean Carroll in 1996.

Trump faces additional criminal charges in a Georgia election interference case that has bogged down. At the federal level, he was indicted for his role in attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election and for his improper handling of classified documents. When he becomes president on Jan. 20, Trump could appoint an attorney general who would expunge the federal charges.

As he prepares to return to the White House, Trump has pledged to quickly enact a sweeping agenda that would transform nearly every aspect of the U.S. government. This includes plans to launch the largest deportation effort in the nation’s history, use the Justice Department to punish its enemies, dramatically expand the use of tariffs, and once again pursue a zero-sum foreign policy approach that threatens to upend long-standing foreign alliances. , including the NATO pact.

When he arrived in Washington in 2017, Trump knew little about the levers of federal power. His agenda was blocked by Congress and the courts, as well as by senior officials who took it upon themselves to serve as safeguards.

This time, Trump said he would surround himself with loyalists who would implement his agenda without question and who would arrive with hundreds of draft executive orders, legislative proposals and in-depth policy documents in hand.