Donald Trump, the Republican President-elect, has declared that his election victory has given him an “unprecedented and powerful” mandate to lead the nation.
He triumphed over Democratic opponent Kamala Harris in all seven pivotal swing states, securing a significant overall advantage.
The Republican Party, led by Trump, has secured victories in both chambers of Congress, positioning the former president with significant authority to implement his policy initiatives.
Since his defeat in 2020, he has expanded his appeal to nearly all segments of the electorate. In achieving this feat, he orchestrated a comeback that stands unparalleled among all previously defeated presidents in contemporary history.
However, the data indicates that the competition was significantly tighter than he and his supporters are portraying.
Steven Cheung, the communications director, has described it as a “landslide” victory. However, this week, reports indicate that his share of the vote has dipped below 50% as the counting process continues.
“It seems quite extravagant to label it a landslide,” remarked Chris Jackson, senior vice president of the US team at polling firm Ipsos.
According to Jackson, Trump’s language implied significant victories; however, merely a few hundred thousand votes in crucial regions enabled Trump’s return to the White House.
The amplification of narrow victories in swing states can be attributed to America’s electoral college system.
Three perspectives on his victory are presented here.
Most voters picked someone other than Trump
According to the latest tally from CBS News, in partnership with the BBC, Trump has secured 76.9 million votes, marking a significant achievement in the popular vote.
This indicates that he received a higher number of votes than Harris, who garnered 74.4 million, and any other candidate in the race. No Republican has achieved that accomplishment since 2004.
As the vote-tallying process persists in various regions of the United States, his vote share has fallen slightly below 50%. He is unlikely to close the gap as counting continues in areas such as Democratic-leaning California.
In 2016, Donald Trump secured the presidency by defeating Hillary Clinton despite receiving only 46% of the popular vote, highlighting a significant discrepancy between the electoral outcome and the overall ballots cast.
In 2024, Trump’s achievement of securing both the popular vote and the presidency marks a notable advancement compared to his previous victory eight years prior.
However, Trump cannot claim that he secured the majority of the presidential votes in the overall election.
Achieving this goal would require him to secure over 50% of the vote, a benchmark met by all winners in the past two decades, except Trump in 2016.
Chris Jackson of the polling firm Ipsos indicated that Trump’s assertion of a historic mandate might be exaggerated. He noted that Trump and his supporters’ rhetoric appears to be a strategy aimed at rationalising the extensive measures they intend to implement once they assume control of the government.
His electoral college win was resounding
In contrast, Trump’s victory over Harris in the 2024 election seems more assured. The candidate secured 312 votes in the US electoral college, while Harris garnered 226 votes.
This figure is significant. The US election can be characterised as a series of 50 individual races, each taking place across the states rather than a singular national contest.
In the electoral process, the candidate who secures the majority of votes in a state is awarded all of that state’s electoral votes, as seen with Pennsylvania, which contributes 19 electoral votes in this competitive landscape. Both candidates aimed to secure the crucial 270 electoral votes necessary for a majority in the Electoral College.
Trump’s 312 electoral votes surpass Joe Biden’s 306 and outperforms both of George W. Bush’s Republican victories. However, it falls significantly short of the 365 electoral votes secured by Barack Obama in 2008, the 332 he garnered during his re-election, and the impressive 525 amassed by Ronald Reagan in 1984.
According to the latest CBS figures, Trump leads by slightly more than 230,000 votes in the key battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Both parties’ intensive campaigning targeted all three states in the lead-up to the 5 November vote.
Had just over 115,000 voters in that demographic chosen Harris, she would have secured victories in the pivotal Rust Belt swing states, ultimately providing her with the necessary electoral college votes to claim the presidency.
While that figure may appear substantial, it represents a small fraction of the over 150 million votes nationwide.
In several pivotal states across the Sun Belt, including Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and North Carolina, Trump’s margins of victory were notably more secure.
Despite the Republicans’ influence, their majority in the US House, the lower chamber of Congress, is notably narrow.The electoral college operates under a “winner takes all” system, which means that narrow victories in critical regions can be magnified, creating the appearance of a more decisive win than may be the case.
Second highest vote count – behind Biden in 2020
Another perspective on evaluating Trump’s victory involves examining the total number of votes he garnered, though this approach may be considered somewhat simplistic.
With 76.9 million, he has achieved the second-highest figure recorded in American history.
The growth of the US population and, consequently, the electorate is a crucial factor to consider. This year’s voter turnout in the United States exceeded 150 million, more than double the 74 million individuals who cast their ballots in 1964.
Such circumstances complicate comparing over time. Only four years have passed since the record haul was accomplished.
In the 2020 presidential election, Biden secured 81.3 million votes, marking a significant moment in a year characterised by unprecedented voter turnout, with Trump also vying for the presidency.
Jackson noted that while the Republicans achieved significant breakthroughs in 2024, the Democrats struggled to resonate with voters. He attributed this trend to a widespread desire among Americans to revert to “2019 prices” following an extended period of rising living costs.
“According to him, the central issue lies in Harris’s failure to galvanise the support of those who cast their ballots for Biden in the 2020 election.”
