The election's over. Trump not only won. Some are calling it a landslide.
In fact, it was such a landslide, he won the popular vote by a Clinton-like margin. (By which I mean Hillary in 2016, not Bill in 1996.)
We can blame sexism. We can blame racism. We can blame Joe Biden. We can blame Elon Musk. We can blame white women. We can blame Latino men.
But one fact that was true last Monday morning remains true today:
If Kamala Harris had simply won the three Blue Wall states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, she would today be America's president-elect.
Even though we can agonize about why she lost the popular vote, the margins in those three crucial states, where the election was truly fought, were remarkably slim.
Based on current AP vote totals (as of Sunday 10 November), Trump won Pennsylvania by 145,000 votes, Michigan by 80,000 votes and Wisconsin by under 30,000 votes.
That's a combined margin of 255,000 in those three states. If just over half of those voters had chosen Harris not Trump—fewer than 150,000 voters across three states—then Harris, not Trump, would be president-elect today
Maybe we should be blaming RFK Jr.
For all the analysis about why Trump won and Harris lost, one of the most obvious questions seems to have been ignored:
Did RFK Jr.'s endorsement and wholehearted embrace of Trump make the difference in this election?
To most Democrats, college graduates, medical experts, and late-night talk show watchers, RFK Jr. is little more than a punchline.
Mr. Brainworm is far more likely to be caught eating a dog or a cat than a Haitian immigrant.
But maybe the joke is on us.
Mr. Dead Whale Chainsaw Massacre is the leading face of the anti-vax movement. And millions of people have gone down that rabbit hole with him.
According to a September 2023 survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) at the University of Pennsylvania, 16% of US adults believe approved vaccines are unsafe. That's up from just 9% in April 2021.
The same survey found that only 63% believe it's safer to get the COVID-19 vaccine than COVID-19 itself, down from 75%.
Prior to Biden's withdrawal from the 2024 campaign, Kennedy, who had peaked around 15%, was still polling at about 10%.
Even after Harris's surge, Kennedy was still polling around 5-7% when he withdrew from the race and endorsed Trump in August.
Did the Kennedy name attract new voters?
We already know that QAnon conspiracy nuts have a strong affection for the Kennedy family. They've been waiting for JFK Jr.'s miraculous return for years.
When RFK Jr. was polling at 10%, three quarters of his supporters identified as independents and polls identified them as low-propensity voters.
But when RFK Jr decided to cross party lines to join Trump, he not only added the brand name, he also gave Trump a bipartisan sheen to his campaign, similar to what Harris gained from her endorsement by Liz Cheney.
And the Trump campaign leaned heavily into RFK Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard in the closing stages of the campaign.
On billboards and on social media, RFK Jr.'s picture featured prominently as a member of Trump's "Dream Team" of future cabinet appointees.
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to give RFK Jr. a very powerful role in his new administration. At Trump's much-watched October 27 rally at Madison Square Garden, Trump promised to let RFK Jr. "go wild on health... on the food... on the medicines."
While some Kennedy voters still refused to vote for Trump (RFK Jr got 29,000 "protest votes" in Michigan and 18,000 in Wisconsin, for example), it's entirely conceivable that his presence in the Trump campaign motivated hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of new and low-propensity voters—including long-ignored anti-vaxxers—to turn out for Trump, a candidate who has himself long flirted with the anti-vax movement.
For all the Democratic handwringing about what went wrong, it may turn out that, in a race ultimately decided by feels not facts, name-recognition not qualifications, and the all-American power of brand names, "Trump" not only beat "Harris," but equally importantly, "Kennedy" trumped "Cheney."
One of the saddest facts about 2024 may turn out to be that Americans' desire to save democracy was less urgent than their passion to ban vaccines.
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