Charlie Harper: 2024 Wasn’t As Close As Expected. 2026 Is a New Game Entirely
Thursday, November 14th, 2024
It wasn’t so close after all. Despite the insistence of many professional pundits and most major media outlets, the 2024 elections for President and control of Congress were called relatively early. By Wednesday morning, the word “mandate” was being used frequently as part of the instant analysis.
Six days later, California has managed to count only 72% of the state’s total votes, so the overall numbers could still tighten a bit. There aren’t enough votes outstanding that will change the fact that Donald Trump won not only the electoral college in a landslide, but the popular vote total as well. As of this writing, he also had a majority of the total votes cast, leaving Vice President Harris and all other candidates combined below 50%. Republicans have flipped the Senate convincingly. Some Democrats are getting dangerously close to “election denier” territory by refusing to concede the Pennsylvania race picked up by Republicans.
They’re joined by some much more comfortable with denying results in Arizona. Republican Kari Lake came amazingly close to flipping that seat despite spending most of her time in South Florida at Mar-A-Lago and upsetting much of the traditional Arizona GOP power structure at the beginning of her failed campaign.
With the White House and the Senate come judges. Republicans may continue to thank former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for setting the precedent here. Note you’ll now hear scarce talk from Democrats about expanding the Supreme Court or ending the filibuster.
With Republicans taking most of the top offices in Puerto Rico, you have to wonder if both parties’ positions on Puerto Rican statehood will now flip. You can also see from the results nationwide and in Puerto Rico that the media’s late fixation on a comedian’s poorly timed joke about Puerto Rico didn’t seem to matter much anywhere except where Democrats were grasping at last straws.
Exit polls trashed many other narratives and beliefs of partisan leanings. Republicans have made huge gains with Hispanic voters over the last few election cycles. Members of national media should spend more time differentiating between legal immigrants and those who chose to break in front of the line. It appears those who have achieved citizenship and vote don’t appreciate their tax dollars being used to open the borders either.
The support of Native Americans swung heavily in Republicans favor as well. Perhaps all the “land acknowledgements” popularized among the left to begin meetings are only sending virtue signals to their own insular groups, where the signals that should be sent should include policies to make improvements on modern day quality of life? Per usual, the losing side is working thro