BONUS: Trump's Return To The White House

0:01Donald Trump will return to the White House as America's 47th president. Yeah, his campaign's often dark messaging resonated with a large swath of Americans, many of whom say they've lost faith in this country's institutions. That gives Trump a broad mandate as he returns for years after being voted out. I'm E. Martinez, that's Lila Foddle, and this is a special bonus episode of Up First from NPR News.

0:30Republicans will also retake the Senate while the House of Representatives is still up for grabs narrowly. So what's behind Trump's historic comeback and what does it mean for the future? Stay with us. We'll give you the latest on the election.

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1:36That's L-E-E-S-A dot com, promo code NPR. Support for NPR and the following message come from Pete and Jerry's Eggs. Their new organic pasture-raised eggs are the next level of commitment to healthy hens, healthy eggs, and a healthy planet. These hens roam outside in nature with over 108 square feet of pasture each and enjoy a USDA-certified organic diet with no GMOs, added hormones, or synthetic pesticides. Delicious, ethical, healthy eggs, as nature intended. Learn more at PeteAndJerrys.com. Vice President Harris has now called President-elect Donald Trump to congratulate him on his victory.

2:18And all day, we've been hearing from a variety of reporters, political strategists, and analysts on what was behind Trump's win. So let's begin with what the president-elect said himself when he declared victory last night before the race was called. They came from all quarters, union, non-union, African-American, Hispanic-American, Asian-American, Arab-American, Muslim-American. We had everybody, and it was beautiful. It was a historic realignment. For insight into that realignment, we spoke to a Republican pollster, the president and CEO of the Terrence Group, B.J. Martino. He's the lead pollster behind Eric Hovde's effort to unseat Wisconsin's Democratic Senator Tammy Baldwin.

3:04Well, he's not wrong when you look at the exit polls in the key states that were critical to this election. he did do better than Republicans have in the past with Hispanic voters, African-American men, union voters, middle class voters. The gains that Donald Trump saw in 2024 are really very much across the board. On the question of what U.S. voters were looking for in a president? Change was certainly a theme here. You look at where voters, ongoing disapproval of the job that Joe Biden was doing as president. and then Harris's inability to articulate a single way in which she would differ from Biden left voters wanting.

3:48When you look at the exit polls this year, again in these key states, 30 % said they wanted a candidate who had the ability to lead was most important for them. Trump won them 65 to 34. Change can bring needed change. 27 % said that was the most important factor. Trump won those voters 73 to 25 in the exit polling. So change was certainly one of the drivers, as were ongoing concerns about the economy. NPR's political correspondent Danielle Kurtzleben and senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith discussed with our co-host Steve Inskeep how much this was about the Democratic candidate, Vice President Harris.

4:28Here's Danielle, then Tamara. To me, that is going to be the big postmortem question that we're looking at. I keep thinking about something that a Democratic strategist, a guy who doesn't sugarcoat things, told me in the last couple of weeks. I asked him, hey, how is Harris doing? And he said she really could not have done anything any better. I mean, so I think the question really is going to be, is this candidate error, quote unquote? Is this the voters just wanted this no matter what? And I know we're going to be picking that apart. Yeah, I mean, a big part of her pitch was turn the page on Donald Trump, turn the page on the Trump era.

5:02Clearly, the American people were or some large portion of large enough portion of the American people were not ready to turn the page on that and instead wanted to move on from this era of high inflation and go back to 2019, like make 2019 great again. I think that all along we've been tracking sort of a realignment along economic and educational lines that was different. That Democrats were trying to claim more of the traditional Republican population and Trump was trying to claim more of that working class population. And it appears as though he succeeded. The top issues for voters, according to exit polls, was democracy, which means something different depending on who you ask and the economy, just how expensive life has gotten.

5:46Now, central to Vice President Harris's campaign was an appeal to women over reproductive rights. The right to an abortion was actually on the ballot in 10 states this election, and the majority of those initiatives passed. But that did not translate to a win for Harris at the top of the ticket in swing states such as Nevada and Arizona. And she did worse with women than either President Biden or Hillary Clinton. Elaine Kamark at the Brookings Institution had this to say. Something happened on October 1st, which is Donald Trump came out and said, frankly, he'll veto a federal abortion ban. And that was the clearest statement he'd made on that, even though he'd changed his mind about it a lot of times.

6:29That in combination with 10 abortion referenda, only two of which failed, okay, meant that women were relaxing a little bit about that because, in fact, what was happening is very, very red states like Missouri and Nebraska were passing freedom to abortion referenda. And I think women sort of said, OK, well, maybe that's taken care of and we can vote our pocketbook or whatever. So in any event, the numbers were not nearly as good for Harris as, ironically, they were for Joe Biden four years ago. Now, analysts thought Trump finished his campaign badly with dark messaging threatening to prosecute his personal and political foes or speakers at his Madison Square Garden rally insulting and attacking racial minorities like Puerto Ricans and Palestinians.

7:23But exit polling shows that last minute deciders broke for Trump. Here's center right pollster Christine Matthews, the founder and president of Bellwether Research and Consulting. What I think may explain that is when we were saying that, you know, as analysts were looking at how Trump was closing out his campaign with what looked like a lot of faux pas, a lot of, you know, alienating statements, that sort of thing, that ultimately didn't matter to voters. So when I'm looking through the exit poll and also AP VoteCast, which ultimately is early and they'll be weighted to final results. We'll get more clarity later.

8:07But the voters are telling us they don't really like Donald Trump, and that's okay with them. They don't think he's honest and trustworthy. They don't think he has a moral character to be president. But they think he's a strong leader and he would be good at handling a crisis. So what they decided was they wanted someone to come in and disrupt the system, shake things up, things are going badly. And so we as analysts are like, well, he's increasingly unlikable. He's increasingly alienating. And what voters were saying is like, yeah, that's true, but we don't care. The world was also watching this historic race and Donald Trump's global allies and skeptics began recalibrating and sending their messages of congratulations.

8:52Foreign policy, a big question. Trump is seen as an isolationist and is expected to end critical support for Ukraine in the midst of Russia's war on that nation. He claims when he's president, the war will be over in 24 hours. We got the view from Ukraine from NPR's Joanna Kakissis in Kyiv. So Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has congratulated Trump. And writing on social media, Zelensky said he and Trump had a, quote, great meeting in September and that he appreciates what he calls Trump's peace through strength approach in global affairs. Recently, Zelensky has grown quite frustrated with President Biden's White House, saying their approach is overly cautious and encourages Russia to be more of a bully.

9:36But what was not said here is that Trump has professed admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is the reason Ukraine is at war in the first place. Ukraine has long sought NATO membership, which it views as essential to its security. And with Trump in the White House, NATO membership for Ukraine may not happen in time to save the Ukrainians. Trump is not supportive of the security alliance, which Ukraine desperately needs for long-term protection against Russia. On the question of NATO and the prospect of President-elect Trump's ability to put an end to the war, historian and Russia expert Sergei Radchenko of Johns Hopkins University says this.

10:14Well, so far we haven't had any evidence that would suggest that Trump is going to pressure Russia. And how? I mean, if he wanted to do that, perhaps he could provide more military aid to Ukraine. And that would be a great starting point. I'm sure Zelensky would be looking forward to that. But what we heard from Trump so far is that he wants to strike a deal. And that's something I think that Putin also wants. But Putin will make his demands. He wants sanctions relief. He wants recognition of the territories that he had annexed in the course of this war in Ukraine. and he wants guarantees of NATO's non-enlargement into Ukraine.

10:49Israel's war in Gaza, which has now expanded to Lebanon, was another top foreign policy question this election for voters here in the U.S. And NPR's Kat Lonsdorf joined us from Tel Aviv with the view from Israelis and Palestinians. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu put out a statement congratulating Trump, calling his win, quote, history's greatest comeback. He went on to say that Trump's return to the White House is a, quote, powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America. And that's how many members of Israel's government are reacting today, especially the most far-right members of Netanyahu's party.

11:22There hasn't been much official comment from Palestinian leaders yet. Bassem Naim, a senior Hamas official, put out a statement this morning calling for an end to the war in Gaza and an end to, quote, blind U.S. support for Israel. You know, many Palestinians we've spoken to have said that they didn't think either candidate was going to make their lives better. But many we've talked to are worried that a Trump presidency he could embolden Netanyahu and his government. On what this could mean for an end to Israel's war in Gaza? Trump has said that he wants a ceasefire in Gaza, but analysts in Israel believe Trump will help Netanyahu end that war on terms that are favorable to Israel.

11:54Many think that's one of the reasons that Netanyahu has been noncommittal on a ceasefire in Gaza up until now. He's been waiting for this very thing to happen, for Trump to win the election and allow him more freedom. Back in the United States, the Democrats will be reckoning with losing both the White House and the Senate, while control of the House is still in question. We asked Democratic Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas how his party sees their role come January. With a Republican Senate, we will have his appointees, no matter how far out they may be, given the opportunity to be approved.

12:27He'll be given free reign to his worst instincts. There'll be no check from the Senate. It's the House of Representatives that needs to be a bulwark of freedom to resist the march to fascism. if we can gain the majority. Trump did make this declaration in his victory speech. I will govern by a simple motto, promises made, promises kept. We're going to keep our promises. Nothing will stop me from keeping my word to you, the people. We will make America safe, strong, prosperous, powerful, and free again. Promises made, promises kept. NPR senior national political correspondent Marr Eliason recapped some of those promises.

13:09He wants to do away with the professional civil service. He wants to do away with our alliances abroad. Instead of dealing with climate change, he wants to drill baby drill. There are going to be a lot of really profound changes. And in that same victory address from Trump last night, he promised to be a unifier. Our co-host Michelle Martin asked Republican strategist Ron Bonjean how he'll be able to do that after running such a divisive campaign. Yeah, it's a million-dollar question. I don't have any easy answers today. There are a lot of hard feelings on both sides, and it's going to be a challenge that we're going to have to see if President Trump can pull off or he wants to pull off.

13:49He's going to need, if Democrats, for instance, win the House of Representatives, he's going to need them going forward. You know, and there are lots of Americans right now that need to hear that from him, that unity message that he didn't use during the campaign but needs to use now. So what's next for this country? We will be reporting on what happens from here in the days and the months ahead. We'll bring you the facts and context you need with new episodes daily and bonus episodes as the results of the election continue to unfold and the transition begins. And that's up first for Wednesday, November 6th.

14:31I'm Leila Foden. And I'm E. Martinez. We want you to know there are two other ways to make sure you don't miss a single development throughout the day. You can find a new episode of the NPR Politics Podcast with context and analysis on big stories whenever they happen. And second, Consider This is the podcast where NPR covers one big story in depth every weekday evening. They will be all over this election and its aftermath as well. This bonus episode of Up First was edited by Lisa Thompson and produced by Katie Klein. It was made by the Morning Edition and Up First teams along with the entire NPR newsroom.

15:05It was also made in collaboration with our engineering and studio teams. Join us again tomorrow.

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