Winners and Losers of Election 2024
Katrina Trinko / Tyler O'Neil / Bradley Devlin / Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell / Fred Lucas /
Here’s a look at some of the winners and losers of the 2024 election.
Winners
The Alternative Media
In the run-up to Election Day, former President Donald Trump circumvented the corporate media and instead chose long-form podcast interviews to make his closing argument. These long-form interviews with podcast megastars such as Joe Rogan brought Trump’s pitch to the low-propensity voters Republicans needed to turn out on Election Day to the media they consume, rather than hoping they tuned into corporate media outlets.
Even if Trump ultimately were to fall short of winning the presidency, the alternative media have proven themselves powerful enough to directly challenge the power of the oligarchic corporate media and, with time, potentially overtake them.
Bernie Moreno
Bernie Moreno will be the next senator from Ohio, taking down Sherrod Brown and ending the Ohio Democrat’s 18-year tenure in the Senate. Moreno seemed like a longshot over the summer, trailing his incumbent opponent by five points. But Moreno surged in the last few weeks of the campaign, chipping away at Brown’s lead until Election Day. Moreno’s victory in Ohio ensures Republican control of the Senate, which will function as a boon to passing a potential Trump administration agenda (even under budget reconciliation) or could serve as a bulwark against a potential Harris administration agenda.
Electoral College
No one gets attacked more than the Electoral College when a Republican wins, but without winning the popular vote. (See: 2000, 2016). With Trump poised to win the popular vote as well, maybe the Electoral College can get a break from the Left’s rabid hate.
Joe and Jill Biden
Joe Biden lost the presidency because of a Democratic coup, and curious observers have wondered if he’s quietly hoping for a Trump win. Let’s not forget he even put on a MAGA hat in September. And was there any chance that the “garbage” gaffe was … intentional? Further adding to the intrigue was first lady Jill Biden’s decision to wear red to vote on Election Day. Hidden messages much?
Babydog
Washington, D.C., might have high crime and far too many ugly buildings, but Babydog, the beloved bulldog of Sen.-elect Jim Justice, R-W.V., has an even better chance of establishing a national profile now that she’s headed to the nation’s capital with her owner. She just better watch out for bitter reporters at legacy outlets: She’s already been fat-shamed by The New York Times, who snidely wrote of “Babydog, a plump bulldog, belly swaying as she trotted across the stage.” We’re just glad there’s more of her to love.
Floridians
Maybe Americans are getting sick of everything reeking of marijuana. (We got rid of second-hand smoke in exchange for this?) Despite spending significantly, the marijuana advocates were unable to get 60% of Florida voters to back legalizing recreational marijuana. (The state allows marijuana use for medical purposes.)
Losers
The Pro-Abortion Lobby in Florida
Floridians Protecting Freedom failed to pass its radical pro-abortion Amendment 4, despite spending 8.3 times as much as the pro-life side.
With about 95% of the vote in, Amendment 4—which would have legalized abortion up to birth—received 57.1% of the vote. A supermajority vote of at least 60% was needed to make Amendment 4 part of the Florida Constitution.
The loss comes after pro-lifers filed a lawsuit against Floridians Protecting Freedom, citing fraudulent practices to get the amendment on the ballot.
The pro-abortion lobby had the opportunity for significant financial gain if the amendment had passed. Florida currently has an abortion ban after six weeks’ gestation, so abortions would have increased exponentially.
“The abortion industry can afford to pour millions into these fights,” said Kelsey Pritchard, the director of state public affairs at Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. “They will see [a return on investment] if these abortion measures pass in their state, and they will be able to profit exponentially off of aborting more children and off of the health and safety of women and girls, when they don’t have to follow any regulations in their industry.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has lost his Senate majority, with Democratic seats flipping to Republican in Ohio and West Virginia before midnight, and other hotly contested Democrat-held Senate seats in Montana, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania too close to call but with GOP challengers leading.
Republican Bernie Moreno defeated three-term Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio. Meanwhile, West Virginia’s Republican governor, Jim Justice, won the Senate seat vacated by retiring Democrat-turned-independent Joe Manchin.
Schumer became the Senate majority leader after two runoff elections in early 2021 that created a 50-50 partisan split. Vice President Kamala Harris, in her role as president of the Senate, cast tie-breaking votes. The outgoing current partisan split is 47 Democrats with four nominal independents who caucus with them, and 49 Republicans.
Biology
Gender ideology defeated biology in some key elections Tuesday.
While gender ideology has made strides in the federal bureaucracy under the Biden-Harris administration, a self-declared transgender person had never won an election to federal office. On Tuesday, Delaware state Sen. Sarah McBride, a male who identifies as female, won the First State’s only seat in the House of Representatives.
An entire state will be represented by a male claiming to identify as female. McBride, a Democrat, defeated Republican John Whalen III, taking 57.6% of the vote with 63% of the vote counted, NBC News reported.
McBride ran on lowering drug prices, increasing the minimum wage, and promoting abortion.
NBC News noted that McBride became the first transgender person to work in the White House under then-President Barack Obama and the first transgender person to speak at a major political convention in 2016. McBride also became the country’s first transgender state senator.
McBride will demand that colleagues in the House of Representatives treat him as a woman as a matter of courtesy. This means that if members insist on referring to him as male, according to his biology, that will become a matter of contention.
Some Democrats who belatedly opposed gender ideology (the worldview that a person’s internal sense of gender overrides biology) have lost their elections. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Texas, lost his challenge to two-term Republican Sen. Ted Cruz.
While Allred has a record of supporting transgender issues, from males competing against women in women’s sports to a “transgender bill of rights,” he later stated, “I’m a dad, I’m a Christian. Of course I don’t support these ridiculous things.”
Yet transgender advocates may still claim that Allred’s loss shows that Democrats cannot afford to abandon transgender issues.
Activist Erin Reed noted that Houston’s LGBTQ+ caucus refused to endorse Allred after he “threw trans people under the bus.”
Perhaps ironically, Allred’s defeat may help transgender activists take more control over the Democratic Party.
The Emerging Democratic Majority
Remember when Obama was going to usher in a glorious permanent Democratic future, where Republicans could never win because women, young people, and racial minorities would give the blue team a permanent majority?
This idea, which emerged in “The Emerging Democratic Majority,” written by John Judis and Ruy Teixeira, proved a definite loser Tuesday night.
Not only did Trump seem poised to win, but he gained more support among the racial minorities who were ostensibly out of reach for Republicans.
Fox News’ exit polls showed Harris winning 56% of Hispanic voters to Trump’s 40%, a 16-point lead for the Democrat. Biden led with that group by 21 points in 2020.
Black men also shifted toward Trump in Georgia, according to Fox News exit polls. Trump won 25% among black men to Harris’ 73%. Biden had 87% among the same group in 2020. Harris won six percentage points less support from black women in Georgia, according to those exit polls.
Trump was also leading in black-plurality Anson County, North Carolina. He had 51% of the vote to Harris’ 48.3%. The county is 47% black.
Democrats Fantasizing Over Blue Texas
Democrats just can’t give up on Texas.
In 2018, Beto O’Rourke launched a fierce fight against Cruz, raising a whopping $80 million to take down the stalwart conservative. He lost. Then O’Rourke, a liberal darling, ran for governor in 2022. Again, he lost, with longtime Gov. Greg Abbott winning a third term.
This time, Democrats bet on a different candidate—Allred, a Democrat member of the House—but he lost. Democrats have not won statewide in Texas since 1990. Maybe it’s time for Democrats to give up on that dream of winning the Lone Star State.