By Geraldine Onyenweaku
The American election has been won and lost. While the winners are congratulating themselves and clinking champagne glasses, the losers are licking their wounds and asking where they went wrong.
On November 5, 2024, Americans unanimously decided to hand over the reins of power to Republican candidate, former president Donald Trump. Trump, in a decisive and stunning victory, last week defeated its Democratic Party candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris to clinch the coveted position, securing him a second term in office. Donald Trump had lost the election four years ago to President Joe Biden of the Democratic Party in a ‘controversial’ circumstance as Trump perceived it.
Four years after, despite a plethora of legal battles he faced, bordering on sexual assault and falsification of business records, making him the first former president in the history of the US to be criminally convicted, having been found guilty, Trump won overwhelmingly in both the popular votes and swing states over Harries to the amazement of his ardent supporters and the chagrin of his staunch opponents.
The question on the lips of many is: What happened? Why would former president Donald Trump, a convicted felon run for and win an election in a landslide? The reason is not far-fetched.
The United States politics reflect a binary party system that has divided the country into two irreconcilable teams: one that represents the multicultural values of cosmopolitan cities and the other that defines the Christian values of the traditionalist countryside. The American election has over time been shaped by the urban/rural divide largely represented by these two parties guided by two extreme values and principles. Of course, other social identities of race, religion, and region pitched the parties against each other and became one mega identity for the parties and their followers.
In the election that took place a few weeks ago, the majority of Americans expressed their disgust over the seeming drift in godlessness of the American society, which they had blamed the far-left democratic party for subtly endorsing. The Americans, especially the Evangelicals have accused the democrats squarely of being responsible for the emergence of the new twisted culture of godlessness that is fast gaining ground in America.
Single dads, unwed parents, and gay couples are the new norm, now changing attitudes to a once sacred institution (marriage). Most Americans feel that traditional marriage institutions are in retreat and that new and varied (unconventional) family structures are changing the way people live in ways that are unacceptable to the vast majority.
The issue of abortion rights, transgender politics, and gay marriages were central in the 2024 election leading up to a Trump win. The GOP won the hearts of many evangelicals with its vehement attacks on these issues during the election.
Republicans at every turn hit the Democrats with the punchline ads in anti-abortion, anti-transgender, and anti-gay marriage. They made it known that they believed in the sanctity of marriage as God had ordained it ab initio and that nobody should disrupt the traditional marriage structure consisting of a man and woman. The GOP in their advertisements came down strongly against the ‘woke’ culture that is prevalent in American society, where school authorities teach children that they should not allow themselves to be trapped in a gender that they are not comfortable with. In contrast, the Republicans stated that their policy would recognize people for their birth gender- the gender they were born with at birth.
The GOP stance on this issue followed the outcry by parents in America accusing schools of plans to deceive parents and children alike into signing documents that permit children to change their gender.
One of the most vocal voices against the ‘woke’ culture was Elon Musk, the charismatic CEO of electric car maker Tesla and rocket manufacturer SpaceX and the owner of the social media company ‘X’, formerly known as ‘Twitter’.
Musk’s first son reportedly fell victim to the ‘Woke’ idea when he transitioned from male to female, adopting a new name, Vivian Jenna Wilson.
Consequently, Musk vowed to fight the trend. He leveraged his ownership of the social media company, ‘X’, to run one of the most abrasive attacks against the ‘woke’ culture, supporting Donald Trump in the just concluded election.
Also, the issue of abortion was another hot point of debate as the GOP believes in the protection of the rights of the unborn child. The Democrats, on the contrary, stand for the right of women to decide what they do with their bodies.
Trump and his Republican party, before the election, displayed ads that became ubiquitous by Election Day: “Kamala is for they/them; President Trump is for you.”
“Week by week when that ad hit and stuck and we didn’t respond, I think that was the beginning of the end,” former Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell said of the 30-second spot that was part of $215 million in anti-transgender advertising by Trump and Republicans, according to tracking firm AdImpact.
“They painted her as something I don’t think she is,” Rendell said. “They painted her as a far-left liberal.”
The fallout leaves some progressive and moderate Democrats struggling between the party’s modern identity as a champion of civil rights and its electoral fortunes across swaths of America with whom those attacks resonated.
After losing the White House and both houses of Congress, Democrats are grappling with how to handle transgender politics and policy following a campaign that featured withering and often misleading GOP attacks on the issue.
Many have described the anti-transgender ads as the underpinning factor on which Trump’s victory over Harris was anchored, despite sweeping promises on the economy and immigration.