Some lessons of the 2024 election

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It happened.

Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris. A twice-impeached convicted felon who has promised to act as a dictator will return to the White House in 2025.

There’s no way to sugarcoat this nightmare scenario. The consequences of this election will unfold for decades to come. They will likely prove destructive to the very fabric of American democracy – and to the survival of life on Earth itself.

Trump is the greatest threat we have ever faced. Yet he will return to power by a vote of the people. Whatever the fate of our nation is, it involves getting through this. We must be up to the task.

Understandably, there’s plenty of blame and finger-pointing to go around. The Harris campaign painted a rosy picture to the very end. Many trusted pollsters and pundits predicted a Democratic victory. They said the fundamentals were favorable to Harris. They said turnout would work in her favor. They said anti-Trump Republicans and women would make all the difference.

They turned out to be very wrong.

Republicans scored a shocking win. The “Blue Wall” crumbled as Trump won battleground states. Republicans took the Senate and the House. Many pollsters and pundits who expressed exceeding confidence about Harris's chances are now in panic mode. And the Democratic Party is gravely damaged as the nation heads into an uncertain future.

At FrameLab, we didn’t make predictions. We tried to be optimistic but acknowledged the grim possibility of a Trump victory. The fact that he remained strong in the polls was a warning sign. Trumpism has grown stronger, not weaker. Defeating this new iteration of Trump – overtly fascist – will be the moral and political challenge of our times.

Democratic Party finger pointing

There’s a lot of finger-pointing and division in the Democratic Party right now. This is largely destructive and unhelpful. Yet it is also true that the Democratic Party needs a complete overhaul after this catastrophic failure.

With everything at stake, how was there no better plan? How did the party's leaders fail to anticipate the resurrection of Trump, and why did they sleepwalk into 2024 with no plan for averting disaster?

While it is tempting to blame individuals or particular groups, let’s be clear: This was a systematic breakdown of both the Democratic Party and American democracy.

Why did Trump win?

 Here are some preliminary observations on the 2024 election: 

Strict Father morality is growing stronger

All politics are moral politics. Trump won because he has tapped into something deep in the American psyche: Strict Father morality. This is a hierarchical view of the world, rooted in the metaphor of a family with a dictator-like patriarch whose word is law. Millions of American brains are wired to accept this moral system, and this is why none of the facts about Trump (his impeachments, his convictions, his lies) mattered.

In the aftermath of his victory, there are – once again – many explanations for why he won. Most of them are piecemeal and incomplete. Strict Father morality is the key to understanding why Trump retains a strong support base. Trump’s supporters accept his moral authority over everything else, so the focus on his flaws did not matter as much as his braying promises to rule the country as a strongman.

Moving forward, Democrats must stop ignoring the metaphorical and moral frameworks underlying our politics. (Keep in mind that there are different forms of morality, and if you find Trump morally repugnant, you have a different kind of morality than those who voted for him.)

For more information on Strict Father morality, listen to "How Republicans Really Think" on the FrameLab podcast.

Moving to the right failed – again.

In 2024, Kamala Harris tried to move to the right to find the mythical “center.” It didn’t work. Moving to the right doesn't get you to the center – because there is no center. When a Democratic politician moves to "the right" during an election, it erodes their authenticity. In fact, such tactics might have demotivated Democratic voters who were disillusioned to see their candidate running as a Republican Lite.

Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney and touted endorsements from a range of Republicans who have long been despised by Democratic voters. The idea was that a Republican embrace would peel off hesitant Trump voters. This would have been considered brilliant – if it had worked. It didn’t.

Moving forward, Democrats must stop making these superficial, last-minute lurches toward Republican ideas. They must frame the case not as left or right, but for the people and the public good. Moving to the right only convinces voters that the right has better ideas. It's a desperate short-term strategy with harmful long-term consequences.

For more information, read "Twelve Communications Traps for Democrats and Progressives to Avoid."

Boosting Trump helps Trump (because it makes him the center of attention)

As in 2016, much of this year’s campaign focused entirely on Trump. Democrats and other Trump detractors feverishly amplified his words – apparently under the impression that a majority of Americans would interpret Trump’s remarks as disqualifying.

That didn’t happen. Instead, Trump (once again) became the most dominant image and voice of the election. He was the center of attention, more dangerous than anyone else. This gave him power. Trump’s content regularly drowned out Harris’s, and even her allies were busy amplifying and boosting every deranged word out of his mouth. They rationally assumed that showing how awful he is would help Harris. But politics isn't rational. Trump’s outrageous words became the center of attention — and took attention away from Harris’ view of a happier future.

Especially helpful to Trump were large social media accounts that thrive on engagement from outraged Democrats. As in 2016, Trump’s "opponents" created a parasitic economy in which constant outrage over Trump's every utterance was the name of the game. Again, this was a massive failure – because focusing attention on Trump’s power — even his power to harm — helps Trump. (Don't expect these professional social media hounds to change their tactics. Amplifying Trump is their bread and butter.)

The attacks on Trump managed to help spread his message far and wide. If Democrats and the liberal press had spent less time reacting to Trump, they might have done a lot better job of trumpeting — and trumpeting loudly — their own candidate’s positives. 

(Dr. Lakoff notes: By the way, notice the word “trumpet” — a loud musical instrument. It is part of the English vocabulary, as is the word “trump,” which came into everyday English from card games, meaning to overwhelm the value of another card. Trump’s family name originally came from the German “Drumpf.” “Donald Drumpf” would never have won an election. The English version of his original family name matters and the meaning of the word "trump" has helped to give him power.)

Trump remains a super salesman

Underestimate Trump at your own peril. No matter how deranged or nonsensical he seems to Democrats, he is connecting powerfully with millions and millions of American brains.

Many Democrats found his performance during this campaign laughable, but the joke is on us. Trump still knows how to manipulate images, symbols and words. He has decades of experience in television and he knows how to work his audience. It’s hard for any politician to compete because Trump is a larger-than-life figure. This is especially true now that he has survived impeachments, convictions and assassination attempts. These have all added to his perverse authenticity, which a majority of Americans preferred to a sane and rational alternative.

Perhaps 2025 will be the year when Democrats stop underestimating Trump and gain a proper respect for his dangerous capabilities.

For more information, see "Trump has turned words into weapons. And he's winning the linguistic war." (2018)

People vote their values, not their self-interest

How could so many people vote for someone who does not have their best interests at heart? Because people don’t necessarily vote their self-interest. Instead, they vote their values.

Unfortunately, Trump reflects the values of many Americans – even those whose “self-interest” is clearly threatened by his policies. Working class voters, white women, Latino and Black men – all of them are under threat by Trump and his ilk. Yet a considerable number voted for Trump because they identify with him on a deeper level, on the level of moral values, in particular Strict Father morality. Moving forward, Democrats need to understand this and to abandon the mistaken notion that people vote their self-interest, which leads to the mistaken assumption that policy alone will persuade voters to support a Democratic ticket.

Identity is not political destiny

Trump’s Strict Father appeal crosses racial, ethnic and gender lines. This confuses Democratic brains because many Democrats assume that certain people will naturally oppose Trump due to their ethnic, gender or racial identity. But this turns out to not be the case.

Identity matters, but identity politics is not the key to winning political power. The Democratic Party must find a way to connect with voters on a much deeper and more unifying level or the MAGA movement will continue to peel off support. Trump’s misogyny and racism is simply not a deal breaker for many Americans, who are willing to overlook Trump’s bigotry because he appeals to their Strict Father moral identity. They identify with his projection of dominance and strength, and it matters more than their own gender or racial identity.

Going forward, Democrats must never again assume that identity politics are a key to victory. Race and gender issues matter, but those issues are ill-served by electoral defeat.

Frames trump facts

Once again, the facts got beaten by the frames. Trump created an alternate reality for his supporters and they bought into it and did not care about the facts. Millions of voters did not consider facts (such as Trump’s failures or his multiple felony convictions or his clear instability) to be relevant.

Instead, Trump successfully framed truth as lies and framed himself as a strong leader, while framing Democrats as incompetent and radical. The frames beat the facts. This a lesson that Democrats must clearly grasp as Trump prepares to use the federal government itself to unleash a flood of fallacious frames and lies.

The facts were on the side of the Democrats, but voters accepted Trump’s framing and handed the victory to Trump. Listen, Democrats: Framing matters. This is a matter of human cognition.

Democrats need to take human cognition seriously. Policy matters. But policies that help most Americans are not enough. It is how voters (largely unconsciously) frame policy that determines how they will vote. That is why we founded FrameLab.  

For more information, read "The power of framing: It's not what you say, it's how you say it." (2017)

Authoritarians are winning the communication war

Republicans have spent decades building a right-wing media ecosystem to undermine the traditional press and get their message out. This information weapon, largely dependent on conspiracy theories and falsehoods, has become an undeniably powerful force.

Democrats have no comparable effort. Instead, they have relied on the mainstream media as a neutral arbiter of reality. But these efforts to remain objective have not been effective. Instead, they have succeeded in normalizing Trump’s radical shift into a would-be dictator. (And prominent legacy media properties are quickly being acquired by billionaires who may not have democracy's best interests in mind.)

Democrats have been losing the messaging war for decades. But they are also losing the media war. The failure to invest in a formidable and ongoing communications strategy – influencers, podcasts, paywall-free media outlets designed to activate citizen engagement – is a big reason why democracy is now jeopardized.

A challenging future

This is not an exhaustive list. There will be a lot more to say in the long days, months and years to come. And the Kamala Harris campaign got some things right, which we'll talk about in another piece.

Unfortunately, Trump is already using his power as president-elect to push down the guardrails of democracy and take unprecedented power for himself. American democracy faces its greatest test, and there are no guarantees.

However, Trump alone will not decide the fate of our nation. The outcome will also largely depend on all of us. We will all be called upon to express our full rights and responsibilities as citizens. Will we step up to the challenge with energy and resolve? Will we answer the call?

In On Tyranny, historian Timothy D. Snyder writes that the first rule of defeating authoritarianism is: “Do not obey in advance.”

Writes Snyder:

 Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.

This is a dark moment in American history. Many of us feel a sense of despair. But we must not give in – because giving in to despair is a form of obedience. Authoritarianism threatens everything we hold dear, but we still have tremendous power. Sorrow is a natural response to this awful election. But our sorrow must turn to outrage, and our outrage must fuel our resolve to win a better future.

Remember: Persistence is the best resistance.

“We are the ones we have been waiting for.” – June Jordan

Any questions? Submit them in the comments and we'll try to answer some in our next Q&A.