How Donald Trump won – by being Donald Trump

The former president cleared a path to the White House by doubling down on the things that Democrats said made him unfit to return to the Oval Office.

Donald Trump arrives to speak at an election night event at the Palm Beach Convention Centre in West Palm Beach, Florida. Picture: AFP

Throughout Donald Trump’s campaign, the Republican Party candidate was bombastic, profane and frequently untruthful, claiming the 2020 race was stolen from him, that he held no responsibility for the January 6, 2021, attack on congress and that President Joe Biden had orchestrated his criminal indictments and felony convictions.

The push by the Democratic Party and Vice-President Kamala Harris to highlight Trump’s words and actions, to portray him as a danger to the country, failed to loosen the former president’s grip on the electorate.

Trump’s legal troubles, instead of hobbling his candidacy, fuelled donations. He denied wrongdoing in all of his cases.

American voters seeking a change in fortune bet on Trump’s promises to boost the US economy, lower prices and taxes, settle foreign conflicts and put a stop to illegal immigration. The Republican Party leader successfully cast himself as a fighter, dodging by a whisker an assassin’s bullet, and as a victim – of political opponents, the media and so-called deep-state adversaries. He broadened his support from black and Latino voters, as well as young men, building a coalition that will strengthen the party in the future.

Trump deftly exploited the political liabilities of Harris and the Biden administration. In long, often rambling speeches to roaring crowds, Trump blamed Harris for presiding over the highest inflation in four decades and a record number of illegal crossings of the US-Mexico border. He harnessed voter nostalgia for the robust US economy that prevailed after his election in 2016 until the pandemic disrupted life in 2020.

Harris struggled to separate herself from Biden, telling a television interviewer last month on The View that she wouldn’t have done anything differently from the President. Polls showed most Americans believed the US was on the wrong track, a data point illustrating how voters were itching for a change.

The Harris campaign raised more than $US1bn ($1.5bn), ahead of Trump’s haul, and fielded a larger voter operation in battleground states. Trump overcame those advantages by running less as a traditional candidate and more like the leader of a movement.

His aggressive and freewheeling style struck a contrast with Harris, a more cautious and scripted politician. Trump pledged tax cuts and more tariffs with little regard for consequences, and he promised to deport millions of immigrants illegally living in the US without saying how.

The campaign peddled T-shirts with Trump’s mug shot from his indictment on charges that he sought to unlawfully overturn Biden’s victory, turning what would seem a political obstacle into a money-making opportunity.

Trump, 78, teamed up with Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and a one-time Trump critic who spent tens of millions of dollars to boost voter turnout in battleground states.

Trump won the backing of Robert F. Kennedy Jr, an idiosyncratic, anti-vaccine presidential candidate who offered his own loyal following after dropping out of the presidential race.

Harris drew a burst of enthusiasm when she replaced Biden in July as the Democratic candidate. Biden’s embarrassing presidential debate a month earlier ignited fears of a Trump landslide win, leading to his withdrawal from the race. Following a jubilant Democratic National Convention, Harris was pilloried by Trump and Republicans for her past, more liberal positions on immigration, fracking and transgender issues.

Trump ignored traditional GOP ideology, advocating tariffs and military isolationism.

He expressed admiration for autocratic leaders such as China’s Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Yet Trump felt free to repeat Republican presidential candidate Ronald Reagan’s famed question to voters during the 1980 debate with incumbent president Jimmy Carter, a performance that helped vault Reagan into the White House. Reagan’s query, echoed by Trump 44 years later, drew similar success. “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” Trump asked during an October 27 rally at Madison Square Garden in New York.

A week later, voters across America answered, choosing Trump’s promise of security and prosperity over the status quo.

Too old

Trump’s November 2022 announcement of his candidacy came at a low point in his political career. He was blamed for the weak performance of Republicans in the midterms a week earlier, including candidates he had backed in high-profile races.

Behind the scenes, Trump began assembling a comeback team that included Florida GOP operative Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, a former marine and veteran Republican strategist. Wiles believed Trump needed to broaden his appeal. That meant drawing more non-white voters and younger voters, two groups that for decades backed Democrats.

A dozen Republicans eventually entered the contest, including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. They presented themselves as a break from the chaos Trump engendered. Trump called them disloyal. Yet he welcomed the growing field, believing the more candidates he faced, the more difficult it would be for any one of them to consolidate support. He stayed out of the primary debates last year, shielding himself from attacks by his rivals.

Trump sailed through January’s Iowa caucuses, winning by the largest percentage in the history of the Republican contest.

By March, he had clinched the nomination.

His GOP rivals had hoped Trump would be sidelined by his criminal indictments. But Trump’s team of lawyers won court delays and the former president turned his court appearances into fundraising opportunities. His campaign arranged for satellite trucks to park outside Trump Tower in New York, where Trump spoke to reporters from TV stations in swing states. He campaigned in the Bronx to demonstrate that his appeal stretched beyond his largely white base of supporters.

In May, a Manhattan jury found Trump guilty of 34 felonies for falsifying records to cover up hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels. His other cases, including Trump’s alleged effort to overturn the 2020 election, were met with delays or setbacks.

The cases energised Trump’s campaign, which pursued a strategy that combined criticism of Biden’s economic and border policies with attacks on his fitness to serve. Biden faced worries in his party and from voters that he was too old to run again.

The Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee put together a social media team that “made hay out of everything” to intimate White House failings, a Trump campaign official said. The team also circulated videos of Biden falling, mangling words or looking confused, which the White House dismissed as edited fakes.

Polls showed Trump leading Biden, a turnaround from the 2020 race. Trump dared Biden to debate him, putting a mock podium onstage at rallies that said, “anytime, anyplace”. Biden, seeking to invigorate his campaign, took the offer. “I’m happy to debate him,” he said in late April on Howard Stern’s radio show. Top Trump campaign officials happened to be nearby, at Fox News headquarters in Manhattan, when they heard. “F..k yeah,” LaCivita said as the group walked to lunch.

On June 4, The Wall Street Journal reported that Biden had shown mental slips in private meetings with congressional leaders, during negotiations for Ukraine funding and talks to lift the debt ceiling. The White House and top Democrats denied it.

Three weeks later, Biden’s halting performance in his Atlanta debate against Trump up-ended the race. The President, his voice strained, stumbled through sentences and struggled to complete thoughts.

Within days, Democratic politicians and campaign donors called on Biden to withdraw. The President refused, insisting he was best suited to defeat Trump. By July, polls showed Trump’s lead over Biden widening further.

Americans watched for Biden’s next move. First, though, came another shock.

‘God is on my side’

On a hot Saturday afternoon, Trump took an outdoor stage in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, two days before the kick-off of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. Less than 10 minutes into his speech, Trump turned to look at a chart about immigration. Pop, pop. Trump put a hand to his right ear and dived to the floor. Pop. Pop. Pop.

Trump was helped up by Secret Service agents. Blood ran down his cheek as he pumped his fist, saying, “Fight, fight, fight.”

Thomas Matthew Crooks had fired shots from a rooftop roughly 120m away, killing one spectator, critically injuring two others and striking Trump’s right ear. Crooks was fatally shot by the Secret Service.

Trump arrived in Milwaukee for the convention with his ear in a bandage, welcomed by a Republican Party united behind him like never before. He announced Ohio senator JD Vance as his running mate, selecting an outspoken populist rather than a candidate more appealing to centrist voters. Vance’s past comments, notably a remark saying the country was run by childless cat ladies leading miserable lives, later drew bursts of outrage.

In accepting the GOP nomination, Trump sounded a note of humility. “I had God on my side,” he told the convention audience. Trump, in his speech the final night, soon reverted to his usual style, hammering on illegal immigration and attacking his critics.

While the GOP convention was in full swing, Biden tested positive for Covid and retreated from public view. On July 21, he posted a letter online announcing his withdrawal from the race. Minutes later, he endorsed Harris.

Trump called the switch a coup. Some on the Trump campaign team came to regret Biden’s dismal performance in the debate, which cost Trump an easy opponent.

Harris resuscitated the Democrats’ presidential hopes. Almost immediately, polls showed the race shifting in her favour. Trump was flummoxed by how best to attack Harris, who at age 60 was nearly two decades younger than the former president. During a forum hosted by black journalists in Chicago, Trump questioned whether Harris was black.

Trump came to see illegal immigration as a campaign issue stronger than even the economy, and he painted the Vice-President as chiefly responsible, using demeaning language to stoke racial divisions. He recounted violent crimes committed by illegal immigrants. His aides arranged for the families of victims to appear with Trump at events.

Harris rolled out policies aimed at easing costs for Americans, such as proposals to prevent grocery-store price gouging, as well as down-payment money for first-time home buyers. Trump asked why Harris hadn’t done more to help struggling Americans while serving as Vice-President. “She’s been there for 3½ years,” he said.

Trump’s campaign sought to reach more men through popular podcasts, including Trump’s three-hour interview with Joe Rogan.

In June, Trump joined TikTok, the platform he had moved to ban when he was president. As a candidate, he delivered short, punchy videos that racked up tens of millions of views.

Trump sought inroads with union workers. He gave Sean O’Brien, general president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, a speaking slot at the GOP convention. In September, the Teamsters for the first time in nearly three decades said it wouldn’t endorse a presidential candidate, a significant blow to the Harris campaign.

The Vice-President held a clear edge on the issue of abortion, which had buoyed Democratic voters since the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v Wade. Trump appointed the three conservative justices who joined the majority in the 5-4 decision. The Harris campaign expected women would help make up a winning margin.

The Trump campaign cast Harris as a far-left candidate. It spent tens of millions of dollars on TV ads late in the election, calling out Harris’s past support of gender-transition surgeries for prisoners. Trump at his rallies also promised to keep biological men out of women’s sports.

In the final stage of the campaign, Wiles pressed Trump to advocate for early voting, despite his long-held opposition and claims of fraud. Republicans significantly closed the gap with Democrats on early voting. Wiles took heat from Trump but steadily made the argument, according to people familiar with the discussions.

In the campaign’s closing days, Trump continued to veer into controversy, saying at one appearance that he would be a protector of women, “whether the women like it or not”. In another, he called former Republican representative Liz Cheney – who backed Harris – a warmonger and asked how she might feel if she had guns “trained on her face”.

During a rally on Saturday in Pennsylvania, Trump said that because of the protective glass surrounding him, an assassin would have to shoot through the news media to get him. “I don’t mind that so much,” he said.

Trump’s advisers cringed, as they had through a long campaign marked by off-colour remarks. Trump, basking in the cheers of supporters, returned to his plane and headed to the next rally.

The Wall Street Journal