Donald J. Trump, former president of the United States and Kamala Harris, current vice president of the United States, both eagerly awaited electoral results after the voting polls closed the evening of Nov. 5. The candidates, along with the rest of the country, were ready to see who would become the nation’s 47th president.
As the counts went on, it became apparent that Trump was pulling ahead. As ballots were counted and electoral votes allocated, Harris fell behind as state after state turned red.
“I stayed up with my girlfriend and some friends watching the results come in, and I knew early on there was no hope for the Harris campaign,” said Skye Mears, a senior biology major. “It was incredibly tragic to watch Georgia turn red and then every swing state following.”
Trump reached the necessary 270 electoral votes first, solidifying him as the United States’ next president. When all votes were finally tallied, he had won the election with 312 electoral college votes and 75,044,060 individual votes, scoring 50.3% of the popular vote.
“I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honor of being elected,” Trump said. “Your 47th president and your 45th president. And every citizen, I will fight for you, for your family and your future. Every single day, I will be fighting for you. And with every breath in my body, I will not rest until we have delivered the strong, safe, and prosperous America that our children deserve and that you deserve. This will truly be the golden age of America.”
President-elect Trump won all seven swing states this election: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
“This was a crucial election on both sides and not just in the presidential election,” said Lincoln Jepson, a junior finance major. “The House and Senate were also both important pieces to this upcoming term. Personally, I’m happy with the result. Foreign affairs are already better off than before. Inflation will drop, and illegal immigration will shrink. I want to end wars, make goods more affordable, pay less taxes and lessen the number of illegal aliens in this country.”
“I really liked Harris’s plan for the economy, how she was going to give small businesses more money to start, money for first-time homeowners, tax breaks for people with children and tax the rich more,” said Elyse Matheny, a senior management information systems major.
Harris earned 226 electoral college votes from 20 states and 71,742,810 individual votes, winning her 48.1% of the popular vote, according to the Associated Press’s reporting. The Democrats have not lost a popular vote since Republican George W. Bush was elected in 2004.
“Harris’s campaign was largely based around not being Trump,” Mears said. “Her promises were mostly centered around how she was different than him and not actually offering any real change to health care, climate change legislation or cutting debt for Americans. In addition, she was a vigorous supporter of Israel in a time when many Americans were unhappy with how the United States was supporting their war on Palestine.”
During the 2020 election, current President Joseph Biden won Georgia. Many of the main democratic counties were in Atlanta and surrounding areas — Fulton, Dekalb, Newton, Henry, Clayton, Douglas, Cobb, Richmond, Liberty and Chatham all went blue. Though Biden flipped Georgia away from the Republicans four years prior, in the 2024 presidential race, Trump was able to turn Georgia back in his favor.
This year, Trump won by over two percentage points, beating Harris by earning 50.7% of the state’s ballots in comparison to her 48.5%. In 2020 the margins were much more slim, with Biden surpassing Trump by a mere 0.3%, which is only about 11,800 votes.
In 2020, Biden won Baldwin County with 9,140 votes at the end of the 2020 presidential election, compared to 8,903 votes for Trump. This Election Day, Baldwin County, too, turned red, winning the county with 9,573 votes, leaving Harris trailing a few hundred votes behind.
With Trump being named the president-elect, Harris conceded the race soon after. On Thursday, Nov. 7. Harris stood in front of a podium at her alma mater Howard University with her family behind her and addressed the nation.
“The outcome of this election was not what we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for, but hear me when I say the light of America’s promise will always burn bright as long as we never give up and as long as we keep fighting,” Harris said.
She went on to pledge to continue to fight for equal justice and democracy.
“I am devastated that Kamala lost; I don’t see anything good happening in the elected president’s upcoming term,” said Roeronidneys Celestine, a junior sociology major.
The presidential election was not the only race on the ballot this year. Locally, Democrat Floyd Griffin Jr. beat out incumbent Republican Ken Vance filled state House seat 149. Based on data on USA Today, Vance won much of Baldwin and Jones counties, but Griffin swept in Bibb.
Many await what is to come after President-elect Trump is sworn in on Jan. 20 and starts his official term.
