2024 United States Presidential Election
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Overview
The 2024 United States Presidential Election refers to the 60th quadrennial presidential election in the United States, which occurred on November 5th, 2024. The election took place between Vice President and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris and former President and Republican candidate Donald Trump, after Joe Biden dropped out of his race for reelection in July 2024. Leading up to the election, particularly in mid-2024 onward, the race between Trump and Harris sparked significant discussion and media coverage online, as well as numerous memes referencing the election itself and the candidates. In the early morning hours of November 6th, 2024, Donald Trump was declared the winner of the election after securing Wisconsin's electoral votes, making the Harris campaign's path to victory mathematically impossible.
Background
Heading into the 2024 election, it was expected that Joe Biden and Donald Trump would face each other in a rematch of the 2020 United States Presidential Election. Donald Trump[1] did face a primary challenge from a field of contenders that included Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy. Ultimately, none of the other contenders presented much of a challenge, and Trump won the nomination handily.
For the Democrats, Joe Biden ran virtually unopposed and was the presumptive nominee heading into the summer of 2024.
Developments
2024 CNN Debate
The course of the election dramatically shifted following a debate between Biden and Trump hosted by CNN in June 2024. Heading into the debate, Biden was flagging in the polls and faced questions about his age and cognitive decline going into a second term. The debate performance raised alarm among Democrats and further hurt him in the polls, leading to calls for him to drop out of the race.
Trump Assassination Attempt
The 2024 Donald Trump Rally Shooting or 2024 Donald Trump Assassination Attempt was a shooting that took place on July 13th, 2024 at a Butler, Pennsylvania rally for United States presidential candidate Donald Trump in mid-July 2024. During the incident, a shooter scaled a nearby building and attempted to kill Donald Trump during his speech by firing several shots from an AR-15, with one of the bullets grazing Trump's ear. The shooter, later identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, killed one spectator and critically injured two others before being shot dead by the Secret Service.
J.D. Vance
On July 15th, 2024, Donald Trump selected Ohio Senator and Hillbilly Elegy author J.D. Vance as his running mate for the 2024 United States Presidential Election.
Immediately after he was selected, multiple controversies surrounding J.D. Vance circulated on social media and in news media. These include a false claim that Vance admitted to having sex with a couch in Hillbilly Elegy, a rumor that he once looked up a video of a dolphin humping a woman on Twitter, discourse surrounding previous comments in which he criticized women without children as childless cat ladies and his extreme stances on abortion.
As of August 6th, 2024, J.D. Vance has a historically low approval rating[2] among vice presidential candidates, leading to some speculation that he may be replaced on the ticket before the election.
Biden Drops Out Of The Race
For three weeks after Biden's poor performance at the CNN debate, he faced increased calls from within the Democratic Party for him to drop out of the race. During this time, online attention turned to Vice President Kamala Harris to be the nominee should Biden drop out.
On July 21st, 2024, Joe Biden announced in a letter posted to Twitter / X that he would not seek reelection. He promised he would address the decision further at a later date (shown below), which he eventually did in a brief, televised address to the nation later that week.
In a second tweet, he endorsed Kamala Harris for President (shown below).
Kamala Harris quickly racked up endorsements from within the party and became the presumptive nominee ahead of the Democratic National Convention.
Tim Walz
On August 6th, 2024, it was announced that Kamala Harris had selected Tim Walz as her running mate. Walz was selected over other rumored candidates Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly and Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear.
Prior to his selection, Walz notably kickstarted a "Republicans Are Weird" messaging tactic that rapidly became popularized among Democrats by using the line in an appearance on MSNBC (shown below).
I’m telling you: these guys are weird. pic.twitter.com/fvNRNf7T7T
— Tim Walz (@Tim_Walz) July 24, 2024
Election Day
On November 5th, 2024, Election Day took place and voting was completed in the United States. As the day unfolded, a series of bomb threats across multiple battleground states were reported by news outlets.[4]
Polls began closing at 6 p.m. EST on November 5th and Donald Trump quickly gained a lead in North Carolina, Georgia and Pennsylvania, three of seven critical battleground states.[3] Kamala Harris took New York and California, as well as Virginia. The race with Harris was predicted to be razor-thin, but overnight results "showed Trump on the cusp of the crucial 270 electoral votes," as BBC[5] reported.
In the early morning of November 6th, 2024, former President Donald Trump secured crucial votes from Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, crossing the threshold of 270 votes in the Electoral College needed to defeat Vice President Kamala Harris.[6]
The YouTube[7] channel The Project uploaded a video highlighting the key events of Election Day (seen below), which amassed more than 6,000 views and 1,000 likes in a few hours.
Candidates Responses
Approaching defeat, Kamala Harris canceled her expected election night appearance at Howard University in Washington D.C.[9] In the early morning of November 6th, 2024, Kamala's campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond addressed the crowd assembled for the Vice President’s election night party, saying, "We still have votes to count. We still have states that have not been called yet. We will continue, overnight, to fight to make sure that every vote is counted, that every voice has spoken. So you won’t hear from the Vice President tonight, but you will hear from her tomorrow."[10]
At approximately 3 a.m. EST on November 6th, Donald Trump gave supporters a victory speech after Fox News[8] projected he would win the 2024 Presidential Race. In his speech (seen below), which was posted on YouTube shortly after, Trump called his campaign “the greatest political movement of all time” and said that his election to a second term would spark the “Golden Age of America.” The video garnered over 757,000 views and 38,000 likes in a few hours.
Around 4 p.m. EST on November 6th, 2024, VP Kamala Harris gave her concession speech at Howard University after the race was called. In her speech, Harris encouraged her supporters to continue fighting and not despair, saying, "The outcome of this election was not what we wanted … 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."[11]
The concession speech was streamed on YouTube by numerous media outlets on November 6th, including the Wall Street Journal's channel, which received over 52,000 views, 550 likes and 20 comments in roughly one hour (shown below).
Related Memes
I Really Don't Know What He Said at the End of That Sentence
I Really Don't Know What He Said at the End of That Sentence and I Don't Think He Knows That Either is a remark made by Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump in response to his opponent Joe Biden during the 2024 CNN Presidential Debate. The clip of Trump replying to Biden with the catchphrase went viral online in late June 2024 after the event, inspiring various memes and references.
What Can Be, Unburdened By What Has Been
What Can Be, Unburdened By What Has Been is a catchphrase of Vice President Kamala Harris that she has used in speeches throughout her career. In late June 2024, a supercut of Harris using the phrase went viral online, leading to its ironic and sincere embrace by meme makers. The phrase circulated in a manner similar to You Think You Just Fell Out Of A Coconut Tree? — another Harris catchphrase that was referenced in numerous memes.
Donald Trump Raised Fist Photograph
Donald Trump Raised Fist Photograph, also known as Donald Trump Fist Pumping After Assassination Attempt, refers to a viral photo of United States presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump taken immediately after a failed assassination attempt on his life at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania in July 2024. The exploitable image, in which a bloodied Trump is seen raising his fist as he is rushed off the stage by members of his Secret Service, achieved virality and inspired numerous memes, edits and redraws in the following days.
Coconut-pilled
Coconut-Pilled, sometimes spelled Coconutpilled or Coconut Pilled, is an internet slang term used primarily by progressives and former Kamala Harris critics who expressed semi-ironic support of the vice president replacing Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee for president in the 2024 election, and later, for President. The term is inspired by Harris' infamous "Fell out Of a Coconut Tree" quote, signaling that those who are "coconut-pilled" are embracing Harris' bizarre tics and weirdness.
Kamala Is Brat
Kamala Is Brat refers to a series of memes that paint presumptive presidential candidate Kamala Harris as "brat" in the context of Charlie XCX's 2024 album brat and its related memes like "Brat Summer," with the slang term being used in a positive and praising manner. Started by TikTok edits that applied brat aesthetic (such as the album cover's lime-green color) to videos of Harris, the meme received further development after Charlie XCX wrote "kamala IS brat" on social media in late July 2024.
"Republicans Are Weird"
Republicans Are Weird refers to unofficial messaging adopted by the Democratic Party's 2024 Presidential Election campaign that sought to deride Republican policies in general, and J.D. Vance, in particular, as "weird" as opposed to only "scary" or "dangerous."
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz made an appearance on MSNBC where he described key Republican policies, as well as Trump's seeming fixation on Hannibal Lecter in his campaign speeches, as "weird" in July 2024. This sentiment about Trump was also echoed in a press release from Kamala Harris's presidential campaign that described Donald Trump as "old and weird."
J.D. Vance Couch Cushion Story Hoax
JD Vance Couch Cushion Story Hoax, also known as J. D. Vance Hillbilly Elegy Latex Glove Masturbation, refers to a viral piece of misinformation stating that United States Senator J.D. Vance, currently the running mate of Donald Trump in the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election, masturbated by humping two couch cushions into a latex glove and that he'd written about the experience in his memoir, Hillbilly Elegy. The story was made up by Twitter / X user @rickrudescalves in July 2024 and spread widely on social media, which led to news publications uncritically repeating the hoax story as fact. In the following weeks, Trump and Vance supporters fabricated a fake story about Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Tim Walz, known as the Tim Walz Horse Semen Story Hoax. The Walz story was labeled cringe by many internet users who believed that the meme was forced and was trying too hard to deflect the Vance, couch memes and "Republicans Are Weird" criticism.
Donald Trump Working at McDonald's
Donald Trump Working at McDonald's, also known as the Trump McDonald's Photo Op, refers to a 2024 Presidential Campaign photo op of former U.S. President Donald Trump working at a McDonald's location in Feasterville-Trevose, Pennsylvania in late October 2024. Trump McDonald's memes surfaced en masse on social media platforms like Twitter / X, Reddit and TikTok (among others) in the following weeks. Many of the photos and videos of Trump working at McDonald's showed him serving and handing out french fries at the drive-thru. In turn, many of the memes referenced the Just Put the Fries In the Bag catchphrase.
Search Interest
External References
[1] APNews – Trump wins Iowa Caucus
[2] AL Reporter – Initial Republican support for Vance turns to concern in face of new polling
[3] Sky News – US election results: How the night unfolded in key moments
[4] APNews – Bomb threats in swing states disrupt a mostly smooth Election Day
[5] BBC – Has Trump won? When US election results will be announced
[6] CNBC – Election results live updates: Trump clinches White House victory
[7] YouTube – How U.S. Election Day Unfolded As Trump Wins
[8] YouTube – Donald Trump's full victory speech
[9] BBC – Kamala Harris yet to concede as Trump barrels towards victory
[10] The Guardian – With 'votes to count' Kamala Harris won't make election speech – video
[11] CBS News – In concession speech, Harris says 'when we lose an election, we accept the results'
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