What does Kamala Harris' defeat in the 2024 election mean for the USA? | News about the 2024 US election

Vice President Kamala Harris' defeat in the US presidential election means she is the second candidate to be defeated by Republican Donald Trump, despite a historic election campaign.

For analysts who spoke to Al Jazeera, Harris' defeat evoked a sense of déjà vu reminiscent of her fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton's defeat in 2016.

They emphasized that Harris' race and gender played a crucial role in her defeat by former President Trump, whose political career was marked by sexism and racism.

“The biggest underlying dynamic in American politics right now is views on race, views on gender,” said Tresa Undem, a pollster specializing in gender.

Undem and other experts predict Democrats will face a tsunami of backlash heading into the 2024 election.

“Harris and the Democrats are going to face a lot of wrath,” Undem said. “There will be all sorts of narratives: What’s wrong with the Democrats?” What’s wrong with Harris? Was it because of their race and gender? She talks too much about abortion…”

As the shock of Harris' loss wears off, Mike Nellis, a former adviser to Harris' 2020 campaign and founder of the group White Dudes for Harris, said there are crucial lessons for the Democratic Party to keep in mind as it faces the battles ahead President Obama poses. Vote for Trump.

“Everyone will have an opinion,” Nellis told Al Jazeera. “All of our hair will be on fire.”

The “Deep Roots of White Supremacy”

Had she won, Harris would have broken glass ceilings and become the first woman, the second Black woman and the first South Asian elected to the highest office in the land.

Harris herself made little mention of the historic nature of her presidential bid during her compressed, three-month sprint to Election Day after President Joe Biden dropped out in July.

Instead, she presented herself as a candidate for “all Americans,” ran a centrist campaign and promised a continuation of Biden’s policies.

That strategy included overtures to Republicans disillusioned with Trump and campaigning alongside conservative lawmakers like former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney.

But it wasn't enough to secure her entry into the White House.

“This loss shows that we still have a lot of work to do when it comes to gender and race relations here in the United States,” said Tammy Vigil, a professor at Boston University whose research focuses on women in politics.

Vigil said Trump has “given people the opportunity to be their worst selves, and that definitely includes being sexist and racist.”

The issue of gender and race will continue to be a mobilizing force, she added: “It will be a big rallying cry.”

For Nadia Brown, director of the women's and gender studies program at Georgetown University, there is no doubt that Harris was the better qualified candidate in the race.

She had decades of government experience, from her time as a prosecutor to her service in the Senate and White House.

That raises the question of why so many voters chose her opponent, Brown explained.

“This loss just underscores the extent of the deep-rooted racism and white hetero-patriarchy, the deep roots of white supremacy in this nation,” Brown said. “There is no denying that she is someone who could have served as president from day one.”

Trump has repeatedly described Harris as “low IQ” and “mentally disabled,” even calling her “one of the dumber people in our country's history.”

That kind of rhetoric, Brown said, gave his supporters permission to dismiss and denigrate Harris. “The way Trump portrayed her and people’s reactions to her brought out the worst in a lot of people.”

Andra Gillespie, a political scientist at Emory University in Atlanta, noted that Harris is not the first presidential candidate to face hurdles based on race or gender.

She pointed to former President Barack Obama, the first black president of the United States, who was repeatedly asked questions about his country of birth and whether he was Muslim.

And then there was Clinton, the first female presidential candidate from a major party. During their campaign, Trump supporters gathered under signs that read “Trump that b****.” Trump himself accused her of “playing the woman’s card.”

While Obama faced challenges with race and Clinton with gender, those hurdles became even greater for Harris, Gillespie told Al Jazeera, adding that “the sexism Harris faced is racially tinged.”

“All three experienced challenges because of their differences,” Gillespie said of Harris, Clinton and Obama.

But Gillespie argued that it was “doubly hard for Harris” because of the combined force of misogyny and racism. “Harris experienced her differently because she is both a woman and a person of color.”

Playing the blame game

But Harris' loss isn't just due to issues of race and gender.

Several analysts said the Democratic Party will have to grapple with how effectively it was able to appeal to key demographics in this presidential campaign, including those disillusioned with Harris' stance on Israel's war in Gaza.

The war had divided the party in the run-up to the election, with progressives, Arab Americans and Muslim voters largely rejecting the Biden-Harris administration's continued support for Israel.

Dalia Mogahed, a former research director at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, had warned that Harris' pro-Israel stance could potentially cost her the election.

But she stressed that it would be unfair to blame certain populations for Harris' loss.

“It is the candidate who should earn people’s votes, not feel entitled to them,” Mogahed said.

Still, she feared that after Harris' defeat there might be a tendency to blame. When Trump was first elected in 2016, there was great “liberal sympathy” for Muslim and Arab people who were seen as victims of his policies, Mogahed said.

Trump introduced what critics called the “Muslim ban” in 2017, restricting entry from seven Muslim-majority countries.

But given the major Arab-American and Muslim backlash against Harris' support for Israel, that sympathy may not be there this time, Mogahed warned.

“Muslims could feel very isolated in a second Trump presidency,” she said. “And it will be a very difficult four years for anyone committed to the humanity of the Palestinians.”

For Rasha Mubarak, a Palestinian-American community organizer from Florida, Harris' defeat highlights the Democratic Party's failure to connect with key elements of its base.

“The Democratic Party continues to fail to listen to its voters,” Mubarak said, citing the party’s support for Israel and its lack of commitment to underserved communities.

She pointed out that while Trump also boasts of pro-Israel policies, Democrats like Harris have an opportunity to take action to address humanitarian concerns raised by Israel's war. But they didn't.

“They had the power to impose an arms embargo, but instead chose to continue funding and supporting the genocide against Israel, and now it is the people of this country who will continue to suffer,” Mubarak said.

“But the people have spoken, and this is a message that they will no longer vote for a cleaner, dirty shirt.”

Nellis, the former Harris adviser, emphasized that to be successful in future presidential elections, Democrats must ask themselves: “What can we change about ourselves?”

The truncated nature of Harris' campaign didn't help, Nellis said, but Democrats need to think about the voters they left behind. These include demographics commonly associated with the Republican Party.

“I want to have a serious conversation about how we speak to white men without college degrees and try to bring them back. I want to talk about rural voters. I want to talk about going into hostile areas and trying to win people back,” he said.

Most urgently, he added, “We need to mobilize to fight back and try to stop some of the worst things Trump wants to do.”

What happens now?

Brown, a professor at Georgetown University, predicts that protests in the US after Harris' defeat will not swell as much as they did during Trump's first victory in 2016.

In 2017, the day after Trump's inauguration, thousands of women poured into the streets Washington, DC and other cities with pink hats and feminist slogans. Activists across the country organized anti-Trump “resistance” campaigns.

Brown said there could be some protests this year, although probably not on this scale.

“I've done focus groups with Black women who are the most reliable Democratic voters, and what they share is that they're just exhausted. You are tired. They’re burned out,” Brown said.

The anti-Trump protest has become “more unsafe,” she added. For example, more than 180 people were arrested for protesting Trump's inauguration, and some were charged with rioting — although many of those charges were later dropped.

But Trump has promised revenge against critics and opponents, and many fear the suppression of dissent will be far harsher this time.

“There will be some people who will find ways to resist,” said Gillespie of Emory University. “The big question is: How will Trump react? Does he react with repression?”

Boston University's Vigil pointed to the recent decisions by two leading national newspapers to cancel their Harris endorsements as evidence that even the powerful fear a backlash from Trump.

“Unfortunately, there is a fear that has become (almost) pervasive among business owners, reporters and everyday people,” Vigil said.

She noted that Trump referred to his domestic political opponents as “the enemy within” – and threatened military intervention against them.

“All of this speaks to the movement toward fascism that Harris was right about,” Vigil said. This in turn threatens to dampen any protest.

“Not only are people tired and exhausted and thinking it doesn't matter anymore, but if we don't see rallies like this, I think there will be a fear component.”