Lessons From Donald Trump’s Victory, By Emeka Monye

Donald Trump, the son of an immigrant, was born on June 14, 1946, at Jamaica Hospital in Queens, New York City. He is the fourth child of Fred Trump and Mary Anne MacLeod Trump.

He is of German and Scottish descent, Fred his father who was a business, German and Mary, a Scot. He grew up with older siblings Maryanne, Fred Junior, and Elizabeth and younger brother Robert in the Jamaica Estates neighborhood of Queens.

He was born into a privileged background and an elitist class. He attended the private Kew-Forest School through seventh grade and New York Military Academy, a private boarding school, from eighth through twelfth grade.

In 1964, he enrolled at Fordham University. Two years later, he transferred to the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in May 1968 with a Bachelor of Science in economics.

All through his life’s trajectory, Trump had been a business man, an entrepreneur, a media mogul, and a television game show host. He was the host of the once popular American reality television programme,

In 1988 during an interview with television personality, Oprah Winfrey, Trump criticised the American political elites, describing them as lacking in knowledge on how to address the basic issues facing the American state, such as foreign and domestic policies and how he would make America better if he were in the public sector.

Then, he didn’t know he would one day contest for the office of the presidency because when asked by Oprah if he would like to contest for the office of the presidency, he simply waved the idea out with a capital NO.

Eighteen years later, specifically in 2016, Trump decided to offer himself for public office. Of course, he contested the primaries of the Republican Party and won the party’s ticket as its flag bearer. Donald Trump served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021, after he was elected president, winning through the electoral college, after beating Hilary Clinton, former first Lady, his main challenger.

That year, he became the oldest person to have been elected president of the United States, at age 70 years, erasing the records earlier held by Former Republican president, Ronald Reagan who was the holder then when he was elected in 1980 as president of the United States, at age 69. This was however broken in 2020 when Joe Biden was elected in 2020 at age 78.

Trump is brash, frank, focused, determined and a firm believer of his inner conviction. A belief he holds dearly, even in the midst of controversies. Many see him as eccentric and controversial because of his statements bordering on controversies.

During his first time in office, he made a major foreign policy decision, sparking reactions from diplomatic circles, when he gave an executive order to relocate the embassy of the United States in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move which drew the irk of many political commentators and observers.

In the run-up to the 2024 presidential polls, there were two attempts on his life by suspected assassins. The first one was in Pennsylvania where he had gone to address his supporters during one of his campaign trains. He narrowly missed the assassin’s bullet by a whisker. The second attempt was in Florida, still during one of his campaigns. He was fortunate too.

In the build-up to the presidential elections, both candidates, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, played dirty, with  Trump accounting more for the dirtier speeches which oftentimes became messy. Name-calling, etc became the centre points of their campaigns

Although both candidates sometimes deviated from issue-based campaigns, with the candidates attacking their personalities, Donald Trump was more focused on addressing the economic and political issues of the country, including taxes and immigration. At the same time, Kamala focused more on social issues like abortion and LGBTQ-inclusive in society.

She also spent most of her time during the campaign cooking propaganda against Trump, calling him a rapist, sexist, racist and homophobic.

But the American people were only interested in a better economy and reducing the prices of food instead of focusing on issues related to a section of the society, leaving out the meats of the  conversations, which the average American voter wanted to hear.

His dramatic comeback in 2024 polls, after losing out in 2020 to Joe Biden, sends a shock wave to not a few people. Although the election was considered too close to the call, one that came with so much intensity, not many gave Donald Trump the chance to win the election by such a wide margin.

Winning 312 electoral college votes, out of a total of 538 electoral votes, and the popular votes at the same time is no small feat. The victory by the former president makes it the first time that a Republican candidate won the popular vote since George W. Bush in 2004 when he was reelected over John F. Kerry.

The next instance of a Republican winning the popular vote was in 1988  when Bush’s father, George Herbert Bush, won the 1988 election over Michael Dukakis.

Winning the popular vote and the electoral college vote was actually the norm in the 1900s, with each winning candidate having won both in each of the 25 elections from 1900-1996.

That streak lasted until George W. Bush’s first presidential win in 2000 when Bush won the election but lost the popular vote to Al Gore. Making Bush the first president to do so since 1888, when Grover Cleveland won the popular vote, but lost the election to Benjamin Harrison.

Former President Donald Trump’s victory over Vice President Kamala Harris was something quite rare for a Republican candidate to do since the turn of the century, but he did it. Yes he did.  This came as quite a surprise to most Americans and even Trump himself agreed that a Republican winning the popular vote is extremely difficult.

Finally, Donald Trump has gone into history as the only man in America’s political space to have contested against two women at different instances, winning at both occasions. His victory against them is also a clear manifestation that the American state is not yet ready for a female president.

*Emeka Monye Is A Journalist And Works With ARISE News*