Donald Trump was elected the 47th President of the United States on Wednesday, after the AP called Wisconsin and the election for the former president, ensuring a stunning political comeback and a return to the Oval Office.
By winning Wisconsin, Trump sailed over the 270 electoral votes he needed to clinch the presidency and victory over Vice President Kamala Harris, and a second non-consecutive term.
Trump and the GOP emerged victorious in the race to run the government’s executive branch after a contentious and blistering populist campaign that saw him air his many grievances about losing the 2020 election to President Joe Biden.
Trump’s campaign was punctuated by the many rulings made against him for multiple legal cases, as well as several attempts against his life. In May, a New York jury found the former (and now future) president guilty of 34 felony counts; he will now be the first president to enter the White House after being found guilty of a felony. Sentencing in the president-elect’s so-called “hush money case” is scheduled for Nov. 26.
While bouncing around the election’s battleground states as he realigned his Make America Great Again movement back to its original form — a presidential campaign — the 78-year-old former president was shot in the ear while speaking at an open-air campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania. Trump recovered quickly and attended the GOP convention in Philadelphia in August, only to learn of a possible second attempt on his life after a gunman was discovered outside one of his golf courses in Florida in September.
Nowhere was Trump’s takeover of the Republican Party more apparent than at the 2024 GOP convention. He handily vanquished Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, as well as his own vice president Mike Pence, his former cabinet member Nikki Haley and other contenders for the party’s nomination. Trump opted out of attending all primary debates and still held a double-digit lead over all challengers throughout his two-year bid.
Trump’s nearly two-year campaign for the 2024 race — he announced his candidacy on Nov. 15, 2022 — continued his aggressive rally style and populist messaging, this time using his rallies as a platform to air grievances about his legal challenges and the 2020 election in front of his loyal followers.
Trump carried on with his lies about the 2020 election, claiming that it was stolen by the Democrats in a so-called “Big Lie” that took hold with his masses. He also steadfastly defended the MAGA supporters who took part in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol as the 2020 vote was being certified by Congress. The financial cost of the president-elect’s lies about the 2020 election teetered toward $1 billion at the end of 2023.
