The popular vote has been counted and Donald Trump has won the 2024 election. Our 47th US President has 2 impeachment attempts, an insurrection, and 34 felony charges. Depending on state law, felons are not allowed to vote or join the military, but this election has set the precedence that they can be president and commander in chief.
270 electoral votes are needed in order to win the presidential election. Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada were the swing states that the outcome of this election relied on. All of these states went red, having Trump win with 312 electoral votes compared to Kamala Harris´s 226 votes.
Republicans won control of the U.S. Senate, and as of this report also won the house majority, giving republicans control of the Congress.
Here are some of Trump’s proposed policies and what he has promised on the campaign trail.
Trump has described his energy plan as “drill baby drill” and has promised to dismantle “Democrat’s green new scam”. He also intends to end subsidies provided by a landmark climate bill that was passed in 2022. Although this is concerning, considering Florida and Appalachia were just hit with 2 huge hurricanes and it’s 70 degrees in November, most experts say that these laws likely will not be repealed as most of the investments and jobs are in rural Republican areas.
Trump also consistently promised higher tariffs in order to ¨make China pay”, proposing a 60% or higher tariff on all Chinese goods, however this burden would not ¨make China pay¨. Tariffs are essentially a sales tax, meaning the person purchasing pays them. These higher tariffs will increase prices for consumers. We are already seeing the effects of these proposed tariffs; many companies are not doing holiday bonuses in order to buy extra stock in preparation for higher prices.
Of course, a huge part of Trump’s campaign was immigration, in the last couple of years, immigration into the U.S. has been increasing exponentially. Trump has proposed the largest deportation of immigrants ever – including detention camps, thousands of more border agents, funneling military spending towards the border, and denaturalizing immigrants. This proposed deportation plan is on top of his spoken want to invoke the Alien Enemies Act from 1798 to expel suspected members of drug cartels and criminal gangs without a court hearing. Trump has not said how any of this would be implemented or where he would get the funding
Trump has a unique health policy. He has promised to let anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr – a man who believes vaccines cause autism and supports ending the fluoridation of public water – “go wild” with his health administration. Trump has denied that he wants a nationwide abortion ban and says he would veto it if it passed onto his desk, but he also refuses to codify the historic abortion protection bill Roe v Wade in the nation’s constitution or make it more accessible to those in affected states. Most experts say that Trump will not be able to repeal Obamacare, instead predicting that he will loosen regulations on insurance companies, Vice president elect J.D. Vance wants to implement risk based insurance, making insurance much more expensive for anyone who is more likely to get sick (including the elderly and chronically ill)
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to close the Department of Education, which has been around since 1979, saying that it is, “a waste of taxpayer dollars” and that it “indoctrinates children”. The Department of Education is essential in making education accessible, providing funding for Title One schools. Title one schools are schools with a high percentage of low income students, including our school. The Department of Education also helps with student loan relief through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program (aka income-based repayment plans). It will be difficult to dismantle this department as many of its functions are essential. He may however be able to defund any programs that try and teach critical race theory, or gender ideology,
These are both incredibly vague terms that could be used to get rid of comprehensive English, history, and especially sex ed courses. Critical race theory is teaching that racism is embedded into our system and that systemic bias should be accounted for. Banning teaching critical race theory would make it nearly impossible to teach a significant portion of history and countless books in English classes as these topics are impossible to discuss without talking about how someone’s race affects their experiences.
New Yorkers did voted to instate prop 1 which reinforces our state constitution, adding abortion rights to it and expanding anti discrimination laws for discrimination based on age, nationality, sexuality, disabilities, gender identity, and gender expression.
