I would be sceptical of post-election analyses in the wake of what is seen as a shock result. For both sides, voting patterns at this point are a sort of Rorschach test – people will see what they want to see. What I offer here is a mix of instinct and conjecture (what’s new, I hear you ask). But it is based on one specific factor that doesn’t come as a shock, and which was predicted to harm the Kamala Harris campaign. We can be certain that the Democrats lost voters because of Gaza. The numbers are stark. Another certainty is that those voters will still not be heard.
In Dearborn, Michigan, the largest majority Arab American city, Joe Biden won in 2020 with around 70% of the vote. Early stats indicate that Harris received something like 40% of the vote. As concerns over the war were raised loudly and specifically, Harris not only continued to ignore and isolate these voices, but also the campaign sent Bill Clinton out to shush them. Harris never even visited the city. But guess who did? That’s right, Donald Trump. And now he’s won in Dearborn and taken all of Michigan.
“Even if he will continue this genocide at a 99% chance,” one voter who cast her ballot for Trump said, “I’m going to take that 1% chance that he’s going to stop it, as opposed to the 100% chance that it’s going to continue under Harris.”
That sentiment perfectly encapsulates a sense of a political dead end that has developed over the past year. The Democrats promised to provide stability and protect a status quo threatened by a volatile opponent, but with that promise of continuity came the certainty that nothing was going to change. Yet in relation to the war in Gaza and Lebanon, nothing changing was, to many, not an........