In the end, Donald Trump’s 2024 election victory was decided by Wisconsin, just as it was eight years ago in the presidential race against Hillary Clinton.
Clinton was the favorite to take the White House in 2016 and her defeat sent shockwaves around the country and the world.
This year’s results and how election night played out don’t just resemble the 2016 race – it was almost identical.
Republican pollster Frank Luntz said just six days ago that the 2024 presidential election reminded him “so much of 2016.”
“I think there are a lot of similarities, right now, between this campaign and that campaign,” Luntz told CNN’s Sara Sidner. “The divisions in the country were significant back then, people didn’t think Trump had a chance back then. He’s been gaining and gaining.”
In 2016, it was a landslide for Trump, who won the Electoral College with 304 votes compared to Clinton’s 227. As America looks at the map for the 2024 election, it sits at 295 for Trump and 226 for Vice President Kamala Harris – with Nevada and Arizona still to be called.
The 2024 map – minus the yet-to-be-called states – looks nearly identical to the 2016 version, except for a split vote in Nebraska in 2024.
Trump, in both 2016 and 2024, won battleground states Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Those were states Joe Biden captured in 2020 to secure his win.
The similarities between Clinton’s and Harris’s 2024 campaigns don’t just extend to the map.
Eight years ago, Clinton appeared to have momentum after an Election Day Eve star-studded rally in North Carolina, with performances from Bon Jovi and Lady Gaga. It mirrored the scenes of Harris in Philadelphia, supported by Gaga again, Oprah Winfrey and Katy Perry.
Election Night 2024 started off in the same way it did eight years ago. Around 7 p.m. on Election Day, Kentucky and Indiana called for Trump, while Vermont was called for Harris. The same states and the same results were also called first in the 2016 race.
I didn’t take long for the red mirage to come into focus in both races.
JD Vance’s home state of Ohio – which was a swing state back then – was called for Trump this year at approximately the same time it turned red eight years ago, at 10:35 p.m. Clinton had made progress in the final weeks of the race in the Buckeye State, but it wasn’t enough.
Harris was never projected to take Ohio, but following the furor over baseless Republican rumors about Haitian migrants “eating people’s pets,” there may have been hopes it could have helped the Democrats. It didn’t.
By 11p.m in 2016, Trump’s path to the White House was much clearer than the Democrat’s, as it was last night.
At 10:50 p.m. in 2016, Trump picked up 29 electoral votes by gaining the then-swing state of Florida in a stunning surprise. This year Trump coasted to victory in the Sunshine state by 8 p.m. on Tuesday night.
The battleground state of Pennsylvania, which, according to the polls, was within Harris’s reach, was called for Trump at 1:35a.m in 2016. That monumental call came in just after 2 a.m. on Wednesday this year.
Not long after, Clinton’s campaign manager, John Podesta, urged supporters to “get the votes counted” and “bring this home.” Jen O’Malley, chair of the Harris campaign, felt the need to send an optimistic memo between 10 and 11 p.m. to calm nerves.
“While we continue to see data trickle in from the Sun Belt states, we have known all along that our clearest path to 270 electoral votes lies through the Blue Wall states,” O’Malley said. “And we feel good about what we’re seeing.”
At the Harris watch party at Howard University in Washington DC Tuesday night, campaign senior adviser Cedric Richmond said the vice president would not speak as the results rolled in.
“This has bad echoes of the Javits Center, New York in 2016 where Hillary Clinton didn’t address her supporters, and just sent her chief of staff to tell everyone to go home,” journalist Jon Sopel and The Independent’s columnist said before the result was confirmed. “Not a good look.”
Eight years ago, at 2:29 a.m., the state of Wisconsin was called for Trump, and it was all over. Just as it was on Tuesady at 5:30 a.m. when he gained the state’s 10 electoral votes, pushing him past the 270 mark.
By 2:50 a.m. Clinton had called Trump to officially concede and congratulate him on the win and he took to the stage in New York to declare victory soon after. Harris didn’t concede until after this year, but Trump wasted no time taking a victory lap around 3 a.m.
In the early hours of Wednesday morning there were scenes of jubilation at Trump’s West Palm Beach HQ as the Republican stood on stage and claimed the win even before the Wisconsin result came in.
As the Trump campaign relives the joy of eight years ago, how the night has unfolded will no doubt bring back difficult memories for Clinton, and the Democrats.