Harris concedes before an emotional crowd at her alma mater

Vice President Kamala Harris attempted to allay disappointment and offer words of empowerment to hundreds of supporters as she conceded the presidential election Wednesday, as some of her backers wiped away tears while she spoke.

"The outcome of this election is not what we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for, but hear me when I say ... "the light of America’s promise will always burn bright," Harris said in remarks at her alma mater, Howard University.

Harris offered console to Democrats over the loss to former President Donald Trump, acknowledging they were like "feeling and experiencing a range of emotions right now."

But she stressed that Democrats had to accept the results of the election to preserve democracy. In conceding the race on Wednesday, Harris did something Trump never has.

"Earlier today, I spoke with President-elect Trump and congratulated him on his victory. I also told him that we will help him and his team with their transition, and that we will engage in a peaceful transfer of power," she said, earning a cheer from the crowd.

Harris' concession capped a tumultuous and trying campaign. She abruptly replaced President Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket just 15 weeks before Election Day. Her rival narrowly dodged a would-be assassin’s bullet, followed by a second apparent assassination attempt nine weeks later. And she weathered months of razor-thin polling margins that set the nation on edge.  

Her loss signified a realignment in the Democratic coalition, with Trump and Republicans expanding their reach deeper into new parts of the electorate, including Latinos. That was despite Trump pushing the chaotic, divisive MAGA politics that have come to define the Republican Party since his emergence as a political force in the 2016 election.

Ultimately, Harris was up against serious economic concerns and voters who wanted change, and she could not vanquish the darker tactics of Trump’s movement, which attempted to paint her as unstable, a traitor and a danger to society through a torrent of lies, racist smears and misinformation. Trump himself leaned into violent rhetoric, referring to a shooter firing into reporters covering his rallies or the idea guns being pointed at a former Republican representative-turned-critic if she was sent to war. 

Harris, 60, attempted to thwart those attacks with a message combining joy and grit — imploring audiences to “lift people up” while embracing her career as a hardened prosecutor — and a stark warning: that Trump, 78, would rule the country as an authoritarian.

The electorate responded though, with a decisive win for Trump, amid an economy that is still recovering from Covid and inflation and dissatisfaction with the direction of the country.

The former U.S. senator and attorney general from California, who blazed the trail as the first female vice president, ignited her party upon her entrance into the presidential race. Democrats had been despondent as Biden devolved from ineffective to severely damaged after his lone debate against Trump.

After Biden dropped out and endorsed Harris, Democrats reveled in the change, flooding donation channels and crushing fundraising records. Harris cultivated a forward-looking identity, seeking to disengage from the unpopular president with whom she still served, and the policies that were failing to compel Americans. 

Ultimately though, she may have not disengaged enough.

Harris had put forth policy ambitions that vowed to restore women’s access to abortion and pledged a “care economy” that aids first-time homebuyers, parents of young children and older Americans. Addressing one of the Biden administration’s biggest vulnerabilities with voters, she vowed to be strong on illegal immigration, pledging more resources for border enforcement while promising to streamline the legal morass for asylum-seekers and improve pathways to citizenship.

Reproductive rights were core to her argument. Again and again Harris sought to harness the anger and energy behind Trump driving the demise of Roe v. Wade. In rallies, interviews and advertising, she laid at the former president’s feet the most restrictive state laws in America, calling them “Trump abortion bans.” A lasting image of her sole debate with Trump — where she appeared the more vigorous and disciplined candidate — came when she described a woman suffering from a miscarriage who was denied care in an emergency room as “bleeding out in a parking lot.” 

What Harris did not spotlight was the historic nature of her candidacy, unlike Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign against Trump. But the vice president was well aware of what her election would mean. In an Oct. 22 interview with NBC News, Harris declared the country was “absolutely” ready for a woman to be president and also eager to move beyond an era of division. 

“I am seeing that in terms of every walk of life of our country,” Harris said at the time. “Part of what is important in this election is really not only turning the page, but closing the page and the chapter on an era that suggests that Americans are divided.” 

But many deep in the MAGA movement saw her as a threat, and Harris could not change transcend the deep divisions and polarization that have come to define U.S. elections.

Just a week before the election, standing before an estimated 45,000 supporters at the Ellipse in Washington, with the White House in the backdrop, Harris offered a blatant reminder of the site where Trump spoke on Jan. 6, 2021, in what preceded a violent assault by a mass of his supporters on the U.S. Capitol. 

“America, for too long we have been consumed with too much division, chaos and mutual distrust, and it can be easy then, to forget a simple truth: It doesn’t have to be this way. It doesn’t have to be this way,” Harris said on that crisp autumn evening, in what would be viewed as her closing argument. “It is time to stop pointing fingers. We have to stop pointing fingers and start locking arms. It is time to turn the page on the drama and the conflict, the fear and division. It is time for a new generation of leadership in America, and I am ready to offer that leadership as the next president of the United States of America.” 

An accelerated campaign

Harris arrived at this point after a series of exceptional events. 

The crisis point for Democrats was Biden’s showing at the June 27 debate with Trump. It was Biden who challenged Trump to debate him early. Democrats created an expectation that the president would, for once, put to rest questions about his cognitive health. 

It backfired spectacularly. Biden labored to speak clearly, stared blankly into the distance and was incoherent at times — at one point declaring that Democrats had “finally beat Medicare.” 

While Democrats were in turmoil, Republicans unified after Trump was grazed by a bullet while speaking at an outdoor rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13. While visibly bleeding and with Secret Service surrounding him, Trump pumped his fist in the air and yelled “Fight! Fight! Fight!” creating an immediately iconic image. 

GOP base energy soared and Democrats fretted that the election was all but lost. 

The Biden campaign was skidding off course, setting off an eruption of party panic. One by one, congressional leaders called on Biden to step aside until a critical mass emerged, with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., working behind the scenes to urge his exit. Campaign insiders doubted that a course forward existed as fundraising dried up, severely hampering the necessary scaling-up that comes in the final stretch of a presidential contest.  

With that, Biden on July 21 announced his exit from the race, putting his backing behind Harris. 

In less than a month, a revamped Democratic National Convention played out in Chicago, where an exhilarated party celebrated a Black woman who showed promise in defeating Trump. It was a remarkable resurgence from Harris’ first presidential attempt, when she abandoned her bid for the Democratic nomination before the Iowa caucuses in 2019. 

Harris’ entry transformed the race’s dynamics — literally overnight — expanding the competitive map for Democrats beyond the blue wall states, sending enthusiasm soaring and bringing in scores of volunteers and new voter registrations. Those efforts were powered by a record pace of fundraising that ultimately soared above $1.4 billion.

Suddenly, sleepy events around Biden were gone, and with Harris, the campaign was booking large-scale venues for massive rallies that immediately drew crowds of at least 10,000 in each of the swing states. Harris also brought in star power, with celebrities like Oprah, Bruce Springsteen, John Legend and others lending their influential voices to support her in some way. 

Trump struggled to adjust to his new opponent, growing publicly agitated over her entry and making a series of missteps that caused him to suffer with certain voters. He questioned Harris’ race and threw gender-based attacks at her, struggled in his only debate against her and dove into debunked conspiracy theories that culminated with his declaring that Haitian immigrants in Ohio were eating family pets. 

Memorably, Harris offered a stinging rebuttal to Trump’s insistence on the debate stage that he had won the 2020 election. 

“Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people,” Harris said. “Clearly, he is having a very difficult time processing that."

But Trump managed to connect with working class voters across racial and ethnic groups as well as holding down strong numbers with men.