Donald Trump returns to the White House

This year, Trump claims victory after a final five months of a campaign that included his felony convictions on 34 charges related to hush money payments to a porn star; being shot in the ear by a would-be assassin during a campaign rally, the first of two attempts on his life; and a July change at the top of the Democratic ticket a week later that made the contest significantly more competitive than it appeared earlier in the summer, when Trump was facing Joe Biden. Trump ultimately succeeded in portraying Harris as an extension of an administration that was widely unpopular with Americans, hurling crass personal attacks at Harris and framing her as even more unqualified for the job than an aging Biden while lacing into her past positions in favor of “Medicare for All,” taxpayer-funded gender transition care for prisoners and detained immigrants, cutting funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and banning fracking. Trump’s victory cements his now decadelong grip on the Republican Party, transforming the GOP under him into a more nativist, less interventionist, more working class and more ethnically diverse party. Trump has called for mass deportations, a wide array of tax cuts and for imposing stiffer foreign tariffs.