Donald Trump 2024 presidential campaign

Donald Trump, who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021, announced his campaign for the 2024 U.S. presidential election on November 15, 2022. After he won a landslide victory in the 2024 Iowa Republican presidential caucuses, Trump was generally described as being the Republican Party's presumptive nominee. He was officially nominated on July 15, 2024, at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, when he also announced JD Vance, a junior U.S. Senator from Ohio, as the nominee for vice president. The two initially faced off against the presumptive Democratic Party ticket of incumbent President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. However, on July 21, 2024, Biden withdrew from the race, and Harris became the Democratic presidential nominee, choosing Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate.
Trump's campaign issues included: initiating a mass deportation of illegal immigrants; pursuing an isolationist "America First" foreign policy agenda; repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act; pursuing an anti-clean energy platform; shutting down multiple departments for "bureaucratic waste", implementing anti-transgender policies; and pursuing what has been described as a neomercantilist trade agenda. His campaign proposed expanding the authority of the executive branch over the federal government, which would be accomplished through the imposition of a spoils system via Schedule F, and directing the U.S. Department of Justice to go after political enemies. It also received significant media attention for its close connections to The Heritage Foundation's Project 2025, a playbook criticized for recommending an authoritarian state. Trump has distanced himself from Project 2025.
Throughout his campaign, Trump made numerous false and misleading statements, used anti-immigrant, incendiary rhetoric and promoted conspiracy theories. Several of his attacks against his opponent, Harris, were considered a breaking of political norms. Beginning as early as Veterans Day in November 2023, Trump espoused authoritarian rhetoric. He used insulting language against his political opponents, and his 2024 campaign regularly espoused anti-immigrant nativism and anti-transgender fearmongering. Trump's embrace of right wing populism, though taken a bit far and harsh rhetoric against political enemies was described by historians and scholars as populist, authoritarian, and unlike anything a political candidate has ever said in American history. A few news sources have also accused Donald Trump of fascist ideals.
The campaign unfolded as Trump faced the legal consequences of four criminal indictments filed against him in 2023, as well as a civil investigation of the Trump Organization in New York. In May 2024, a jury in New York found Trump guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, making him the first former U.S. president to be convicted of a crime. His campaign promoted false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him, coming in the wake of Trump's unprecedented attempts to overturn that election and its culmination in the January 6 United States Capitol attack, described by many as an attempted coup d'état or self-coup. Trump publicly embraced the January 6 attack and, during his campaign, repeatedly promised to pardon those charged for their involvement. Trump survived two assassination attempts during the campaign, one in July 2024, and a second the following September.
On November 5, 2024, Trump and Vance were elected president and vice president of the United States, winning all seven swing states for a cumulative 312 electoral votes to Harris' 226. Trump is the oldest person to be elected to the presidency. He also became the second president to serve a non-consecutive term after Grover Cleveland.
Trump, the incumbent president, sought election to a second consecutive term in the 2020 United States presidential election, losing to Democratic nominee Joe Biden. He refused to concede the loss and claimed that the election was stolen. Trump and his allies in seven key states then allegedly devised a plot to create and submit fraudulent certificates of ascertainment that falsely asserted Trump had won the electoral college vote in those states. The intent was to pass the fraudulent certificates to Mike Pence to count them rather than the authentic certificates and overturn Joe Biden's victory. Trump reportedly had been considering a 2024 presidential run immediately after his loss in the election if the plot failed to "work out". In the week of November 9, 2020, Trump indicated to Republican Party senator Kevin Cramer: "If this doesn't work out, I'll just run again in four years." Later, a group of Trump's supporters attacked the United States Capitol building to prevent the election results from being certified.
With one week remaining in his presidency, Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives for incitement of insurrection for his actions during the January 6, 2021, Capitol Hill attack, but was acquitted in the Senate with a bipartisan 57–43 vote in favor of conviction, which fell short of the two-thirds supermajority (67 out of 100 senators) required.
In July 2022, as the public hearings of the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack were progressing, Trump was reportedly considering making an early announcement of his 2024 candidacy. On July 14, 2022, Intelligencer published an interview with Trump, based upon which they reported that Trump had already made up his mind, and was just deciding when to declare. Following the August 2022 FBI search of Mar-a-Lago, many of Trump's allies urged that he announce his candidacy sooner, including some who had previously advised that he defer an announcement until after the mid-term elections. During a rally in Iowa in the run-up to the 2022 United States midterm elections, Trump stated, "in order to make our country successful and safe and glorious, I will very, very, very probably do it again", indicating that he might announce his candidacy soon thereafter, prompting speculation that he would announce as soon as the week of November 14, 2022.
After months of speculation, Trump announced his candidacy for president in a November 15, 2022, speech to supporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. His announcement received wide media coverage and a mixed response from both Democrats and Republicans. Some Democrats warily welcomed the campaign, viewing Trump as beatable, while others opposed it, citing negative effects it could have on U.S. democracy. Some Republicans, consisting mostly of Trump supporters, welcomed the campaign, while others (including many Republican elected officials) opposed it, viewing Trump as a weak and beatable candidate who had cost the Republicans the past several election cycles.
In August 2023, Trump was indicted separately both by the federal government and the state of Georgia on numerous criminal conspiracy and fraud charges he is alleged to have committed along with co-conspirators during efforts to illegally change and overturn the results of the lost 2020 presidential election. The indictments allege that Trump engaged in a criminal conspiracy to illegally alter the results of the 2020 election via fraudulent electors in the Trump fake electors plot as well as pressuring government officials to illegally change vote tallies during incidents such as the Trump–Raffensperger phone call. Prior to these indictments on charges relating to Attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election, on March 30, 2023, Trump was also indicted for 34 felony counts of fraud stemming from his alleged role in falsifying business records related to hush money payments made to pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels during his 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign. Trump called his indictment political persecution and election interference. Later, on June 8, Trump was indicted by a federal grand jury for allegedly improperly retaining classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence and destroying evidence related to the government probe. In addition to the four criminal indictments brought against Trump in Georgia, Washington, Florida, and New York, on May 9, Trump was found liable in a civil lawsuit for sexual abuse and defamation against journalist E. Jean Carroll. Trump said that he will appeal the decision, describing it to be "unconstitutional silencing" and "political persecution."
On May 30, 2024, Trump was convicted of 34 felonies related to hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels in an attempt to influence the 2016 presidential election. He is the first former U.S. president to be convicted of a crime in American history.
In the lead up to the 2024 election, former President Trump and the Republican Party have expressed concerns regarding the electoral process, making unfounded claims of voting fraud and indicating intentions to contest the election results should Trump not emerge victorious. The statements are part of a broader trend of election denial within the Republican party regarding the integrity of elections in the United States.
On November 15, 2022, Trump announced his candidacy at Mar-a-Lago in an hour-long speech. The announcement came one week after the 2022 mid-term elections in which Trump-endorsed candidates underperformed non-Trump-endorsed candidates. His announcement speech had at least "20 false and misleading claims", uttering the first inaccurate claim "about two minutes in and a few minutes later, tick(ing) off at least four hyperbolic claims about his own accomplishments". The New York Times Fact Check stated that "Mr. Trump repeated many familiar exaggerations about his own achievements, reiterated misleading attacks on political opponents and made dire assessments that were at odds with reality."
The New York Post mocked Trump's announcement by relegating it to page 26 and noting it on the cover with a banner reading "Florida Man Makes Announcement". The article referred to Mar-a-Lago as "Trump's classified-documents library" in reference to the ongoing investigation regarding Trump's alleged improper handling of classified materials which he had brought to Mar-a-Lago following his presidency for as yet unclear reasons.
The announcement was attended by comedian Alex Stein, consultant Roger Stone, businessman Mike Lindell, outgoing Representative Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), former deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought, political advisor Jason Miller, attorney Kash Patel, political analyst Sebastian Gorka, and political aide Hogan Gidley. The Insider noted "many members of Congress were not in attendance", including Matt Gaetz. Family members who attended included Trump's wife and former first lady Melania, Trump's sons Barron and Eric, Eric's wife Lara, and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner. His daughters Ivanka and Tiffany did not attend the announcement party; Ivanka said she would not be engaging in politics going forward and would not be a part of her father's presidential bid. Trump's son Donald Trump Jr. also did not attend. Stan Fitzgerald, president of Veterans for America First, attended.
On July 18, 2024, former President Trump formally accepted the GOP nomination for the presidency in a one-and-a-half-hour speech on the final day of the Republican National Convention.
A central campaign theme for Trump's second presidential bid is "retribution", in the sense that "America has been wronged and Trump will make America great.". Trump announced the theme during his March 2023 speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), stating "In 2016, I declared, 'I am your voice.' Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution. I am your retribution." Trump framed the 2024 election as "the final battle," and openly promised to leverage the power of the presidency for political reprisals.
The Trump campaign has been noted for its close connections to The Heritage Foundation's Project 2025, a right-wing presidential transition plan and policy proposal for the Trump campaign. Trump denied knowing of Project 2025, labeling some of the proposals as "absolutely ridiculous" and "seriously extreme". Other think-tanks and policy groups aligned with Trump include the Center for Renewing America, the America First Policy Institute, and America First Legal. Trump's campaign has stated Trump will have the final say on which policies are implemented. They were specifically advised on public policy by Steve Bannon, David Bernhardt, Kellyanne Conway, Richard Grenell, Tom Homan, Sean Hannity, Kevin Hassett, Brandon Judd, Kieth Kellog, Larry Kudlow, Robert Lighthizer, Stephen Miller, Stephen Moore, John Ratcliffe, Russel Vought, and Matt Whitaker, though none of them were formally part of the campaign itself. Vince Haley was officially responsible for overseeing the team developing the campaign’s policy proposals.
Trump's platform calls for the vast expansion of presidential powers and the executive branch. In campaign speeches, Trump stated that he would centralize government power under his authority, replace career federal civil service employees with political loyalists, and use the military for domestic law enforcement and the deportation of immigrants. In Trump v. United States, Trump has argued that the Constitution allows for absolute immunity for all presidential actions taken—even if criminal—unless the Senate successfully votes to impeach.
Trump has called to bring independent agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Trade Commission under direct presidential control. Trump's allies have drafted an executive order requiring all independent agencies to submit actions to the White House for review. Trump has called for presidential authority to 'impound' funds for Congressionally appropriated programs, a practice which was outlawed under President Richard Nixon. Trump promised to order the Justice Department to investigate political rivals and Joe Biden, and fire Attorneys General who disobeyed him. According to the New York Times, Trump has called for stripping employment protections for thousands of career civil service employees and replacing them with political loyalists if deemed an 'obstacle to his agenda' within federal agencies, the United States Intelligence Community, State Department, and Department of Defense. Trump has proposed instituting a new civil service test of his own creation to test the loyalty of federal workers. Trump has promised to crack down on whistleblowers who are shielded by law and create an independent body to "monitor" intelligence agencies.
Trump's plan to expand presidential powers is based largely on a controversial and not widely-held interpretation of the constitution known as the unitary executive theory. The theory rejects the notion of the separation of powers and that the government is composed of three separate branches but that Article Two of the United States Constitution gives the President absolute authority. The theory is noted to be in line with Trump's thinking owing to comments made in 2019, where he stated "I have an Article 2, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president." Such proposals would be carried out via the reintroduction of Schedule F that was originally introduced at the end of Trump's former presidency, which would strip civil service protections of tens of thousands of civil servants to be at-will appointments filled with Trump loyalists identified by Project 2025 of The Heritage Foundation. The reforms have been described as a reimposition of the Jacksonian spoils system. Trump has stated his intention to see these reforms completed in order to root out the "deep state", stating: "We will expel the warmongers from our government. We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the communists, Marxists and fascists. And we will throw off the sick political class that hates our country." His proposal has been widely criticized as dangerous for democracy and likely to result in dysfunction through more bad hiring decisions, with his first administration setting the record for the highest turnover rate in any administration.
Trump and his allies have reportedly drafted executive orders to invoke the Insurrection Act on the first day of his presidency to allow the military to shut down civil demonstrations against him. Campaigning in Iowa, Trump stated he would deploy the military in Democratic cities and states. The Insurrection Act would be used to allow the military to detain migrants at the southern border. Trump has suggested overriding the Posse Comitatus Act.
Trump has been noted by analysts' for attempting to strike a middle ground on abortion despite previously calling himself "the most pro-life president ever", and taking credit for having appointed the Supreme Court justices responsible for the overturning of Roe v. Wade. On April 8, 2024, Trump reiterated that he was "proudly responsible" for overturning Roe v. Wade, but supported leaving the issue of abortion for the states to decide. Trump has stated he would allow red states to monitor women's pregnancies and prosecute those who violate abortion bans.
In September 2023, Trump did not state whether or not he supported a 15-week abortion ban, stating "I'm not going to say I would or I wouldn't," but stated that Ron DeSantis' six-week abortion ban was "terrible" and later criticized Arizona's near total ban on abortion. In March 2024, Trump stated he was leaning towards a 15-week national abortion ban with exceptions, acknowledging that "you have to win elections".
Trump had vehemently opposed abortion throughout his political career. During his 2016 campaign, he stated that women should be punished for having an abortion, and claimed he would appoint pro-life justices to the Supreme Court. In January 2017, Trump reinstated and expanded the Mexico City policy, which blocks U.S. federal funding for foreign non-governmental organizations that provide abortions or referrals for abortion services, or that advocate for the decriminalization of abortion. In January 2020, he became the first president to speak in person at the anti-abortion March for Life rally, saying "unborn children have never had a stronger defender in the White House".
On June 24, 2022, Trump claimed credit for appointing the justices responsible for the Dobbs decision. On May 17, 2023, Trump took credit for ending Roe, stating on Truth Social, "After 50 years of failure, with nobody coming even close, I was able to kill Roe v. Wade, much to the 'shock' of everyone, and for the first time put the Pro Life movement in a strong negotiating position over the Radicals that are willing to kill babies even into their 9th month, and beyond. Without me there would be no 6 weeks, 10 weeks, 15 weeks, or whatever is finally agreed to. Without me the pro-Life movement would have just kept losing. Thank you President TRUMP!!!" During a Fox News town hall held in January 2024, Trump reiterated his opposition to Ron DeSantis and Florida's six-week abortion ban. He also deflected questions on how he would vote on Florida's abortion referendum.
Asked twice during a television interview about whether he supported restrictions on contraception, Trump stated he was "looking at that" and would release a policy on contraception "very shortly", and further commented: "Things really do have a lot to do with the states and some states are going to have different policies than others". Following criticism, Trump backtracked and stated he would "never advocate" to restrict birth control but did not recant his suggestion of possibly allowing states to restrict them. Trump has previously stated he felt "very strongly" about the 19th-century Comstock Act that prohibits the mailing of mifepristone, birth control and other abortion medications and that he would make a statement on the issue.
Trump's economic proposals heavily feature protective tariffs and presents them as a solution to almost all of America's problems, from childcare, deficit reduction, economic growth, and supply chains. Trump has stated he views his proposals as economic nationalism and has praised William McKinley. Trump's stated trade policy involves the United States decoupling from the global economy and having the country become more self-contained and exerting its power through individual trade dealings. Trump's proposed changes have been roundly criticized for the negative impact on American jobs, price increases, global alliances damaged, and the potential for a global trade war. One non-partisan analysis estimated the proposed tariffs would cost $1,700 per year for the average household. Trump has called for a universal baseline tariff of 10% to 20% on all imports, with increased penalties if trade partners manipulate their currency or engage in unfair trade practices. Trump has also called for 100% tariffs on cars made outside the U.S. and a minimum 60% tariff on Chinese goods.
Trump stated his plans to urge Congress to pass a "Trump Reciprocal Trade Act" to bestow presidential authority to impose a reciprocal tariff on any country that imposed one on the United States. Trump's policies have been described as protectionist, neomercantilist or autarkist. Trump's trade policies are noted to be aimed against China. The Washington Post reported in January 2024 that Trump was preparing for a "massive trade war" with China. Trump has proposed a four-year plan to phase out Chinese imports of essential goods such as electronics, steel, and pharmaceuticals. Trump proposes forcing Chinese owners to sell any holdings "that jeopardize America's national security", and ban Chinese holding of vital infrastructure in the energy, technology, and agricultural sectors, among others.
Trump has stated his intention to institute anti-regulatory policies and cut back on regulations he believes stifle job creation. Trump has stated he intends to institute further individual tax cuts and corporate tax cuts beyond his prior 2017 tax cuts. The Economist says an extension would worsen America's "dire fiscal trajectory". Trump has argued that keeping taxes low for the wealthy increases job creation. Trump has suggested eliminating the income tax and replacing it with an "all-tariff policy". Analysis of the plan indicated it would create a regressive tax system that would disproportionately increase prices for lower and middle class households and benefit the wealthy.
By October 2024, Reuters reported that Trump was "rolling out a new tax-cut proposal about once a week in an unusual rush in the final stretch of the campaign to sway voters" but with "little acknowledgment of the fiscal cost to be paid down the road". Trump has suggested eliminating federal taxes on tips in an attempt to appeal to working class voters. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimated the plan would lead to a $150 to $250 billion loss in federal revenue over the next ten years, and some critics on the left and right claimed it would offer little relief to workers and potentially lead to increased taxes on "everyone else". Trump has also stated that he would eliminate federal income tax on social security income for seniors, ending double taxation on US citizens living abroad, and proposed making car loan interest fully tax deductible.
On April 15, 2024, Politico reported that economic advisors close to Trump have drafted plans to devalue the US dollar if elected to a second term. The plan would aim to reduce the trade deficit and make US exports cheaper, but would also increase inflation, invite retaliation from other countries and threaten the dollar's role as the world's dominant reserve currency.
On April 26, 2024, The Wall Street Journal reported Trump allies plan on greatly limiting the independence of the Federal Reserve should Trump win the election. Of particular note were plans to allow the president to directly set interest rates, remove Chair Jerome Powell before his term expires in 2026, and subject the Fed to oversight from the OMB. Trump stated in a press conference in August 2024 at Mar-a-Lago that he "[feels] the president should have at least [a] say in there" with respect to Federal Reserve interest rate decisions. Trump-aligned Project 2025 also plans for dismantling the Department of Commerce.
Increasing inflation has become a more common critique of Trump's economic plans. In June 2024, 16 Nobel Prize in Economics laureates signed an open letter arguing that Trump's fiscal and trade policies coupled with efforts to limit the Federal Reserve's independence would reignite an inflation surge in the United States. Most economists surveyed by the WSJ in July 2024 found that inflation would be worse under Trump compared to Biden, due in part to tariffs, a crackdown on illegal immigration, and larger federal budget deficits. In October 2024, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, "a nonpartisan group that seeks lower deficits, found that Mr. Trump's various plans could add as much as $15 trillion to the nation's debt over a decade. That is nearly twice as much as the economic plans being proposed by Vice President Kamala Harris", per the New York Times.
Trump has pledged to terminate the Department of Education, claiming it has been infiltrated by "radical zealots and Marxists", but also pledged to exert influence over local school districts and universities by giving funding preference to schools that abolish teacher tenure, adopt merit pay, and allow the direct election of school principals by parents. Trump has said that he would refuse to fund any school with a mask or vaccine mandate. Trump has stated his support for teachers to carry concealed weapons, and to provide funding to allow schools to hire armed guards. Trump has said he will require universities to "defend American tradition and Western civilization" and purge diversity programs.
Trump has stated his intention to promote prayer in public schools, and stated he will fight for "patriotic education" that will "teach students to love their country, not to hate their country like they're taught right now" and will promote "the nuclear family" including "the roles of mothers and fathers" and the "things that make men and women different and unique". Trump has stated he will cut federal funding for programs that include "critical race theory, gender ideology, or other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content onto our children". Trump has stated he will allow public funds to be used for private religious instruction.
The Trump campaign has advocated universal school choice to allow parents to send their children to public, private, or religious schools, arguing that they should be empowered to choose the best education option for their children. In October 2024, Trump supported universal school choice, asserting that school choice is the “civil-rights issue of our age.”
Trump has also proposed an "American Academy", a free online university open to all Americans to be funded by taxes on endowments of universities that have large endowments.
Trump is running on a climate change denial platform. Trump has repeatedly referred to his energy policy under the mantra "drill, baby, drill", or "drill, drill, drill", and has promised to increase oil drilling on public lands and offer tax breaks to oil, gas, and coal producers. Trump has stated his goal for the U.S. to have the lowest cost of electricity and energy of any country in the world.
Trump has promised to rollback electric vehicle initiatives and rescind proposed EPA tailpipe emission limits that would require 54% of new vehicles to be electric by 2030. Trump has proposed leaving the Paris Climate Accords, ending wind subsidies, and eliminating regulations targeting incandescent lightbulbs, gas stoves, dishwashers and shower heads. Trump has draft executive orders to pull the United States out of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Trump previously rescinded over 125 environmental rules and policies designed to reduce planet-warming emissions during his previous presidency. Plans drafted by the Heritage Foundation as part of Project 2025 promise the "rescinding of all funds not already spent" by the Inflation Reduction Act, slashing funding for the Environmental Protection Agency, and closing the Energy Department's renewable energy offices. Trump has said he will end all federal policies that support electric vehicles and add a 100% tariff on electric vehicles imported from Mexico, and will halt all offshore wind energy projects "on day one" of his presidency.
Trump campaign spokespersons have stated that Trump would repeal a climate disclosure rule approved by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in March 2024 requiring disclosure of climate risks, climate risk management policies, and carbon footprint accounting by public companies, and also reinstate a rule promulgated during his administration requiring fiduciaries in proxy voting under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to consider pecuniary interests only and not environmental, social, and corporate governance factors in investments for 401(k)s that was rescinded by the Employee Benefits Security Administration during the Biden administration under Executive Order 13990.
Trump has made varied statements over the years about his belief in climate change. Between 2011 and 2015, Trump made a total of 115 tweets expressing climate change denial. During his initial 2016 campaign, Trump stated that climate change was a hoax, that China was using the myth of climate change to gain an advantage over the United States, and that environmentalists were using the phrase climate change because global warming did not stick. In an October, 2018 interview with 60 Minutes, Trump stated that he did not deny climate change and that something was changing, but doubted it was being caused by mankind and speculated it was part of a natural cycle and could "go back", and that scientists have a political agenda. In January, 2019, Trump mocked a Defense Department report outlining climate change's effects by pointing to a major winter storm at the time. In September 2020, Trump stated that he believed humans played a small role in causing climate change. However, in an interview with Fox in March 2022, Trump stated again that climate change was a hoax, and that the climate naturally fluctuated and mentioned concerns of global cooling in the 1920s. In November, 2022, Trump repeated claims on the campaign trail ridiculing efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Green New Deal, and incorrectly stated that the effects of climate change would not happen for another 200 to 300 years. During his 2024 presidential run, Trump has repeated that human-caused climate change is fake, and has made false claims that whale deaths are caused by wind turbines. Trump has not officially stated how he will deal with climate change if reelected to the White House.
In June 2024, S&P Global reported that gasoline prices would have effects on the 2024 presidential election given that petroleum prices increased due to Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, citing a study published in 2016 found a negative correlation between gasoline prices and presidential approval.
In September 2024, Trump said that America's allies "treat us actually worse than our so-called enemies". He added, "We protect them and then they screw us on trade. We're not going to let it happen anymore". He vowed to impose tariffs on trade partners, which economists said could spark trade wars.
Trump promised to "fundamentally reevaluate" NATO's purpose and mission. During his first term as president, Trump repeatedly denigrated NATO, and suggested withdrawing the US from the alliance. Trump had said that defending an ally would depend on whether they "fulfilled their obligations to us", called the European Union a "foe" because of "what they do to us in trade", and questioned the value of alliances. Thierry Breton claimed that in January 2020 during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Trump told Ursula von der Leyen that "if Europe is under attack, we will never come to help you," and that "NATO is dead, and we will leave," along with claims that Germany owed America $400 billion for defense. On January 10, 2024, Trump said that "NATO has taken advantage of our country" and he would only support allies "if they treat us properly". Trump tried to withdraw troops from Germany at the end of his presidency due to his anger at then-Chancellor Angela Merkel, but the order was rescinded by President Biden. Trump suggested withdrawing troops from South Korea if it does not pay more to support U.S. troops there.
NATO members are obliged to defend any other member who is attacked, under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. It has only been invoked once, in response to the September 11 attacks against the US. During a February 2024 rally, Trump said he would not defend a NATO ally if they did not meet the alliance's target of spending 2% of GDP on defense, and instead he would "encourage" Russia to "do whatever the hell they want". NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg responded: "Any suggestion that allies will not defend each other undermines all of our security, including that of the U.S., and puts American and European soldiers at increased risk". Trump reiterated his stance a few days later, saying "if they're not going to pay, we're not going to protect". NATO estimated that 23 of its 32 members would meet its spending target by the end of 2024.
On the Russo-Ukrainian War, Trump vowed that even before he is inaugurated, he will negotiate an end to the war in a day, stop the "endless flow of American treasure to Ukraine", and make Europeans reimburse the U.S. the cost of rebuilding its old stockpiles. In June 2024, Trump described Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as "maybe the greatest salesman of any politician that's ever lived ... Every time he comes to our country, he walks away with $60 billion ... It never ends ... I will have that settled prior to taking the White House as president-elect". However, it was pointed out that most of the money for Ukraine actually goes to American factories and workers who make weapons and military equipment. Trump previously said he might recognize Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea, and suggested the 2022 invasion could have been prevented by Ukraine giving up parts of its own country to Russia.
Retired Lieutenant General Keith Kellogg and Frederick H. Fleitz, who both served in Trump's National Security Council staff, presented Trump with a detailed peace plan to end Russia's war in Ukraine. The plan aims to force the two sides into peace talks and a ceasefire based on the current frontlines. If Ukraine refused to enter peace talks, weapons supplies would be stopped; if Russia refused peace talks, weapons supplies to Ukraine would be increased. Fleitz said Trump responded favorably to the plan. Kellogg told Reuters: "Our concern is that this has become a war of attrition that's going to kill a whole generation of young men."
Trump brought in more pro-Israel policies than any president before. He presented himself as a stronger defender of Israel, and is seen as less sympathetic to Palestine than Biden or Harris. He vowed to continue supporting Israel in the Israel–Hamas war, and said that Israel must "finish the problem". Trump is expected to continue arming Israel, likely with "no strings attached" for humanitarian concerns. He promised to ban Gaza residents from entering the US. Trump said his government would "crush" pro-Palestinian protests, deport pro-Palestinian demonstrators, and "set the movement back 25 or 30 years". At times, he has also been critical of Israel's war in Gaza, saying Israel should "get it over with ... get back to peace and stop killing people".
Trump promised a tougher stance against China than Biden, but has also questioned whether the U.S. should defend ally Taiwan.
Trump suggested sending armed forces into Mexico to battle drug cartels.
In the last days of his presidential campaign, Trump voiced support in favor of the restoration of peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan, amid the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Trump also blamed Harris, and more generally the Biden administration, for "inaction" during the 2023 Azerbaijani invasion of Nagorno Karabakh that led to a massive ethnic cleansing of ethnic Armenians in the region.
Trump has promised to replace the Affordable Care Act if elected as president. Some Republican senators have signaled openness to unwind and replace the ACA. No specifics on a replacement plan have yet been revealed. Trump previously attempted to repeal the ACA in 2017 in addition to a number of other actions taken throughout his administration to undermine the Affordable Care Act.
During a March 11, 2024, interview, Trump suggested he was open to cutting entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, which the Trump campaign later claimed was merely referring to "cutting waste" and that he would protect the programs. Trump previously suggested while president in 2020 that he would "at some point" look into cutting entitlement programs, and Trump's previous budget proposals have suggested some cuts to the programs. During the Republican primary, Trump attacked his opponents by suggesting they would cut entitlement benefits.
Trump has stated his intention to force the homeless to accept drug treatment or face arrest. Trump has stated he intends to move the homeless out of cities to "open large parcels of inexpensive land" to seek treatment. On appointees Trump has stated he intends Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to have a major role in regulation of food and drugs, claimed during the 2024 Trump rally at Madison Square Garden. According to RFK, Trump has promised him control over the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).
The New York Times reported that Trump planned "an extreme expansion of his first-term crackdown on immigration", including "preparing to round up undocumented people already in the United States on a vast scale and detain them in sprawling camps while they wait to be expelled", and that it "amounts to an assault on immigration on a scale unseen in modern American history".
The New York Times also reported that Trump's advisors are preparing a 'blitz' strategy designed to overwhelm immigrant-rights lawyers, and that his plans would rely on existing statutes without the need for new legislation, although such legislation would also likely be attempted. Trump's plans are expected to encounter significant Supreme Court challenges, and engender social and economic toil, especially within the housing, agriculture, and service sectors.
During rallies, Trump has blurred the distinction between legal and illegal immigrants, and has promised to deport both. Trump has stated he will deport between 15 and 20 million people, although the estimated number of undocumented immigrants is only 11 million. The American Immigration Council says that a "highly conservative" estimate Trump's plan would cost at least $315 billion, or $967.9 billion over a decade and be unworkable without massive outdoor detention camps. Economic reports from the Brookings Institution and Peterson Institute for International Economics have found that Trump's plans would result in a decrease in employment for American-born workers and result in "no economic growth over the second Trump administration from this policy alone" while other estimates have it shrinking GDP by 4.2-6.8 percent. Trump has also not ruled out separating families with mixed citizenship status. This could affect millions of families, with most undocumented immigrants having lived in the US for more than 16 years.
Trump has stated that his plan would follow the 'Eisenhower model,' a reference to the 1954 campaign Operation Wetback, stating to a crowd in Iowa: "Following the Eisenhower model, we will carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history." To achieve the goal of deporting millions per year, Trump has stated his intent to expand a form of deportation that does not require due process hearings which would be accomplished by the expedited removal authorities of 8 U.S. Code § 1225; invoking the Alien Enemies Act within the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798; and invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807 to allow the military to apprehend migrants and thus bypass the Posse Comitatus Act.
Trump would reassign federal agents to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and deputize local police officers and sheriffs, agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and National Guard soldiers volunteered by Republican states which would be sent to blue states. Individuals would be placed in massive camps constructed with funds redirected from the military budget in case of any refusal by Congress to appropriate funding. ICE raids would be expanded to include workplace raids and sweeps in public places. Following arrest, Stephen Miller has stated that immigrants would be taken to "large-scale staging grounds near the border, most likely in Texas" to be held in internment camps prior to deportation. Trump told a rally audience in September 2024 that the deportation effort "will be a bloody story." He has also spoken of rounding up homeless people in blue cities and detaining them in camps. The Trump team will also attempt to overturn the Flores settlement that prevents the indefinite holding of children.
Trump has promised to reinstate his ban on entry to individuals from certain Muslim-majority nations, and having the Centers for Disease Control reimpose COVID-era restrictions on asylum claims by asserting migrants carry infectious diseases such as the flu, tuberculosis, and scabies. Trump has said he would build more of the border wall, and move thousands of troops currently stationed overseas to the southern border.
Other proposals include: banning visas of foreign students who participated in anti-Israel/pro-Palestinian protests; suspending the U.S. refugee program; directing U.S. consular officials to expand ideological screening of applicants deemed to have undesirable attitudes; revoking temporary protected status to individuals living in the United States, including Afghans who moved to America following the 2021 Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, while those who helped U.S. forces would be 're-vetted' to see if they really did; ending birthright citizenship for babies born in the United States to undocumented parents; using coercive diplomacy by making immigration cooperation a condition for any bilateral engagement; reinstating 'Remain in Mexico'; and reviving 'safe third country' status with several nations in Central America, and expanding them to Africa, Asia, and South America.
Trump's campaign has stated his intention to expel DACA recipients after his previous attempt failed in 2020 by a 5–4 vote in the Supreme Court in Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California. Trump's campaign has not stated whether they will reinstate Trump's former child separation policies.
Throughout January and early February 2024, Trump successfully called on House and Senate Republicans to kill a bipartisan immigration deal to address the Mexico–United States border crisis that included several sought-after conservative proposals. Trump claimed that it would hurt his and Republican's reelection chances and ability to run off immigration as a campaign issue.
Trump's campaign has argued that immigration depresses American's wages, contributes to unemployment, and increases home prices. Research has repeatedly shown that immigration does not negatively impact American prosperity and enhances the welfare of native-born Americans.
In October 2024, Trump proposed a plan for recruiting and retaining U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents; his plan included a 10 percent wage increase for the agents, $10,000 retention and signing bonuses, and hiring 10,000 new agents.
Trump has made conflicting statements regarding his support for law enforcement during his 2024 campaign. Trump has run on pro-police 'law and order' platform while also attacking state and federal law enforcement that is viewed as unfriendly to himself or in relation to his multiple criminal incitements. Trump has painted America as violent and crime-ridden on the campaign trail. Trump has stated that FBI statistics showing that homicides have dropped by 6% in 2022 and 13% in 2023 are "a lie". Trump has made false claims of a "migrant crime wave" that are not supported by national data.
Trump has previously called for defunding the FBI and Justice Department in response to their investigations into his attempts to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents. Trump-aligned Project 2025 has called for terminating the FBI and slashing funding for the DOJ. Trump has repeatedly stated his intention to have the Department of Justice investigate his domestic political rivals, judges, prosecutors, and witnesses involved in his criminal trials. The Washington Post previously reported Trump's plans to use the Justice Department to prosecute critics of the former president including former attorney general Bill Barr and former chief of staff John F. Kelly.
Trump has frequently criticized of what he sees as perceived restrictions on police use of force, advocating for a tougher stance on local governments that receive federal grants by pushing for the reinstatement of stop-and-frisk policies. He has also voiced support for shooting suspected shoplifters, having police carry out "one really violent day" against those committing property crimes, the extrajudicial killing of minor offenders, and the implementation of death penalty for smugglers. Trump has called for the death penalty for migrants who kill American citizens and law enforcement officers. Trump has also advocated for the implementation of qualified immunity and full indemnification for law enforcement officers, a move that experts believe is largely superfluous and would simply serve to strengthen current police protocols.
Trump has called for fining or jailing those who criticize judges. Trump has repeatedly called his political rivals and critics criminals and has supported outlawing political dissent and criticism he considers misleading or challenges his claims to power.
Trump's campaign has stated its intention to reinterpret existing Civil Rights-era protections for minorities to counter "anti-white racism". According to Axios, Trump's Justice Department would "push to eliminate or upend programs in government and corporate America that are designed to counter racism that has favored whites". Trump has stated that there is a "definite anti-white feeling in the country". Trump's advisors have stated Trump will rescind Biden's Executive Orders designed to boost diversity and racial equity.
Trump has promised a rollback on trans rights. Trump stated he will rescind Biden's Title IX protections "on day one" for transgender students using bathrooms, locker rooms, and pronouns that align with their gender identities. Trump has stated that he will ask Congress to pass a bill stating that the United States will only recognize two genders as determined at birth, and has promised to crackdown on gender-affirming care. Trump has stated that hospitals and health care providers that provide transitional hormones or surgery will no longer qualify for federal funding, including Medicare and Medicaid funding. Trump has stated he will push to prohibit hormonal and surgical intervention for minors in all 50 states.
Trump has promised "severe consequences" for teachers that "suggest to a child that they could be trapped in the wrong body". Trump previously removed Title IX protections to ensure transgender youth had access to bathrooms of their choice and took steps to roll back transgender protections in the Affordable Care Act.
Trump's campaign has been more accepting on lesbian, gay, and bisexual rights. Trump contributed to drafting parts of the Republican Party's 2024 platform. He advocated for a more tolerant position on same-sex marriage and successfully removed language that supported conversion therapy.
As with his previous presidential runs, Trump's campaign has used fearmongering against immigrants and apocalyptic rhetoric by forecasting imminent doom should he lose the election. Trump has repeatedly promoted conspiracy theories and QAnon. According to The New York Times, a computer analysis found that since 2015, Trump's speeches had grown "darker, harsher, longer, angrier, less focused, more profane and increasingly fixated on the past" and were described as "rambling" and tangential. It highlighted an average rally length of 82 minutes compared with 45 minutes in 2016, and a 13% increase in use of all-or-nothing terms like "always" and "never". It also found 32% more negative words than positive words compared with 21% in 2016, and a 69% increase in swearwords. The Times reported that several experts have considered the increase in tangential speech and disinhibition as signs of advancing age and potential cognitive decline.
Trump uses social media to spread his campaign positions and messaging. According to his former senior counselor, Kellyanne Conway, Trump understands the reach of these platforms and uses them as "an opportunity to communicate right to people by cutting through the noise or the silence". In the 2016 election, Trump's Twitter account, which he used as an extension of his campaign website, garnered him a mass amount of public attention. During the 2024 election, he primarily uses his own social media platform, Truth Social. Research has shown that regardless of the platform used, Trump's use of social media has served as an effective agenda-building strategy due to journalists' growing reliance on digital media.
Media outlets have faced criticism for their reporting of Trump's rhetoric, including accusations of "sanewashing". Kelly McBride has commented that it is a difficult task for journalists to convey his rhetoric in a succinct way, which results in criticisms that they are "selectively quoting his speeches to make them sound more coherent than they actually are" and "packaging Trump's ideas into news stories as if they are sensible suggestions".
Trump has employed harsher rhetoric compared to that used during his previous presidential campaign in 2020. Trump's violent rhetoric against his political enemies has been described by historians and scholars as populist, authoritarian, fascist, and unlike anything a political candidate has ever said in American history. Following the Republican primaries, Trump "doubled down" on incendiary rhetoric rather than moderating it to appeal to swing voters.
Despite Trump's former attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election and its culmination in the January 6 United States Capitol attack, widely described as an attempted coup d'état or self-coup; Trump has claimed Biden is the "destroyer" and real threat to democracy, and repeated baseless claims the 2020 election was stolen from him. Trump has stated he has the power to "terminate" the Constitution to reverse his election loss. Trump allies have reportedly drafted plans to use the Insurrection Act of 1807 to deploy the military to shut down civil demonstrations against him on his first day in office.
Trump has repeatedly claimed that he won the 2020 election as part of the election denial movement conspiracy theory, and has stated during a rally that he "shouldn't have left" the White House at the end of 2021. In the lead up to the 2024 election, the Republican Party has made false claims of massive "noncitizen voting" by immigrants in an attempt to delegitimize the election if Trump loses. Trump and several Republicans have stated they will not accept the results of the 2024 election if they believe they are "unfair".
During a rally in December 2023, Trump quoted Vladimir Putin condemning American democracy, stating that the criminal charges against him "shows the rottenness of the American political system, which cannot pretend to teach others about democracy", and praised Viktor Orbán and Kim Jong Un. Trump has been noted to praise despots in public and in private during his 2024 campaign. During a July 2024 rally in Michigan, Trump praised Xi Jinping as a "brilliant man" for ruling "with an iron fist" and praised Orbán and Putin as "tough" and "smart" leaders.
Despite the Trump campaign disavowing Project 2025, critics have noted its connections to the Trump campaign, describing it as a path leading the United States towards autocracy and an attempt by Trump to become a dictator. Several legal experts claimed that some of its proposed policies would be unconstitutional, undermining the rule of law and the separation of powers.
Trump has repeatedly stated his intention to have the Justice Department investigate and arrest his domestic political rivals, judges, prosecutors, and witnesses involved in his criminal trials. Trump has promised to fire U.S. Attorneys that disobey his orders to prosecute someone, which has drawn comparisons to Nixon's Saturday Night Massacre. Trump has promised to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Joe Biden. Trump has promised to direct the Justice Department to investigate district attorneys on novel civil rights grounds by arguing some are engaging in selective enforcement. Trump has called for the indictment of members of the January 6 Committee. Trump has called for "televised military tribunals" against current and former Democratic and Republican officials for treason. Trump has stated multiple times that if reelected to the presidency, he will order the Justice Department to investigate and arrest political rivals for the sole purpose of preventing them from winning an election. He has called for jailing people whose actions he objects to, including Supreme Court critics, flag burners, and the U.S. Capitol Police who acted during the January 6 attack on the capitol.
On December 5, 2023, in a recorded television interview with Sean Hannity, Trump said he would only be a dictator on "day one" of his presidency and not after, and did not answer Hannity's question if he would not "abuse power, to break the law, to use the government to go after people". Trump campaign aides later stated that Trump was merely attempting to "trigger the left" and media with his dictator comment. Peter Baker from The New York Times reported that after the statement, "talk about the possible authoritarian quality of a new Trump presidency has suffused the political conversation in the nation's capital", and stated that the Trump campaign was not doing enough to ease worries and seemed to be 'leaning in' to the media's autocratic predictions.
On December 9, 2023, Trump responded to Baker's article about his dictator remarks at the New York Young Republican Club's 111th Annual Gala Keynote by saying "Baker today in the New York Times said that I want to be a dictator. I didn't say that. I said I want to be a dictator for one day. You know why I wanted to be a dictator? Because I want a wall, and I want to drill, drill, drill." Trump then claimed talk that he was a threat to democracy was Democrats' "newest hoax".
The comment sparked discussion about its meaning and possible consequences among the ones who found it unimportant, and the ones who found it concerning.
During his 2024 campaign, Trump suggested seeking a third term in office which would echo comments he previously made during his 2020 campaign and previous time in office. During an April interview with Time magazine, Trump stated he would not be in favor of challenging the 22nd Amendment which prohibits a third term in office. He later suggested he could be a three term president.
Speaking at a July 2024 faith-themed Turning Point Action conference, Trump urged Christians:
The comment was criticized by several journalists and experts on authoritarianism as continuing Trump's trend of authoritarian rhetoric.
In Trump v. United States, Trump has argued that the Constitution allows for absolute immunity for all presidential actions taken—even if criminal—unless the Senate successfully votes to impeach. During oral arguments on April 25, 2024, Trump attorney D. John Sauer argued that if structured as an official act, the president could not be charged for selling nuclear secrets to a foreign adversary, accepting a bribe, ordering the military to stage a coup to retain power, or ordering a political assassination. Sauer argued that owing to absolute immunity, the president must be successfully impeached and removed from Congress first.
Trump's claims for "absolute immunity" have been rejected by most political commentators and two lower courts. In a unanimous ruling by the three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, the court stated that if Trump's theory of constitutional authority were accepted, it would "collapse our system of separated powers" and put a president above the law. Charlie Savage of The New York Times wrote that "rather than a presidency at least theoretically checked by law, the country would be ruled by presidents who could openly commit official crimes with impunity, so long as enough allied lawmakers remained sufficiently loyal to block any impeachment".
On July 1, 2024, in a 6–3 decision along ideological lines, the Supreme Court determined that the Constitution affords the President with absolute immunity for acts within his constitutional purview and presumptive immunity for official acts, but provides no immunity for unofficial acts. The decision was widely criticized by legal experts and historians.
During his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump has made numerous false and misleading statements. The large amount of lies and false statements have been attributed to Trump's rhetorical style described as using the big lie and firehose of falsehood propaganda technique. During a 64-minute news conference on August 8, 2024, NPR counted Trump making over 162 "misstatements, exaggerations and outright lies" averaging more than two per minute. They described the amount of Trump's lies as "stunning" and "beyond the bounds of what most politicians would do". CNN has called Trump's claims a "bombardment of dishonesty" and a "campaign of relentless lying". The Washington Post has described Trump's speeches as a "bacchanalia of lies and mistruths".
Trump has embraced and celebrated the January 6 Capitol attack and has promoted a revisionist history of the event. Trump has continually brought up the events of the January 6 attack on the Capitol during rallies and speeches for his 2024 campaign and has made it a political rallying cry. Trump has repeatedly called those charged for their actions on that day "warriors", "hostages" and "great, great patriots" and has promised to pardon them if reelected to the presidency. Trump has noticeably downplayed the events of that day. Trump has spread baseless conspiracy theories at his rallies that "there was Antifa and there was FBI" at the riot. The New York Times stated that Trump's comments "risked radicalizing his most die-hard supporters even further, encouraging them to repeat events like those that unfolded on Jan. 6". Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago stated that Trump's comments on the attack "normalizes violence as a legitimate solution to political grievances". Trump has played down but not ruled out violence after the 2024 election if he does not win, stating, "it depends".
Following the withdrawal of Biden as the presumptive Democratic nominee and the launch of the Kamala Harris 2024 presidential campaign, Trump has made many personal attacks against Kamala Harris, many of which have been described as racially charged and misogynistic. Trump stated that he was "entitled" to make such personal attacks. In a July 31, 2024 interview, Trump repeatedly questioned Harris' racial identity and falsely claimed that she "happened to turn black" a few years ago. After the interview, Trump doubled down on his false assertion that Harris was not previously and may not currently be black. Trump's false claims drew comparisons to Trump's previous false "birther" conspiracy theories he has used against his political rivals such as Barack Obama and Nikki Haley. Trump has suggested Kamala Harris would be "like a play toy" to world leaders who would "walk all over her" due to her appearance and later stated "I don't want to say as to why, but a lot of people understand it." The statement was criticized for sexist undertones, although the Trump campaign denied he was talking about her race or gender. Trump has attacked Harris' previous relationship with former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown, and has criticized her for her laugh by calling her a derisive nickname, "Laffin' Kamala Harris". Throughout the campaign, Trump called Harris "dumb", "low IQ", "mentally disabled", and lacking "mental capacity" which Politico noted was "reminiscent of the rhetoric he used against Hillary Clinton during the 2016 campaign". Starting on August 5, 2024, Trump occasionally called Harris by the nickname "Kamabla". On August 28, 2024, Trump reposted an image featuring Harris and Hillary Clinton on Truth Social with the text "Funny how blowjobs impacted both their careers differently". The New York Times reported it was "the second time in 10 days that the former president shared content from his personal account making sexually oriented attacks on Ms. Harris" and showed Trump's "willingness to continue to shatter longstanding norms of political speech".
After Tim Walz became the Democratic nominee for Vice President, Trump and Vance began making personal attacks against Walz. On August 7, 2024, Vance criticized the timing of Walz's retirement from the Army National Guard in 2005 as a means of avoiding a deployment to Iraq. Vance also attacked Walz for claiming in a 2018 video that he had previously carried guns "in war" despite never having served in a combat zone, to which Vance characterized as "stolen valor". The Harris campaign later stated that Walz "misspoke" in the video.
Trump suggested investigating MSNBC and NBC's parent corporation Comcast if he returns to office, calling their news coverage of him "treason". In 2020, Trump signed an Executive Order prohibiting U.S. companies to do business with ByteDance, the Chinese company owning TikTok, and said that he would ban TikTok. In March 2024, he said he now opposed a ban because it would help Facebook, and that he considered "Facebook to be an enemy of the people, along with a lot of the media". Trump stated he will prosecute Google once he is reelected, claiming they only display "bad stories" about him. Trump has repeatedly voiced support for outlawing political dissent and criticism he considers misleading or challenges his claims to power. He has stated that ABC and CBS should lose their broadcast licenses and that journalists, editors, and publishers should face time in jail if they refuse to name confidential sources. Several news outlets have been accused of self-censorship in their withholding of editorial endorsements of presidential candidates, documentaries, and articles due to fear of antagonizing Trump. During a rally in Pennsylvania two days before Election Day, Trump stated that "I don't mind" if reporters are shot at.
Trump's campaign was noted for using increasingly dehumanizing and violent rhetoric against his political opponents.
In public remarks in September 2023, Trump used violent rhetoric, calling for shoplifters to be shot and for Mark Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff appointed by him, to be executed for treason; he also mocked the hammer attack that critically injured Paul Pelosi, the husband of the then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. As early as 2023, Trump began stating that his political opponents are a greater threat to the United States than countries such as Russia, China, and North Korea, and urged deploying the military on American soil to fight "the enemy from within" which he describes as "radical left lunatics" and Democratic politicians such as Adam Schiff. Trump was criticized for saying his political opponent Liz Cheney should have guns "trained on her face". Trump drew criticism for calling Democrats "so evil" and "dangerous", and that they are "demonic".
In advance of the 2024 election, Trump reposted QAnon content on his social media, has encouraged QAnon chants, and plays a song associated with QAnon to close out his rallies. The posts were regarded by experts as a "tacit endorsement of a dangerous movement that has been linked to criminal acts ranging from the Jan. 6 Capitol riot to isolated cases of violence and even murder".
While discussing the U.S. economy and its auto industry in a rally on March 16, 2024, Trump promised to place tariffs on cars manufactured abroad if he won the election, adding "Now, if I don't get elected, it's going to be a ... bloodbath for the country." On March 30, 2024, Trump was criticized for posting a video on his social media showing a hog-tied Joe Biden.
Trump was known to send out false, inflammatory fundraising emails in an attempt to generate attention and cash which have been described by The Washington Post as aggressive even by standards of "Trump's frequently hyperbolic and inflammatory language". Trump has suggested his opponents seek to give him the death sentence via guillotine, and has suggested that his political opponents are coming after his supporters. Trump's comment stating, "1 MONTH UNTIL ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE! THEY WANT TO SENTENCE ME TO DEATH" was especially criticized for resembling a tweet he gave out before the events of the January 6 attack stating, "Be there, will be wild!" and Steve Bannon's tweet that "all hell is going to break loose tomorrow" before violent extremist groups assaulted the US Capitol.
Trump attacked the witnesses, judges, juries, and families of individuals involved in his criminal trials. Trump repeatedly attacked law enforcement in relation to their criminal investigations into his attempts to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents, calling them "political monsters", telling people to "go after" New York attorney general Letitia James, and warning that an indictment against him by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg would bring "potential death and destruction", among other comments, which raised concerns over officers' physical safety.
During and after his criminal conviction of 34 felonies in The People of the State of New York v. Donald J. Trump, Trump and his Republican allies made numerous false and misleading statements and attacked the judge and jury involved in the trial. Trump called Judge Juan Merchan "a devil", claimed the trial was "rigged" and falsely accused Joe Biden and the Democratic Party of orchestrating his criminal trials to prevent him from returning to the White House, of which there is no evidence. The false statements were met with calls for violent retribution, execution of the judge, civil war, armed insurrection and rioting by pro-Trump supporters online.
During his 2024 campaign, Trump continued portraying himself as a victim of a "Deep State" of elites who are attempting to undermine him and America. Trump has said his criminal trials make him a "political prisoner" and compared himself to the late Russian dissident Alexei Navalny. On May 21, 2024, Trump falsely claimed Joe Biden was ready to kill him during the August 8, 2022 FBI search of Mar-a-Lago by misrepresenting standard Justice Department policy on use of force. The accusation was noted to be without precedent in modern U.S. history. The New York Times reported the accusation was an escalation in rhetoric and portrayed himself as a "political martyr whose very life could be in danger".
As with his previous presidential campaigns, Trump's 2024 campaign regularly espoused racist, anti-immigrant nativist fearmongering, racial stereotypes, and dehumanized immigrants. In his rhetoric, Trump has blurred the distinction between legal and illegal immigrants, and has promised to deport both. Trump has repeatedly claimed that undocumented immigrants are subhuman, stating they are "not people", "not humans", and "animals". At rallies, Trump has stated that undocumented immigrants will "rape, pillage, thieve, plunder and kill" American citizens, that they are "stone-cold killers", "monsters", "vile animals", "savages", and "predators" that will "walk into your kitchen, they'll cut your throat" and "grab young girls and slice them up right in front of their parents". Trump's dehumanizing anti-immigrant rhetoric regularly features details of young women allegedly killed by Hispanic male assailants while ignoring male victims. Studies find no evidence that immigrants commit crimes at higher rates than native-born Americans, and Trump has not provided any evidence to back up his claims.
Other rhetoric includes false statements that foreign leaders are deliberately emptying insane asylums to send "prisoners, murderers, drug dealers, mental patients, terrorists" across America's southern border as migrants, and comparing migrants to the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter. Trump stated the removal of immigrants "will be a bloody story." Trump claimed without evidence that undocumented immigrants from Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere are "building an army" of "fighting age" men to attack Americans "from within". Trump has suggested that migrants should be put in special fighting leagues to fight for sport. Trump spread the false conspiracy theory that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio were eating people's pets. Trump described immigrants as deadly snakes during a rally, repurposing lyrics from the 1968 song "The Snake".
Since autumn of 2023, Trump repeatedly used racial hygiene rhetoric by stating that undocumented immigrants are "poisoning the blood of our country", which has been compared to language echoing that of white supremacists and Adolf Hitler. He also falsely claimed that immigrants are genetically predisposed to commit crimes and have "bad genes", and that they are the "enemy from within" who are ruining the "fabric" of the country.
Trump's anti-immigration tone was noted to have grown harsher from his previous time as president, where, as reported in The New York Times, he "privately mused about developing a militarized border like Israel's, asked whether migrants crossing the border could be shot in the legs and wanted a proposed border wall topped with flesh-piercing spikes and painted black to burn migrants' skin".
Trump received significant media attention over a March 16, 2024 rally, where in a section of a speech talking about the American automobile industry, Trump stated that "Now, if I don't get elected, it's going to be a bloodbath for the whole — that's going to be the least of it. It's going to be a bloodbath for the country." Many commentators saw the use of the term "bloodbath" as a call to political violence and congruent with the larger pattern of violent rhetoric that Trump has used during his 2024 campaign, or that it was a call for another January 6-style attack.
Trump later said that the quote was taken out of context and that he was referring to the American automobile industry, calling the controversy the result of the "Fake News". Others said it was unclear exactly what Trump meant within the context of the speech.
Lisa Friedman of The New York Times stated that even if Trump's comment referred to automobiles, it fit a pattern of increasingly brutal language Trump uses towards electric vehicles, and that some experts believe Trump is "normalizing violence by peppering a screed against electric vehicles with promises of a "bloodbath" if he loses the election" and that supporters of Trump have responded violently even when his language is ambiguous.
Trump's embrace of far-right extremism and several statements and actions were accused of echoing Nazi rhetoric, far-right ideology, antisemitism, and white supremacy.
Starting in autumn of 2023, Trump repeatedly stated that undocumented immigrants are "poisoning the blood of our country", which has been compared to racial hygiene rhetoric language echoing that of white supremacists and Adolf Hitler. Trump's "poisoning the blood" comments resulted in greater media attention to Trump's past statements. Trump has repeatedly talked about "good genes" and previously mentioned "racehorse theory" during a campaign rally in 2020 which was used to justify selective breeding of humans and was criticized for connections to eugenics and Nazism during World War II. In October 2024, Trump falsely stated that immigrants were genetically predisposed to commit crimes and had "bad genes", which drew comparisons to Nazi ideology.
On October 22, 2024, Trump's former Chief of Staff John F. Kelly went public with accusations that Trump had expressed admiration for Adolf Hitler while in office, stating that Trump had said "You know, Hitler did some good things, too" to him during a meeting, and that he "rebuilt the economy". Kelly went on to say that he believed Trump met the definition of a fascist, would rule like a dictator, and had no concept of the Constitution or the rule of law. The same day, The Atlantic reported that Trump had previously stated that "I need the kind of generals that Hitler had" during a meeting in the White House with Kelly and two other military advisors. After being corrected that Hitler's generals had attempted to kill Hitler multiple times, Trump responded "No, no, no, they were totally loyal to him" and stated he was unfamiliar with Erwin Rommel.
Trump also drew criticism for past statements during the white supremacist and antisemitic Unite the Right rally in 2017, where he stated there were "very fine people on both sides". In May 2024, Trump claimed Biden was running a "Gestapo administration" which was criticized for its comparisons to Nazi Germany's secret police. On August 1, 2023, the Trump campaign compared Trump's criminal trials to "Nazi Germany in the 1930s, the former Soviet Union, and other authoritarian, dictatorial regimes". The statement was criticized by the Anti-Defamation League, which stated that the comparison "to Nazi Germany in the 1930s is factually incorrect, completely inappropriate and flat out offensive".
In November 2022, Trump was widely criticized after eating dinner at his Mar-a-Lago home with guests including African-American rapper Kanye West, who had recently posted antisemitic statements on social media, and Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist and Holocaust denier. Trump responded that West "unexpectedly showed up with three of his friends, whom I knew nothing about".
In a campaign speech and a post on his social media site on Veterans Day, November 11, 2023, Trump called some of his political opponents "vermin", promising to "root out" the "communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections". Trump's use of the term "vermin" was criticized for echoing the fascist rhetoric of Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler. Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung responded to criticism by saying:
According to The New York Times, scholars are undecided about whether Trump's "rhetorical turn into more fascist-sounding territory is just his latest public provocation of the left, an evolution in his beliefs, or the dropping of a veil".
On March 18, 2024, Trump was criticized for claiming "any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion," and that "they hate everything about Israel, and they should be ashamed of themselves because Israel will be destroyed." Following mounting criticism from Jewish groups, Trump's campaign responded that "Trump is right," and that the Democratic Party "has turned into a full-blown anti-Israel, antisemitic, pro-terrorist cabal". The Anti-Defamation League called Trump's comments "defamatory and patently false". The Jewish Council for Public Affairs claimed Trump was "further normalizing dangerous antisemites". Trump's comments were accused of evoking an antisemitic trope that Jews have a 'dual loyalty' and are more loyal to Israel than their own countries. Trump has since repeated that Jews who vote for Biden are betraying their religious and cultural identities multiple times during his campaign. The Harris campaign and several non-partisan Jewish organizations criticized Trump's comments during an antisemitism conference on September 19 where he stated that "if I don't win this election" then "the Jewish people would have a lot to do with a loss" and continued criticizing liberal Jews for "voting for the enemy" by claiming the Democratic party had a "hold, or curse" on Jewish Americans.
Trump was criticized for elevating and inviting far-right conspiracy theorist, white nationalist and "proud Islamophobe" Laura Loomer to the 2024 9/11 ceremony in New York City. Trump was criticized by Democrats and some Republicans for his increasingly close connections to the influencer.
Several researchers criticized Trump's use of the word "remigration" when referring to the deportation of immigrants due to its association and use with the international far-right Generation Identity and Identitarian movement.
On May 20, 2024, Trump's campaign posted a video on Trump's Truth Social account, which showed hypothetical newspaper headlines in the event of a Trump victory. Under one headline titled "What's next for America?" was a subtitle that read: "German industrial strength significantly increased after 1871, driven by the creation of a unified Reich", although the subtitle was not fully visible at all times, instead showing: "industrial strength significantly increased ... driven by the creation of a unified Reich". The Trump campaign deleted the video the next day after it drew bipartisan criticism, with criticism particularly focused on the phrase "the creation of a unified Reich"; President Biden commented that the video used "the language of Hitler's Germany".
The Trump campaign responded that the video was not made by the campaign, but by a Trump supporter. After CNN found the video's template on an online motion graphics template store, the contact form of the template linked up CNN with a Turkish graphic designer who said that he created the newspaper graphics in 2023, using online content on World War I to duplicate the phrase listed above. The Bulwark reported, citing anonymous sources, that Natalie Harp was the staffer who had posted the video.
Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita were senior advisers and co-campaign managers. Other top advisors included Dan Scavino, Jason Miller, and Steven Cheung. In August 2024, the campaign announced that Corey Lewandowski, Tim Murtaugh, Alex Pfeiffer, Alex Bruesewitz, and Taylor Budowich had joined the campaign.
The campaign has received criticism for having a very small team of 20, instead of the usual 200. The team was also criticized for not having a transition team in place by early August 2024. Caroline Wiles, the daughter of co-campaign manager Susie Wiles, became the fourth-highest paid staffer on the 2024 Trump campaign making $222,000, though she, her mother and Trump denied any involvement in her hiring.
On November 15, 2022, Trump announced his candidacy for the 2024 United States presidential election and set up a fundraising account. In March 2023, the campaign began diverting 10 percent of the donations to Trump's leadership PAC which had paid $16 million for his legal bills by June 2023. Trump's fundraising agreement with the Republican National Committee was noted to prioritize payments to his Save America PAC before the party itself. Since leaving office in January, 2021 to March, 2024, Trump has spent more than $100 million in legal fees from campaign accounts. Trump's leadership PAC Save America spent $76.5 million since March 30, 2023 to February, 2024, with approximately $47.4 million directly going towards legal expenditures.
In early 2024, Trump noticeably lagged Biden in total fundraising in part due to his diverting of donations to pay legal bills related to his many criminal trials. At the start of March, 2024, Trump's campaign had $50 million in cash on hand and Trump-aligned Super PACs had $52 million, while Biden's campaign had $155 million in cash on hand and Biden-aligned Super PACs had $64 million. According to a March 28 Reuters article, large contributions made up 65% of Trump's support, compared to 55% of Biden's support. In part due to low fundraising numbers, the Trump campaign announced in April that all candidates using Trump's name, image, and likeness needed to pay 5% of all funds raised to Trump National Committee JFC, and that "any split that is higher than 5% will be seen favorably by the RNC and President Trump's campaign and is routinely reported to the highest levels of leadership within both organizations."
On April 6, 2024, the Trump campaign self-reported a $50.5 million fundraising haul at the house of billionaire John Paulson. By May 21, Trump reported a total April fundraising haul of $76.2 million, beating Biden's reported $51 million and beating Biden's total fundraising for the first time. The New York Times reported that Trump was widely expected to catch up in total fundraising once he secured the Republican nomination and signed a joint fundraising agreement with the RNC. Trump lagged Biden in total cash on hand, totaling $48 million to Biden's $84.5 million, both totals not including PAC money. Trump continued to spend millions on legal bills totaling $3.3 million. In June, the Trump campaign reported a $141 million fundraising haul for May, beating Biden's $85 million haul. Trump and the RNC entered June with $235 million on hand compared to Biden's $212 million. The Trump campaign accredited the haul with the aftermath of his 34 felony convictions in May that raised $70 million in the 48 hours after the verdict and briefly crashed WinRed. Trump also received a $50 million donation from billionaire Timothy Mellon. The combination of Trump's improved fundraising and Biden's increased spending on television ads were noted to give Trump a cash advantage by summer 2024.
Following Biden's withdrawal from the race, Trump lagged Harris in total fundraising, with Trump's campaign and assorted committees reporting taking in $138.7 million in July compared to Harris, the DNC and assorted committees raising $310 million that same month; of which $200 million was raised in the week following the Harris campaign announcement. Trump also saw a temporary bump in donations from his "fiercest supporters" following his assassination attempt and the reveal of his running mate, JD Vance at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
Trump was noted for an "unprecedented" mixing of personal business and political fundraising during his 2024 campaign. Trump promoted $59.99 bibles, $399 sneakers, $99 "Victory47" cologne, and $99 Trump-branded NFT digital trading cards for his personal, non-campaign accounts. Trump's campaign has been noted for spending large sums of campaign money at Trump-owned businesses, in particular his Mar-a-Lago resort and the Trump National Doral Miami.
In May 2024, the Washington Post reported that around a dozen top oil executives, including Mike Sabel, CEO and founder of Venture Global LNG; Jack Fusco, CEO of Cheniere Energy; and top executives of Chevron, Continental Resources, Exxon, Occidental Petroleum, and other companies, attended a fundraising dinner at Trump's Mar-a-Lago club in April 2024. Trump asked them to give $1 billion to his campaign and pledged to immediately roll back environmental rules and policies implemented under President Biden, including clean energy and electric vehicles. Greg Sargent argues that promises like these are corrupt and contributing to the impression that a Trump second term would be "unsettlingly chaotic and disruptive to the business climate".
In May 2024, Politico reported that Miriam Adelson will contribute $90 million to a Super PAC supporting Trump. At this time the Biden's campaign account had $84 million cash, and Trump's had $49 million (not accounting for PAC dollars). Adelson has sought support from candidate Trump for Israel's annexation of the West Bank. She pledged more than $100 million to Trump's campaign in exchange for US recognition of Israeli sovereignty over Palestinian territory West Bank, where there would be no Palestinian Authority or peace accord.
By the end of Trump's presidential campaign, Elon Musk had spent $277 million to elect Trump and allied Republicans, making the largest individual political donor of the 2024 election and the largest individual political donor since at least 2010 outside of candidates funding their own campaigns according to OpenSecrets. Musk's donations primarily went to his Super Pac, America PAC, and ran what The Washington Post described as most significant get-out-the-vote operation for Trump. Musk also gave $20.5 million to an "RBG PAC" that sought to use the name of former Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to convince voters that Trump would not sign a national abortion ban. He also launched a $1 million a day giveaway for swing state voters the Justice Department warned could potentially violate federal election laws. Musk beat Trump's second largest donor, Timothy Mellon, by roughly $80 million.
Trump's campaign events were often described as "freewheeling", like a "rock show", and "filled with lies and mistruths". Events frequently included claims of election denialism over the results of the 2020 presidential election, claims of victimization and persecution, anti-immigrant rhetoric, the retelling of unverified stories that showcase Trump's negotiating skills, and dark and apocalyptic messaging about the future if Trump did not win. The Associated Press noted that "Trump's rallies take on the symbols, rhetoric and agenda of Christian nationalism." To this end, he described his presidential campaign as a "righteous crusade" against "atheists, globalists and the Marxists". Trump's rallies sometimes ended with an instrumental song appropriated by the QAnon movement called "Mirrors".
On January 28, 2023, Trump held his first campaign events in South Carolina and New Hampshire.
On March 4, 2023, Trump delivered a lengthy keynote speech at the CPAC convention, also attended by Nikki Haley, but not by other prospective Republican candidates. In his speech, Trump promised to serve as the retribution for those who were wronged, and stated that he was the only candidate who could prevent World War III.
On March 25, Trump staged a rally in Waco, Texas during the 30th anniversary of the Waco siege, and opened with a rendition of the song "Justice for All" featuring a choir of about 20 men imprisoned for their role in the January 6 Capitol attack.
In late April, Trump suggested he was not interested in debating other Republican contenders, at least not until later in the year.
On May 10, 2023, Trump appeared one-on-one with news host Kaitlan Collins on CNN Republican Town Hall with Donald Trump at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire, with an audience of Republican and undecided voters. During the event Trump took credit for the overturning of Roe v. Wade (1973), supported defaulting on the national debt in the debt ceiling showdown, and again falsely claimed that the 2020 election was stolen. Trump also suggested pardoning those convicted as a result of the January 6 United States Capitol attack.
On January 20, 2024, Trump started his rally in Manchester, New Hampshire, by telling New Hampshire Democrats to vote for Representative Dean Phillips in the 2024 New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary to signal to Biden that “you don’t abandon us.”
On January 27, 2024, during a rally in Las Vegas ahead of the state's presidential caucus, Trump took credit for attempting to block a bipartisan border security deal in the works in the Senate. Trump repeated his claims that the border crisis was an "invasion", an "open wound", "a crime against our nation" and "an atrocity against our Constitution", and admitted that he did not want a deal to pass as it would be "another gift to the Radical Left Democrats" who "need it politically" and would impact a key plank of his reelection campaign.
On February 23, 2024, Trump was criticized for comments during a campaign speech for saying his four criminal indictments and mug shot boosted his appeal among black voters and for comparing his legal jeopardy to historical anti-black discrimination.
In June 2024, Trump reportedly described Milwaukee, the hosting city for the July 2024 Republican National Convention, as "a horrible city"; later, Trump responded to the reporting, stating to the media: "I love Milwaukee, I have great friends in Milwaukee, but it's as you know, the crime numbers are terrible. We have to be very careful. But I was referring to also the election, the the ballots, the, the way it went down, it was very bad in Milwaukee." One month later, at the Republican National Convention, Trump said: "Wisconsin, we are spending over $250 million here, creating jobs and other economic development all over the place, so I hope you will remember this in November and give us your vote ... I am trying to buy your vote, I'll be honest about that".
Trump's rallies repeatedly featured music for which the artists and owners of copyrights were not compensated. After one of their songs was used, a band spokesperson told Billboard, "Foo Fighters were not asked permission, and if they were, they would not have granted it," and "appropriate actions are being taken," against the campaign and that any royalties received as a result of the usage of the song will be donated to the Harris/Walz campaign. Other artists and their agents have made similar complaints and/or demanded payment of royalties and/or the cessation of unauthorized use and lack of compensation including Beyonce, Celine Dion, Kendrick Lamar, Johnny Marr, Tom Petty, Rihanna, The Rolling Stones, The Village People, Aerosmith, Bruce Springsteen, Phil Collins, and the band Journey. The estate of Isaac Hayes, along with David Porter, co-writer of the song "Hold On, I'm Comin'," brought suit against the campaign which had allegedly used the song 134 times without permission of the copyright owners, or of the payment of royalties. Federal judge Thomas Thrash in Atlanta, Georgia, issued an injunction against further use of the song.
On October 27, 2024, Trump held a rally at Madison Square Garden, promoting it as a "historic" event just days before Election Day. Speakers included prominent figures such as Elon Musk, Dana White, and Mike Johnson, alongside various political figures and entertainers.
Trump pledges to appoint Elon Musk to chair Federal Efficiency Commission. Trump said the commission would audit the entire federal government and propose "dramatic reforms". Musk has also officially announced that he will accept the appointment if Trump is elected. Everett Kelley, president of a union representing federal government workers, criticized the proposal, saying "There's nothing efficient about that". Trump vowed to achieve his long-held goal of drastic reform by minimizing government and cutting red tape government regulations, which he says are the bureaucracies that are holding back American prosperity.
On July 31, 2024, Trump was interviewed by journalists Rachel Scott, Kadia Goba, and Harris Faulkner during a question-and-answer session at the National Association of Black Journalists's annual convention. Trump questioned the racial identity of Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic nominee following the withdrawal of President Joe Biden from the 2024 election. Trump said that she had claimed Indian heritage "until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black, and now she wants to be known as Black". When Scott said that Harris had "always been Black", Trump responded that "she was Indian all the way and all of a sudden she made a turn and she became a Black person".
Afterward, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre referred to Trump's statements as "repulsive" and "insulting". The Harris campaign responded by condemning the former president's "hostility" in his comments, with campaign director Michael Tyler writing: "Today's tirade is simply a taste of the chaos and division that has been a hallmark of Trump's MAGA rallies this entire campaign."
On July 13, 2024, Trump was shot and wounded in the upper right ear in an assassination attempt at a rally near Butler, Pennsylvania. He was escorted out of the venue by United States Secret Service. The shooting was an attempt to assassinate the former president with eight bullets. The shooter, identified by the FBI as Thomas Matthew Crooks, was shot and killed by the Secret Service. During the attempt, Crooks also shot three other spectators, including 50-year-old Corey Comperatore who was killed instantly. The authorities are investigating the motive for the assassination.
On September 15, 2024, Trump became the target of a second assassination attempt at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida. The secret service agent walking the course before Trump's golf party arrived at the hole saw a rifle barrel protruding from the bushes and opened fire in that direction. The suspect, identified as Ryan Wesley Routh, fled, leaving behind an SKA-style rifle and other belongings. He was apprehended driving north on Interstate 95.
Trump and his entourage went to Arlington National Cemetery (ANC) on Monday, August 26, 2024, invited by families of soldiers fallen in Afghanistan, in a visit arranged by House Speaker Mike Johnson for a wreath-laying ceremony commemorating the 2021 Kabul airport attack. The visit developed into an incident.
In September 2024, Trump's campaign launched a tour called "Team Trump Agenda 47 Policy Tour" to promote Agenda 47.
Trump's campaign held an event at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan on October 27, 2024, at 5 p.m. EST. The event received widespread coverage and criticism due to the rhetoric shared by its featured speakers, which included comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who likened Puerto Rico to a "floating island of garbage," and Trump's friend David Rem, who referred to Harris as "the antichrist." Other prominent speakers included former wrestler Hulk Hogan, television personality Phil McGraw, political commentator Tucker Carlson, and House Speaker Mike Johnson. Trump appeared on stage two hours late, being introduced by his wife Melania, and announced a proposed tax credit for family caregivers.
Hinchcliffe's comments in particular received backlash, which were noted for his set of jokes that disparaged Latinos, African Americans, and the crisis in the Middle East. Hinchcliffe's "floating island of garbage" remark was noted as particularly potentially damaging to Trump's appeal to stateside Puerto Ricans, who make up a significant portion of the population of swing state Pennsylvania. Campaign advisor Danielle Alvarez later stated that "this joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign.” Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and vice presidential nominee Tim Walz reacted to Hinchcliffe's set on her Twitch livestream, calling the clip "super upsetting" and telling her online audience "that's what they think about you.” Hinchcliffe responded to Ocasio-Cortez and Walz on X, stating they "have no sense of humor" and took the clip out of context to "make it seem racist." Several Republicans also expressed their disgust with Hinchcliffe's Puerto Rico comment, including Cuban American Representatives María Elvira Salazar and Carlos A. Giménez, as well as Puerto Rican Congressman Anthony D'Esposito, who stated "the only thing that's 'garbage' was a bad comedy set." Puerto Rican musical artists Ricky Martin, Bad Bunny, and Jennifer Lopez expressed their support for Harris on social media shortly after Hinchcliffe's comments went viral.
At MSG, the campaign unveiled a new slogan, "Trump Will Fix It."
Trump, his team and supporters have used Artificial intelligence (AI) in the campaign.
In June 2024, Trump said on a podcast that: "AI was 'really powerful stuff,' adding that 'we’re right at the beginning of it … and it is alarming.'" He was surprised by how fast AI was as it generated a speech that he later used in a few minutes, adding that speech writers' jobs might soon disappear. He also discussed the use of deep fakes that showed him promoting a product, saying that he: "could not tell [that it was fake], the voice was perfect, the lips moved perfectly with every word".
Trump also used AI-generated content on social media platforms often made by his supporters. Typically, they show images or memes of him, for example, astride a lion or as a bodybuilder. He also shared content that showed unfavorable images of his opponents, for example, one of Kamala Harris addressing a soviet-style rally. In August 2024, Trump posted AI-generated images on his social media site showing fans of musician Taylor Swift falsely endorsing his election bid. The images showed women wearing t-shirts with "Swfties for Trump" slogans and were made by the non-profit organization the John Milton Freedom Foundation. He denied making the images, or having anything to do with them, saying: "I don’t know anything about them other than someone else generated them. I didn’t generate them."
From May 2024 onwards, the company Campaign Nucleus used ai-powered campaign tools to aid the election bid. These tools included generating custom emails, determining voter sentiment, finding persuadable voters and heightening the social media posts of "anti-woke" influencers. Campaign Nucleus and other companies linked to the boss, Brad Parscale, have been paid "more than $2.2 million by the Trump campaign, the Republican National Committee", as well as other political and fundraising committees.
The questions of Trump's eligibility to run for president in 2024 are delineated by the U.S. Constitution. Two amendments addressing this issue are the 14th and 22nd Amendments. On the one hand, some scholars have argued, although Trump has been indicted multiple times, neither the indictments nor any resulting convictions would render him ineligible for the office. On the other hand, conservative, originalist scholars have argued that Trump is ineligible because Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment applies.
On December 19, 2023, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that Trump was disqualified from holding office and that his name must be removed from the Colorado Republican primary ballot. Trump's campaign said that he would appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court. On December 28, 2023, Maine's Secretary of State banned Trump from Maine's Republican primary ballot. The Trump campaign said that they would appeal the decision in Maine state courts, and the secretary of state suspended the ruling until the court's decision. On March 4, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Colorado's Supreme Court ruling, saying that states do not have the authority to disqualify Trump or other candidates from federal elections under the 14th Amendment's insurrection clause.
In the aftermath of the American Civil War, the 14th Amendment was passed. Section 3 of the amendment prohibits anyone from holding public office if they had previously sworn an oath to support the Constitution, but then "engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the [United States], or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof". Trump's role in the January 6 United States Capitol attack is cited by opponents as a reason for his disqualification from seeking public office.
The non-profit group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and other advocacy groups and individuals were planning state-by-state efforts to keep Trump off state ballots. In 2023, court cases were brought in states including Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota, and New Hampshire.
On December 19, 2023, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled in Anderson v. Griswold that Trump is ineligible to hold office under section three of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and cannot appear on the ballot for the 2024 United States presidential election in Colorado. The ruling, which marks the first time a court has ever determined that a presidential candidate is disqualified due to section three of the 14th Amendment, was stayed to allow for an appeal. The Colorado Republican Party appealed. Trump also appealed. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case.
On March 4, 2024, the Colorado Supreme Court's ruling to disqualify Trump from the state's primary ballot was unanimously overturned by the United States Supreme Court.
Trump has only been elected president once, in 2016, so is not limited from running again by the 22nd Amendment, which permits two full terms. Even before losing the 2020 election, he publicly proclaimed his willingness to seek a third term in 2024, despite this being explicitly prohibited. Trump claimed that he was entitled to a third term because he contended that Barack Obama had spied on him and his campaign.
Trump has questioned presidential term limits on multiple occasions while in office, and in public remarks talked about serving beyond the limits of the 22nd Amendment. During an April 2019 White House event for the Wounded Warrior Project, he jokingly said he would remain president for 10 to 14 years, and in March 2018 praised Xi Jinping for abolishing term limits. During an April 2024 interview with Time magazine, Trump stated he would not be in favor of challenging the 22nd Amendment. During a May 2024 National Rifle Association convention, Trump suggested he would be a three-term president.
Trump is seeking to become the second president in American history to serve non-consecutive terms, after Grover Cleveland who was re-elected in 1892, and who, like Trump, ran for president in three consecutive elections. The last one-term president to campaign for a second non-consecutive term was Herbert Hoover, who, after serving from 1929 to 1933, made unsuccessful runs in 1936 and 1940 after his loss in 1932.
Three days after Trump announced his candidacy, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Jack Smith to serve as special counsel for the investigations regarding Trump's role in the January 6 attack and into mishandling of government records. Special counsels can be appointed when there can be a conflict of interest or the appearance of it, and Garland said the announced political candidacies of both Trump and President Biden prompted him to take what he described as an "extraordinary step". Special counsel investigations operate largely independent of Justice Department control under decades-old federal regulations, and Garland said the "appointment underscores the department's commitment to both independence and accountability in particularly sensitive matters".
On November 19, 2022, Elon Musk, four weeks after taking ownership of Twitter, reinstated both Trump's personal account and Trump's campaign account, nearly two years after Trump was permanently banned from the platform by previous Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, due to Twitter's Glorification of Violence and Civic Integrity policies, following the January 6 United States Capitol attack.
In late November 2022, Kanye West announced his own candidacy for the 2024 presidential election. Shortly thereafter, West visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago, bringing with him Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist and Holocaust denier. West claimed that after he asked Trump to be his vice-presidential candidate, "Trump started basically screaming at me at the table telling me I was going to lose". Trump responded with a statement that West "unexpectedly showed up with three of his friends, whom I knew nothing about", and in a further statement acknowledged advising West to drop out of the race. Several other possible 2024 contenders spoke in the aftermath of this event, with Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson calling the meeting "very troubling", and Trump's former vice president Mike Pence calling on Trump to apologize for giving Fuentes "a seat at the table". Mitch McConnell said that Trump was unlikely to win the 2024 presidential election as a result of the dinner.
On December 3, 2022, following the publication of the "Twitter Files" by Elon Musk, Trump complained of election fraud and posted to Truth Social, calling for "the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution".
In early 2023, Trump told his staff to hire white nationalist and anti-Muslim activist Laura Loomer to work on his campaign. After a backlash, the campaign decided not to hire her.
After several years of vilifying mail-in voting and early voting as rife with fraud and a contributor to supposed 2020 election fraud, by April 2024 Trump was advising supporters to use those voting methods in the coming election. The RNC was also encouraging Republican voters to use those methods, as well as promoting ballot harvesting, which they called "ballot chasing". Ballot harvesting was the subject of the 2022 Dinesh D'Souza film 2000 Mules, which falsely alleged an organized scheme by Democrats to commit fraud by the method.
During the campaign, Trump often referred to "election integrity" to allude to his continuing lie that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen, as well as baseless predictions of future mass election fraud. As he did during the 2020 election cycle, without evidence Trump told supporters that Democrats might try to rig the 2024 election. Many Republicans believe a conspiracy theory claiming Democrats engage in systematic election fraud to steal elections, insisting election integrity is a major concern, though voting fraud is extremely rare. By 2022, Republican politicians, conservative cable news outlets and talk radio echoed a narrative of former Trump advisor Steve Bannon that "if Democrats don't cheat, they don't win." Appearing with Trump in April 2024, House Speaker Mike Johnson baselessly suggested "potentially hundreds of thousands of votes" might be cast by undocumented migrants; as president, Trump falsely asserted that millions of votes cast by undocumented migrants had deprived him of a popular vote victory in the 2016 election.
Politico reported in June 2022 that the RNC sought to deploy an "army" of poll workers and attorneys in swing states who could refer what they deemed questionable ballots in Democratic voting precincts to a network of friendly district attorneys to challenge. In April 2024, RNC co-chair Lara Trump said the party had the ability to install poll workers who could handle ballots, rather than merely observe polling places. She also said that the 2018 expiration of the 1982 consent decree prohibiting the RNC from intimidation of minority voters "gives us a great ability" in the election. Trump's political operation said in April 2024 that it planned to deploy more than 100,000 attorneys and volunteers to polling places across battleground states, with an "election integrity hotline" for poll watchers and voters to report alleged voting irregularities. Trump told a rally audience in December 2023 that they needed to "guard the vote" in Democratic-run cities. He had complained that his 2020 campaign was not adequately prepared to challenge his loss in courts; some critics said his 2024 election integrity effort is actually intended to gather allegations to overwhelm the election resolution process should he challenge the 2024 election results. Marc Elias, a Democratic election lawyer who defeated every Trump court challenge after the 2020 election, remarked, "I think they are going to have a massive voter suppression operation and it is going to involve very, very large numbers of people and very, very large numbers of lawyers."
In March 2024, veteran Republican elections attorney Charlie Spies joined the RNC as chief counsel, his role to include overseeing the deployment of lawyers and volunteers at polling places in battleground states in the campaign's election integrity effort. Spies resigned less than two months later, citing potential time commitment conflicts with the law firm where he remained employed. Trump had approved his hiring, but in recent weeks became angered that Spies had previously represented rivals Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney and Ron DeSantis, and had publicly disputed election denial claims that there had been fraud in the 2020 presidential election.
On May 26, 2024, Trump spoke at the 2024 Libertarian National Convention. During his speech, Trump made a play for the Libertarian Party's nomination and vowed to appoint a Libertarian to his cabinet. Trump was eliminated during balloting, with Chase Oliver being selected as the Libertarian nominee.
National primary polling showed Trump leading by 50 points over other candidates during the Republican primaries. After he won a landslide victory in the 2024 Iowa Republican presidential caucuses, Trump was generally described as being the Republican Party's presumptive nominee for president. On March 12, 2024, Trump officially became the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party.
Mike Pence served as Trump's vice president from 2017 to 2021, with Pence having been Trump's chosen running mate in both the 2016 and 2020 elections. In March 2021, Bloomberg News reported that if Trump runs again in 2024, Pence "likely won't be on the ticket" and that Trump had "discussed alternatives to Pence", while Trump's advisors "have discussed identifying a Black or female running mate for his next run". In April 2021, Trump indicated that he was considering Florida governor Ron DeSantis for the position, noting his friendship with him; he later criticized and ridiculed DeSantis who launched his own presidential campaign on May 24, 2023. In June 2022, a former aide testified that Trump had opined to his staff during the Capitol Hill attack that Pence "deserved" the chants of "hang Mike Pence" made by the rioters. However, on a Truth Social post, Trump denied that he said Pence deserved to be hanged. Names raised as possible candidates for the position included:
In January 2024, independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claimed that Trump had approached him to be his running mate and that he had refused the offer. Trump campaign advisor Chris LaCivita denied that the Trump campaign had ever approached Kennedy to be Trump's running mate, however, and added that they had no plans on ever doing so. In April, multiple sources close to Trump once again reported that he was considering Kennedy.
In June, it was reported that the Trump campaign had delivered vetting paperwork to Burgum, Carson, Cotton, Donalds, Rubio, Scott, Stefanik, and Vance.
In July, at the 2024 Republican National Convention, JD Vance (R-OH) was announced as Trump's running mate.
Vance is the first Ohioan to appear on a major party presidential ticket since John Bricker (Thomas Dewey's running mate in 1944), the first person to have facial hair since Dewey himself, in his 1948 upset loss as presidential nominee, and the first veteran since John McCain in 2008, all of whom were Republicans. If elected, he would be the first Ohio native to be elected to the vice presidency since Charles Dawes in 1924, the first to have facial hair since Charles Curtis in 1928—both of whom were Republicans—and the first veteran since Al Gore in 1992. He was also the first Millennial, Marine veteran, and veteran of the Iraq War and the wider War on Terror on a presidential ticket.
On July 21, 2024, Joe Biden, the incumbent Democratic president of the United States, announced his withdrawal from the 2024 United States presidential election, and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his replacement. By August 5, Harris had officially secured the nomination via a virtual roll call of delegates. The next day, she announced Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her vice presidential running mate.
Biden's withdrawal reportedly caused problems within the Trump campaign. In an article published on August 10, The New York Times characterized the situation in the Republican camp as "the worst three weeks of Donald Trump's 2024 campaign".
In August 2024, Nick Fuentes began a "digital war" against the Donald Trump 2024 presidential campaign, which he dubbed "Groyper War 2" aimed at pressuring the Trump campaign to adopt further-right positions on race and immigration and fire Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles. In addition to directing his followers to make their demands trend on Twitter and Truth Social, Fuentes threatened to "escalate pressure in the real world", urging followers to withhold their votes and protest Trump rallies in battleground states. By mid-August, Fuentes took credit for Trump's rehiring of Corey Lewandowski as a senior campaign advisor.
On August 10, 2024, Politico revealed that it had been receiving internal Trump campaign documents from an anonymous source since July 22, including a 271-page vetting report on vice presidential candidate JD Vance's potential vulnerabilities. The Trump campaign confirmed that it had been hacked and blamed "foreign sources hostile to the United States"; it suggested that Iran was responsible, citing a Microsoft report the previous day that an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps intelligence unit was responsible for a spear phishing attack on a former senior official with a presidential campaign. The Washington Post and The New York Times also reported having received the hacked materials. Although the Trump campaign became aware of the hack earlier in the summer, it did not report the hack to law enforcement at the time. The account that sent the documents to the news organizations identified itself as "Robert" and communicated with them via email. Robert claimed to have access to a "variety of documents, from [Trump's] legal and court documents to internal campaign discussions".
On August 26, Trump visited Arlington National Cemetery. NPR reported that after laying wreaths at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in honor of 13 Americans who were slain in the 2021 Kabul airport attack, Trump and his entourage accompanied family members of a slain soldier to his graveside in Section 60, an area where the recently deceased are buried, for filming and photographing. When a cemetery official tried to stop them from bringing in an external photographer and videographer, two staffers verbally abused and pushed the official aside. The staffers were identified by NPR as deputy campaign manager Justin Caporale and Michel Picard, a member of Trump's advance team.
Steven Cheung, the Trump campaign spokesman, stated: "We are prepared to release footage if such defamatory claims are made. The fact is that a private photographer was permitted on the premises and for whatever reason an unnamed individual, clearly suffering from a mental health episode, decided to physically block members of President Trump's team during a very solemn ceremony," and that this "individual was the one who initiated physical contact and verbal harassment that was unwarranted and unnecessary".
Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita in a later statement said: "For a despicable individual to physically prevent President Trump's team from accompanying him to this solemn event is a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hollowed [sic] grounds of Arlington National Cemetery." LaCivita went on to publish on social media more video of Trump's Arlington visit, with LaCivita commenting: "Reposting this hoping to trigger the hacks at @SecArmy," mentioning the social media account of the United States Secretary of the Army, Christine Wormuth. In an interview given to Fox News, Lieut. Gen. Keith Kellogg, who was present, said he had not seen any "dust-up".
On its part, Arlington National Cemetery confirmed the incident, that a report had been filed, and stated: "Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities within Army National Military Cemeteries, to include photographers, content creators or any other persons attending for purposes, or in direct support of a partisan political candidate's campaign." According to the statement, "Arlington National Cemetery reinforced and widely shared this law and its prohibitions with all participants."
On August 27, the campaign released a video on TikTok that included Trump's Section 60 visit, which garnered criticism. He was also faulted for taking photos next to graves while smiling and giving a thumbs up. The Trump campaign pointed to a statement from some of the family members who accompanied Trump, expressing their desire for the visit to be "respectfully captured". Arlington officials updated their statement: "To protect the identity of the individual involved, no further information about the incident is being released at this time." Later on that day, Trump posted a photo on Truth Social of the Gold Star families who had invited him. In the post, the families thanked the president and stated they had invited the campaign to film in Section 60.
On August 28, Trump's running mate, Sen. JD Vance accused Kamala Harris of criticizing Trump's visit to the cemetery, which she had not yet commented on. "She wants to yell at Donald Trump because he showed up," Vance said. "She can go to hell." He also said that the media were "acting like Donald Trump filmed a TV commercial at a gravesite," but he was only "providing emotional support" to the family members. The family of another veteran whose graveside was included in campaign photographs and video said that they had not given permission for it to be included. Later that day, Vance said that his comment of "go to hell" was "colloquial" and further said: "Don't do this fake outrage thing. If Kamala Harris was really outraged about what happened, then she would do her job differently." Vance further alleged that the "media and the Democrats have made a scandal out of something where there really is none", while also saying, "I don't know the details of the altercation between the photographer and somebody in Arlington".
On August 29, the U.S. Army issued a statement rebuking the Trump campaign, saying that the participants had been "made aware of federal laws, Army regulations and DoD policies" against campaign activity on ANC grounds, and that the staff member had been "abruptly pushed aside ... and her professionalism has been unfairly attacked." The Defense Department, the Green Beret Foundation, Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, VoteVets.org, issued similar statements. The Army added that while the incident was reported to the police department at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall, the employee in question "decided not to press charges" so the Army "considers this matter closed". It was also reported that the cemetery worker feared retaliation from Trump supporters. Cheung said in a statement on August 27 that "that is ridiculous and sounds like someone who has Trump Derangement Syndrome".
The same day, Trump said in an interview with NBC News: "I don't know what the rules and regulations are. I don't know who did it. And it could have been them. It could have been the parents. It could have been somebody else." He said that he did not know "anything about it", adding, "[i]f this was a set up by the people in the administration that, oh, Trump is coming to Arlington, that looks so bad for us."
On August 30, at the Moms for Liberty 2024 Convention, in Washington, he characterized the situation as "disgusting", and declared that he did not need that publicity. At a rally in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, he blamed the Biden administration for the deaths of the soldiers.
American Oversight, a government watchdog group, filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Army for documents related to the incident, including incident reports. The group subsequently filed suit to expedite the request, and on October 22, Judge Paul Friedman ruled in their favor, giving the government three days to comply.
In the end stages of the 2024 season the Trump campaign outsourced much of the on the ground campaigning in swing states to America PAC.
As of October 2024, the Trump campaign has asked to travel by military aircraft and other increased security measures. President Biden said he gave instructions for Trump to have the highest possible level of security, as if he were "a sitting president."
In early November 2024, recorded conversations from August 2017 surfaced, allegedly over 100 hours in total, in which the author Michael Wolff interviewed the convicted child sex trafficker and pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, and the latter referred to himself as "Donald's closest friend for 10 years". He also stated that Trump is a "horrible human being" who had affairs with his "best friends' wives." "He does nasty things to his best friends, best friends’ wives, anyone who he first tries to gain their trust and uses it to do bad things to them." Epstein compared him to "an emotionally challenged 9-year-old". "With respect to real estate deals, he’s brilliant. He’s a salesman. He knows real estate really well," Epstein said. "Anything else but that? He knows nothing. No history, no strategy. … He certainly can’t read a balance sheet."
Politico noted in December 2020 that many Republican figures were expressing support for a Trump 2024 run. Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said that he would "absolutely" support Trump if the latter were nominated again. A number of Republican officials at both federal and state levels were quick to endorse Trump's candidacy, while others were noted for being silent on the question, with a few stating opposition, including Senator Bill Cassidy and Senator Mitt Romney.
In April 2022, American intelligence officials assessed that Russia intended to exact revenge on the Biden administration for its sanctions against Russia and aid for Ukraine by intervening in the election on Trump's behalf.
In August 2024, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suspended his independent presidential campaign and endorsed Trump.
Bloomberg noted in January 2025 how a number of highly influential podcasters, including Joe Rogan, Theo Von and Logan Paul, amplified Trump's messages to their audiences, relying on overlapping guests and conservative talking points. A third of the analyzed videos called for voting, inserted among popular non-political topics, and appealed to a generation of male viewers with low levels of social support and negative views of their future.
Notable Republican politicians who either opposed or declined to announce their support publicly include former president George W. Bush, former vice presidents Dan Quayle, Mike Pence, and Dick Cheney, former House Speakers John Boehner and Paul Ryan, as well as former representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. Some of Trump's 2016 and 2024 primary opponents such as Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Carly Fiorina, Chris Christie, Asa Hutchinson, and Will Hurd also declined to endorse or openly opposed the campaign. Republican organizations such as 43 Alumni for America, Haley Voters for Harris, and The Lincoln Project all endorsed Harris. Half of the members of Trump's cabinet did not support his run for president.
The Economist joined a number of news organizations endorsing Harris citing Trump as an unacceptable risk.
In February 2023, Americans for Prosperity (AFP), the flagship of Charles Koch's network of donors and activist groups, announced it would fund a primary challenge to Trump.
Besides the opposition to Trump's candidacy declared by Republican former executive branch officials, senators and representatives, statewide officials, public figures and organizations, Trump was challenged in the primaries by Nikki Haley (February 14, 2023, to March 6, 2024), Vivek Ramaswamy (February 21, 2023, to January 15, 2024), Asa Hutchinson (April 6, 2023, to January 16, 2024), and Ron DeSantis (May 24, 2023, to January 21, 2024).
Other challengers, who withdrew before the primaries, were Perry Johnson (March 2, 2023, to October 20, 2023), Larry Elder (April 20, 2023, to October 26, 2023), Tim Scott (May 19, 2023, to November 12, 2023), Mike Pence (June 5, 2023, to October 28, 2023), Chris Christie (June 6, 2023, to January 10, 2024), Doug Burgum (June 7, 2023, to December 4, 2023), Francis Suarez (June 14, 2023, to August 29, 2023), and Will Hurd (June 22, 2023, to October 9, 2023).
When Nikki Haley announced her 2024 presidential campaign, one of her first statements as a candidate was to call for candidates over the age of 75—which would include both Trump and Biden—to be required to take a competency test. She made the age issue a main campaign point during the rest of 2023 and the 2024 Republican Party presidential primaries. On November 28, 2023, AFP endorsed Nikki Haley.
From August 23 to January 10, 2024, there were five debates among the candidates in the campaign for the Republican Party's nomination for president of the United States in the 2024 United States presidential election. Trump was absent from all of them, and was not planning to attend the debates scheduled for January 18 and 21, 2024. On January 16, when she and Ron DeSantis were the last challengers left, Nikki Haley announced she would not attend the January 18 debate unless Donald Trump took part in it. ABC News canceled that debate, and CNN canceled the January 21 one.
Responding to Haley's challenge, Trump stated that he had successfully taken two cognitive tests, said that anyone who donated to Haley's campaign would be "permanently barred" from the "MAGA camp", and he nicknamed her "birdbrain".
On February 25, 2024, when she lost the election in her home state, Americans for Prosperity cut funding to Nikki Haley's campaign. After winning the primaries in Washington, D.C. (March 3) and Vermont (March 5), Haley suspended her presidential campaign the day after Super Tuesday.
As the results came in on election night, November 5, 2024, Trump won in multiple swing states. In the early morning hours of November 6, media sources declared Trump the winner of the presidency, crediting him with 276 electoral college votes where 270 were needed to win. Harris then phoned Trump to concede and to congratulate him on his victory, whereupon Trump gave a victory speech.
As of November 9, Trump is credited with 312 electoral votes compared to 226 for Harris. In the nationwide popular vote, Trump received over 2.2 million (1.5%) more votes than Harris. Trump is the first Republican presidential candidate since George W. Bush in 2004 to win the national popular vote. Trump is also the first non-incumbent Republican presidential candidate since George H. W. Bush in 1988 to win the national popular vote.