Kamala Harris urged her supporters to ‘keep fighting’ as she publicly conceded the presidential election to Donald Trump, saying she will keep
But she vowed to engage in a peaceful transfer of power.
‘While I concede this election, I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign,’ she said.
Her voice shook at times as she addressed a massive crowd of supporters at Howard University, her alma mater.
‘My heart is full today. Full of gratitude for the trust you have placed in me. Full of love for our country and full of resolve.
‘The outcome of this election is not what we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for, but hear me when I say, hear me when I say, the light of America’s promise will always burn bright,’ she said.
‘Look, I am so proud of the race we ran. And the way we ran it,’ she added.
‘Now, I know folks are feeling and experiencing a range of emotions right now. I get it. But we must accept the results of this election. Earlier today, I spoke with President-Elect Trump and congratulated him on his victory. I also told him that we will help him and his team with their transition and we will engage in a peaceful transfer of power.’
A fundamental principal of American democracy is that when we lose an election, we accept the results. That principle as much as any other the distinguishes democracy from monarchy and tyranny. Anybody that seeks the public trust must honor it. At the same time, in our nation, we owe loyalty not to a presidentor a party, but to the constitution of the united States,’ she added.
Her supporters shed tears as she spoke.
‘Kamala, Kamala, Kamala,’ the crowd shouted at her as she took the stage to Beyonce’s ‘Freedom,’ her signature campaign song.
‘We love you,’ was screamed at her. ‘I love you back,’ Harris said.
Kamala Harris formally conceded the election to Donald Trump
Harris running mate Tim Walz and his wife Gwen
Despite a DJ blasting party music including Beyonce and other hits, the mood was dour. Some supporters were wiping away tears. Lots of hugs were exchanged.
‘I’m just so sad,’ said Christine Payack, a 69-year-old public school teacher who resides in Alexandria, Virginia. ‘I could just cry, so I just came to be with others to kind of find solace and a community.’
‘I just don’t understand. All the enthusiasm and joy and large crowds. I’m just in disbelief,’ she continued. ‘And I’m really mourning the country. That more than half of the people could vote for him.’
‘It’s very confusing,’ she added, pointing to Trump’s ‘hateful’ rhetoric – and policies that would drastically impact areas like the environment. ‘And half the county accepts it.’
Nicholas, a 19-year-old Howard University student who declined to give his last name, but said he was born in Jamaica, also expressed dismay.
‘It seems like the vibes were on her side,’ he told DailyMail.com
A 25-year-old who wished to be referred to by her initials K.F. said she and her friends had gone to bed, thinking that – like 2020 – it could be days before there was a result.
She woke up to the news of a Trump win – and came to Howard to be with the like-minded.
‘I think I just wanted to be surrounded by other people and kind of get some sense of unity and inspiration even in the face of defeat. And being really disappointed and feeling kind of hopeless,’ K.F. said.
A Harris supporter wipes away tears
Sen. Laphonza Butler (right) hugs a supporter of Vice President Kamala Harris as they await her concession speech Wednesday on the campus of Howard University in Washington, D.C.
Attendees await Vice President Kamala Harris’ concession speech in the quad at Howard University in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday, after she was defeated by former President Donald Trump
Harris campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon (left) and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (right) arrive at the concession speech
Ahead of her speech, Harris called Trump congratulating him and uring a peaceful transfer of power and encouraging him to be a president for all Americans.
President Joe Biden then called Trump and invited him to the White House just as Michigan was called – the fifth swing state to go in the Republican’s favor.
Her concession address came a little more than 15 hours after campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond, a Biden White House aide and former member of Congress from Louisiana, appeared onstage.
He addressed what was left of the crowd on the Howard University quad a little before 1 a.m. on Wednesday.
‘We still have votes to count, we still have states that have not been called yet. We will continue overnight to fight to make sure that every vote is counted, that every voice has spoken, so you won’t hear from the vice president tonight,’ Richmond said.
What he didn’t say was that there was still a viable path to victory.
Throughout the night, the campaign highlighted data points that could spell surprise good news for Harris – higher-than-expected turnout in Philadelphia, votes yet to be counted in Detroit.
But in the end Harris didn’t improve upon President Joe Biden’s performance against Trump four years ago.
Democrats had been counting on holding the trio of states – Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania – to give Harris the White House. Biden won them in 2020.
But Trump won them instead, giving him 292 electoral votes to Harris’s 224. It takes 270 to win the presidency.
Harris is now on track to do worse than Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election. She could even be on pace to have the worst Electoral College result of any Democrat since the 1988 race.
Trump is the first president in over 130 years, and only the second in history, to win a non-consecutive second term.
Exit polls show his victory came after he made gains with nearly every voting bloc he lost in the 2020 election and put together a coalition of multi-ethnic working-class voters.
And Harris did worse on Tuesday than Biden in the 2020 contest among key voting groups including women, the working class and Latinos.
The exit polls suggested voters trusted Trump more to fix the economy.
They overwhelmingly believed the Biden-Harris administration had put the country on the wrong track.
The blame game has begun.
‘It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,’ Senator Bernie Sanders said in a blistering statement.
‘First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right.’
Harris supporters hug ahead of her concession speech at Howard University in Washington
Two devastated supporters wait for Harris to take the stage at Howard University
After a brutal night of results for the Democrats, some of them had their heads in their hands
Supporters wait for Vice President Kamala Harris to arrive to deliver her concession speech
Democratic National Committee chair Jaime Harrison, who announced he wouldn’t be seeking the position again after Harris’ defeat, shows up to the party
A jubilant Trump celebrates his victory with wife Melania in Palm Beach, Florida, on Tuesday night
On Tuesday night a Harris supporter reacts to results showing Trump heading towards victory
Harris’ loyal fans watch the results pour in on Election Night Tuesday at Howard University
A janitor picks up trash left by Harris supporters after they deserted her victory party
A lone American flag stands in the middle of what was supposed to be Harris’ victory party
In fact the Republican had made gains in nearly every demographic besides college-educated women.
At Howard Tuesday night had kicked off with a sense of elation.
The nation was – again – close to electing its first female president – and also the first female president of color.
Two barriers broken – the glass ceiling finally smashed.
But a blond billionaire businessman thwarted that effort again.
As the election returns came in, the crowd got more quiet, as a DJ loudly played music as the jumbotrons played a muted CNN.
The volume only came on the TVs to announce Harris’ wins – Washington, Hawaii and then Virginia.
It turned back off as John King showed his magic wall turning red.
In the end, Harris’ run was a Hail Mary pass.
Harris ran the shortest presidential campaign in modern American history.
She picked up the baton on July 21st from President Joe Biden after he decided to abandon his reelection bid after being pressured, for weeks, by Democratic Party heavyweights after his disastrous debate appearance against Trump.
Voters, for months, had warned that they had major reservations about putting the 81-year-old back in office for four more years as he suffered gaffe after gaffe and stumble after stumble.
Then, for 90 minutes on the Atlanta debate stage, the oldest president in U.S. history showed his age.
Biden’s chances of winning another four years quickly plummeted and so he called Harris and asked her to take his place.
With all the Democratic primaries already done, she was able to get the Biden delegates to commit to her in less than 36 hours.
Harris accepted the Democratic nomination on the Chicago stage just four weeks later.
She built what appeared to be a strong coalition of surrogates – receiving support from progressive like Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and anti-Trump Republicans, like former Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger.
Seeking to project a message of unity, Harris pledged that her opponents would get a ‘seat at the table’ and promised to name a Republican member of her Cabinet.
She had a widely praised debate against Trump in September.
Onstage in Philadelphia, Harris successfully baited Trump into ranting about the crowd size at his events.
‘People start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom, said Harris, provoking a furious response.
In one of the most memorable moments of the entire race – the former president accused Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, of ‘eating the dogs… eating the cats. They’re eating the pets.’
Harris laughed and called him ‘extreme.’
The Democrat caught a lucky break when comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made a joke-gone-bad about Puerto Rico, describing the audience at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally as an ‘island of garbage’.
The Harris campaign rapidly moved to court the influential Puerto Rican voting bloc – though that effort fell short.
She made a number of verbal slips.
Former Obama political advisor David Axelrod described her answers at a CNN town hall in late October as ‘word salad city’.
Harris was also, perhaps, fortunate that there was no serious blowback from voters over allegations made about ‘second gentleman’ Doug Emhoff.
DailyMail.com reported that Emhoff had impregnated the family’s nanny while married to his first wife, that he allegedly slapped an ex-girlfriend at the Cannes Film Festival and had been ‘inappropriate’ and ‘misogynistic’ at work.
Liberals like former White House press secretary Jen Psaki, AOC and Lady Gaga had fawned over Emhoff and the way he supported his wife on the campaign trail.
Oprah Winfrey (left) introduced Vice President Kamala Harris (right) at her Philadelphia, Pennsylvania rally Monday night
Pop star Lady Gaga performed two songs at Vice President Kamala Harris’ final rally on the campaign trail – in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Monday night
Around 30,000 supporters showed up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Monday night for Vice President Kamala Harris’ final rally, held on the famed Rocky Steps
Harris had major support from Hollywood, too, and used celebrities to support her get-out-the-vote efforts. These included Oprah Winfrey, Beyonce, Tyler Perry, John Legend, Lady Gaga, Fat Joe, Katy Perry, Kerry Washington, Eva Longoria, Jennifer Lopez, Bruce Springsteen and more.
Democratic Party superstars Barack and Michelle Obama supported her campaign in the closing weeks and days.
The final days saw the Harris strategy pivot from attacking Trump to embracing what she termed ‘joy,’ promising to be a president for ‘all Americans.’
Her final rally was in Philadelphia in the all-important commonwealth of Pennsylvania – a state that was called for Trump in the early morning hours.
During that final address, held on the Rocky Steps alongside Oprah Winfrey and Lady Gaga, Harris didn’t once mention Trump by name.
