It was shortly after 2:30 a.m. in West Palm Beach, Florida, this Wednesday, November 6, when Donald Trump took the stage in the convention center hall, his headquarters. Building on his success in the key states of Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia, the Republican candidate is hastening to claim what so many feared: his victory in the American presidential election. “Thank you for electing me the 47th president of the United States. We have written history,” he proclaimed in front of his supporters, despite only having 267 electors out of the 270 required to win.
But two hours later, around 4:40 a.m. (10:40 a.m. French time), the result is clear: Donald Trump has a total of 276 electors, confirming his victory. A triumph which did not fail to provoke an international reaction. While the eyes of the whole world have been fixed on the United States for several months, the foreign press hastened to comment on this historic episode.
“A day of despair”
Like the New Yorker’s biting speeches, the media had no shortage of metaphors to describe this victory. “A day of despair” where “vulgarity, corruption, pettiness, narcissism and bigotry were rewarded at our expense,” writes the english daily The Guardian, before adding “that a violently and grossly misogynistic man was elevated to a position of power at the expense of an imperfect but competent and hard-working woman.” THE British business daily The Financial Timeshe describes the re-election of Donald Trump as an “existential disaster for the Democrats”, warning that “there will be no turning back after the seismic result of the 2024 American election”. Across the Atlantic, THE Los Angeles Times prefer to talk about the exceptional nature of this success, recalling that the Republican “overcame a shooting and an unexpected rival to win a historic second term”.
And this second victory was not only applauded by the Californian daily. Nicknamed “the colossus” by the New York PostDonald Trump found loyal support in the American newspaper. “I’m not going to judge Trump’s sins or mistakes here, although I am aware of them to the point of not voting for him. […] I’m here to represent hundreds of millions of people around the world who are speechless, amazed that Trump made it here on election night in 2024,” wrote John Podhoretz, columnist in the One of America’s oldest newspapers, “His utter refusal to bend or be broken by enemies and critics, and his determination to redeem himself by regaining the office he lost, have no parallel. to my knowledge”, can we also read.
If the daily insists so much on the invincibility of the Republican candidate, it is because his third campaign was marked by two assassination attempts, the guilt of 34 counts and a criminal conviction. Last May, Manhattan Criminal Court found him guilty of concealing a payment of $130,000 to pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels. After multiple postponements so as not to hinder the presidential campaign, the sentence of the former American president was finally to be pronounced on November 26. But Donald Trump’s victory once again shuffles the cards. For Politicothere is therefore no doubt, beyond having “beat Kamala Harris [Donald Trump] beat the system that tried to put him in prison,” becoming “the first convicted felon to win a presidential election.”
Is it the Democrats’ fault?
Despite the legal cases involving him, Donald Trump was still able to count on the support of his voters, won over by his measures on inflation and immigration. “So many people who voted for Donald Trump have told me repeatedly that they felt the economy was much better when he was in office, and that they were tired of trying to make ends meet “, confides a BBC journalist.
Second determining element in the billionaire’s victory: the counterproductive strategy of the Democrats. Starting with the failed entry into the running of the outgoing president. “If Joe Biden had withdrawn six months earlier, Democrats would have had time to find a better candidate than Harris. […] “She was mediocre at best when the conversation turned to the economy, a topic she did her best to avoid.” Financial Times. An argument also worn by The Daily Beast : “President Biden is not too old to know what he did. No matter how handicapped he may be by his age, he should know that he should have resigned after one good term. Democrats would have then was able to choose someone in the usual way, during the primaries.”
For the British daily The Timesthe fault is also to be found on the side of the Democratic candidate who “misjudged the gap in enthusiasm and overestimated her position on the ground”. “It appears that this confidence in women’s enthusiasm for Harris was misplaced,” he continued, recalling “that a similar situation occurred with Hillary Clinton in 2016.”
Whatever the reasons behind Donald Trump’s victory, this success should not be without consequences. “We can expect massive changes in US foreign and security policy, which are likely to have negative repercussions, particularly for Europeans,” fears the German newspaper Spiegel referring to a possible withdrawal of the United States from NATO, adding that “Trump sees the world as a jungle in which only the law of the strongest applies. For The Guardianthe consequences of this mandate will be summed up in “those ironic punishments of classical mythology or Dante’s Inferno”.
A situation that the Swiss daily Time sees it differently, believing that the Republican’s actions will not be as radical: “He spoke in a caricatured way to his electorate, with a megaphone and combat sports stars to get elected. There is no guarantee that he will take action.”