In every election, there are a few tipping points that lead to victory for the winning candidate. The 2024 campaign had no shortage of high-profile moments that shaped the race and ultimately produced Trump’s historic victory. Here are the most significant ones that paved the way for Tuesday’s result.
MAY 30 – Trump’s New York Conviction
In May of this year, a New York court convicted Trump on 34 felony counts in what can only be described as a politicized sham trial. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg relied on a so-called “novel legal theory” to justify the prosecution, and the case was rife with instances of apparent bias from the judge and jury.
For Democrats, this was supposed to be the “gotcha” moment with Trump. Finally, they could label him a “convicted felon,” and hopefully throw him in jail to boot.
Instead, the ploy completely backfired – Trump’s poll numbers went up, not down, as Americans saw the left’s lawfare for what it was. Democrats exposed their claims that Trump is a “threat to democracy” as rank hypocrisy, and from that moment on Trump became a symbol of resistance to a weaponized government and legal system.
JUNE 27 – Biden’s Debate Disaster
In a campaign full of historic moments, Biden’s debate against Trump is undoubtedly the worst debate performance in presidential history – so much so that it eventually led to Democrat power players forcing a sitting president out of the race. Biden appeared lost and confused, stumbling over his words while Trump seized the moment and made a strong case for his re-election, opening up a massive polling lead in the following days.
JULY 13 – Trump Narrowly Escapes Death
Trump’s mugshot was already perhaps the most iconic photo in presidential campaign history. But the former president soon delivered an even more stirring image after an assassin’s bullet came within a fraction of an inch from ending his life on a rally stage in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13.
As the Secret Service shielded Trump, he emerged from the pile with a blood-streaked face and a raised fist, repeating “FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT!” The crowd erupted in cheers, and the image quickly exploded on social media. It seemed to encapsulate everything that defined Trump – toughness, grit, and a dogged determination to fight for the American people no matter what.
JULY 15 – Trump Picks JD Vance
It is often said that vice presidential picks don’t matter much. But JD Vance has proven himself an exception to that rule.
Trump made a bold choice in Vance – a former top critic and first-term senator with a relatively sparse political track record. But that bet paid off big, with Vance becoming an invaluable asset to Trump on the home stretch.
Vance quickly became the corporate media’s worst nightmare, sparring with liberal pundits and dismantling the latest media hoaxes live on-air. As much as they tried, the legacy press simply couldn’t get Vance off message, and he used his time on CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, and other liberal networks to tell the American people what those networks weren’t – about the real crisis at the border, how bad inflation actually is, and so on. How many of those viewers were persuaded to pull the lever for Trump after hearing the truth will never be known, but it seems safe to say it wasn’t an insignificant number.
Vance’s vice-presidential debate with Tim Walz was another masterclass in political messaging, with the Ohio senator using the opportunity to focus attention where it belonged – squarely on the failures of the Biden-Harris administration.
Trump has repeatedly spoken about doing a better job of staffing the government this time around with competent, loyal individuals committed to the America First movement. He got off to an excellent start by choosing JD Vance to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.
JULY 19 – Triumphant RNC Convention Speech
Just days after the Pennsylvania rally shooting, Trump appeared on stage at the RNC Convention in Milwaukee to accept the Republican nomination for president. Ear bandage and all, Trump delivered a rousing 90-minute speech that set the stage for the final four months of the campaign.
“Together, we will launch a new era of safety, prosperity, and freedom for citizens of every race, religion, color and creed,” Trump said. “The discord and division in our society must be healed. We must heal it quickly. As Americans, we are bound together by a single fate and a shared destiny. We rise together. Or we fall apart.”
After the shooting and the outpouring of sympathy that followed, Trump’s hopeful, unifying speech shattered the caricature that Democrats had worked so hard to build off a selfish, bitter former president bent on political revenge. What Americans saw of Trump in Milwaukee was a man who had given up a life of luxury and celebrity to endure grueling months on the campaign trail and literally put his life on the line to defend the interests of everyday Americans. It was Trump at his finest in perhaps the biggest moment of his political career.
JULY 21 – Democrats Drop Biden
Biden’s sudden exit from the race on July 21 was one of the most earth-shattering events in presidential campaign history, leaving Democrats without a nominee with just over three months to go until Election Day.
The Democrat establishment’s decision to install Harris without any sort of primary process – in effect disenfranchising 14 million Democrat primary voters who cast ballots for Biden – looks in hindsight to be a strategic mistake of epic proportions. Democrat turnout was far below 2020 and just barely above 2016, indicating a fatal lack of enthusiasm among the Democrat base.
Biden being forced out of the race confirmed what Republicans had been saying all along – that the president was mentally and physically unfit for office and Democrats had been lying about it for four years. That level of deception evidently did not sit right with even many Democrats. As it turns out, Americans don’t take kindly to political elites rigging the game to install their favored candidate without consulting the voters at all.
SEPTEMBER 10 – Harris’s Sneaky Bad Debate
The one and only debate between Harris and Trump wasn’t the knockout blow for Harris that it proved to be for Biden. With a big assist from the moderators and corporate media spin cycle, Harris managed to keep her head above water.
But as AMAC Newsline reported at the time, Harris likely came off as preachy and condescending to everyday Americans, while her exaggerated facial expressions and canned talking points smacked of inauthenticity – a problem that would continue to plague her candidacy.
OCTOBER 17 – Skipping the Al Smith Dinner & Anti-Catholic Bigotry
Harris’s decision to skip the annual Al Smith charity dinner – which every presidential candidate had attended since 1984 – became the trigger for a cascade of negative headlines exposing Harris’s record of anti-Catholic bigotry and even talk of a campaign shakeup. The snub was highlighted in a series of two-minute ads in battleground states tying her record to that of incumbent Senate Democrats and helping thrust the issue into the mainstream.
According to Washington Post exit poll data, Trump won the national Catholic vote 56 percent to 41 percent – a ten-point improvement over his 2020 performance. Those votes likely proved crucial in what ultimately became the tipping point state in Pennsylvania, with its heavily Catholic population.
OCTOBER 7 – Harris’s Media Tour Fiasco
After studiously hiding the vice president from the media for most of her campaign, the vice president suddenly burst onto TV screens in early October for a flurry of interviews with friendly networks.
To put it mildly, the media tour was an unmitigated disaster. Harris confirmed what Republicans had been saying about her all along – her campaign lacks any substance, while she personally lacks any charisma or understanding of policy. Harris repeatedly said that she would not have done anything differently from Biden, divulged some truly epic word salads, and failed to offer any explanation for how she proposed to pay for her $1.7 trillion economic package.
Those interviews were the start of a steady polling slide for Harris. The more voters saw her, the less they liked.
OCTOBER 20 to OCTOBER 30 – Trump’s McDonald’s & Garbage Truck Moment
Trump’s political career has been nothing if not entertaining, and he delivered two more viral laugh-out-loud moments in the final days of the race.
On October 20 Trump served up fries and burgers at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania – a nod to his own famous love for Big Macs and a dig at Kamala’s dubious claims that she once worked for the fast food franchise. Photos of the former president donning a shirt and tie with an apron and handing paper sacks to drive-through customers became the defining images of the home stretch of the race.
Just over a week later, Trump responded to Biden’s infamous comment slandering Trump supporters as “garbage” by showing up to talk to reporters in a “Trump-Vance” garbage truck wearing a neon vest. The scene was another show of solidarity with the working-class Americans who form the core of Trump’s base and whom Democrats continue to alienate.
Trump’s comeback is already one of the most significant political developments in the history of the United States. In the history of this campaign cycle, these are the moments that made that comeback a reality.
Shane Harris is a writer and political consultant from Southwest Ohio. You can follow him on X @shaneharris513.