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On the eve of the 2016 election, voters faced a choice between two historically unpopular candidates: Trump’s unfavourability rating was the worst in presidential polling history, according to Gallup, at 61 per cent. Clinton’s, at 52 per cent, was at that point the second-worst. In the run-up to 2020, things were only marginally less negative: Trump was viewed unfavourably by 57 per cent of voters, and Biden by 50 per cent.

This time around, only 48 per cent viewed Trump unfavourably, compared with 50 per cent for Harris. His favourability ratings, meanwhile, rose from 36 per cent when he won in 2016 to 50 per cent this time around.

When it comes to levels of enthusiasm, things have also shifted markedly: a YouGov survey two weeks before the 2024 election found 76 per cent of Republican voters would feel “enthusiastic” (rather than merely “satisfied”) if Trump were to win (66 per cent of Democrats felt the same about Harris). That compares with just 45 per cent of Republicans who felt enthusiastic about him in 2016 and 67 per cent in 2020 (in that election, a meagre 61 per cent of Democrat voters felt enthusiastic about Biden, the eventual winner).

The 2016 and 2020 elections were won because voters were motivated to keep out first Clinton and then Trump. But while the Democrats tried to win on a negative basis again, focusing much of their campaign on maligning Trump, this ended up being an ineffective strategy.

Voters didn’t enter the polling booths holding their noses; they went in with their eyes wide open. This was a positive endorsement of Trump, not a vote for the least bad option. As a distressed Democrat said to me last week: “The last time he won, nobody knew what we’d be getting. This time it’s like, ‘Wow, OK, you people actually want this.’”

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