THE FATBOY SHOW : The 2024 US election: What happened?

Republicans rejoiced the morning after election day, and Democrats despaired, as it became clear that Donald Trump had won a decisive victory that left no scope for the kind of delay and dispute that afflicted 2020.

In the run-up to the vote, analysts of polling averages had declared the contest too close to call. On election night they were largely vindicated, as it became clear early in the counting that there was no true landslide hiding beneath the public opinion data. All the same, the final vote was markedly less close than last time. Fairly quickly after counting started, the path to 270 electoral college votes for Kamala Harris shrank to a 'blue wall or bust' requirement to squeak out a win by holding Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Before long, it evaporated altogether as it became apparent Trump was on course to win all three of those states. As a live contest, the election was all over well before breakfast time.