The Free Press
The biggest winners on election night, of course, were Donald J. Trump and J.D. Vance. But there are plenty of other honorable mentions coming out of Tuesday’s victory. Read our rundown of the winners and losers of the race below, and chime in with your own in the comments.
Losers:
Wife Guys: You have to give it to Doug Emhoff—he emailed me every single day. “My wife is a badass,” read the subject line of one. “Happy birthday, honey,” read another and a third said, “On our 10th wedding anniversary, I got to watch Kamala make history as she accepted the Democratic nomination for president of the United States.” Got it. Tim Walz is another wife guy, though his proverbial wife in this case was Kamala, and all of them came up short when it came to defining a new kind of nontoxic, unthreatened, unburdened masculinity.
Celebrities: When Kamala Harris lost I was shocked, since Jennifer Aniston had endorsed her. Ditto Beyoncé, Megan Thee Stallion, George Clooney, Jennifer Lopez, Anne Hathaway, Cardi B, Billie Eilish, Taylor Swift, Oprah, and basically everyone else who’s walked a red carpet or gotten a vampire facial. The celebs who endorsed Kamala may have actually hurt her chances—their backing further cemented her as the avatar of coastal elites rather than the voice of the people. Hollywood’s Kamala supporters should stick to giving advice on skincare regimens and scented candles.
Drugs: Florida voters swatted down Amendment 3, which would’ve legalized the adult recreational use of marijuana. Similar initiatives in South Dakota and North Dakota failed to pass. Meanwhile, in Massachusetts, where weed is already legal, a ballot measure that would have legalized some psychedelics, including psilocybin and DMT, failed to pass. The people have spoken, and they said they would like to have their mom come pick them up, because they didn’t realize it was that kind of a party.
Tims: A word of caution if you are a woman hoping to occupy the highest office in the land. Someone will come to you with a short list of names for your VP. “He’s safe!” an aide will say. “He’s folksy,” says another. “He’s relatable and he’s kind,” they’ll tell you. Sister, his first name will be Tim and if you want to ever see the inside of the Lincoln Bedroom, you will look them in the eye and tell them to get that Tim far away from you. We’re not going for folksy. Request a Josh.
Fiat Currency: This week, 253 pro-cryptocurrency candidates were elected to the House of Representatives, compared to 115 anti-crypto pols. Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase, is calling it “America’s most pro-crypto Congress ever.” The crypto industry raised over $245 million for this election cycle, and it seems that their, uh, shitcoins were well spent. Meanwhile, Trump promised to make America “the crypto capital of the planet.” The price of a Bitcoin shot to $75,000 on election night. Bye–bye, bills!
More losers: Barack Obama, Lina Khan, brats, girlbosses, joy, polish, Tony Hinchcliffe, elegies.
Winners:
Prediction Markets: Forget Gallup and Siena. You might not have heard of Kalshi or Polymarket before Tuesday, but these are the prediction markets where you can bid on future events like the presidential election and whether Zyn nicotine pouches will be banned by next year. They had Trump up—like, way up—compared to the traditional polls. Tarek Mansour, who runs Kalshi, put it starkly: “Polls 0 Prediction Markets 1.” The next frontier of polling, it turns out, is gambling.
Peter Thiel: When Thiel’s protégé Blake Masters lost to Mark Kelly in 2022, it seemed that the billionaire’s big gamble on a new type of Republican—young, brash, technophilic—was a bad one. But his other horse in that year’s race, J.D. Vance, won his Senate race in Ohio. Now Vance is one flipped golf cart away from the Resolute desk. Thiel has been a mentor to Vance since the now-VP’s law school days, and today it seems like the $15 million he spent to get Vance into the Senate was a steal.
Bros with Podcasts: The Nelk Boys, the brothers Paul, Adin Ross, Andrew Schulz, and Theo Von: These are just a few of the YouTubers and comedians who landed long interviews with Trump ahead of Election Day. And then there are the bigger dogs—the big bros?—in this space. Joe Rogan sat down with Trump for three hours last week, while Tim Dillon got on mic with J.D. Vance. No one in tech—other than Elon Musk—was more influential than the Besties: Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks, and David Friedberg, the four hosts of the All-In podcast, who spearheaded Silicon Valley’s embrace of the Don.
Moderate Democrats from Pennsylvania: Josh Shapiro and John Fetterman are shaping up to be the future of Democratic Party (that is, if the party wants to start winning again). Shapiro and Fetterman are moderate Democrats who know how to speak to blue-collar voters, and they have no patience for the young radicals within their ranks eager to play footsie with Hamas. They also seem to understand the new rules of the game: Fetterman just went on Rogan.
Professional Wrestling: If I had told you a decade ago that Hulk Hogan would’ve gotten top billing at the RNC and that Dana White would stand next to president-elect Donald Trump onstage the night he was elected, I should hope you would’ve told me to check my meds. But here we are. Pugilism, in politics and otherwise, is in. Let’s hope the mania stops short of wet T-shirt contests on the South Lawn.
More winners: Thomas Massie, raw milk, tradwives, being rough around the edges, hillbillies.
Suzy Weiss is a reporter for The Free Press. Follow her on X @SnoozyWeiss, and read her piece “The People Who Rage Against the Machine.”
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