10 Reasons for the Big Blue Wave

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I wrote the other day about a top reason US voters said they voted for Democrats in such large numbers — corruption in the Trump household, Trump administration, and Republican Party. It was surprising to me that this showed up as the biggest factor for so many people … even though it was also a huge one for me. However, I think everyone knows what the most significant reason was for the dramatic, historic shift in voting. It’s the economy, stupid! That’s the famous old quote from James Carville, a political strategist working for Bill Clinton when he was running for president in 1992, and it’s as relevant as ever. With that in mind, let’s take a look at some of the top reasons for the Big Blue Wave.

1. Inflation!

Inflation has hit and hit and hit. Donald Trump said while campaigning for president in 2024, “Starting on day one, we will end inflation and make America affordable again.” However, of course, beyond the fact that he didn’t come close to doing that and was just making an obviously false promise, Trump actually jacked up inflation significantly with his obsessive, high tariffs and with his war on Iran. Whereas it’s often hard to tie inflation to a specific presidential policy, in this case, we had two specific presidential policies that clearly caused inflation! Even when there are no clear links, voters blame the president for such matters, so imagine how much they must have done so in this case!

2. The Economy Isn’t Great Either!

Aside from inflation, the economy overall isn’t great. The country isn’t adding a bunch of jobs, wages and salaries aren’t rising much, and people by and large don’t feel optimistic about their financial futures. So, combined with quickly rising costs, a very meh economy had voters wanting change.

3. Corruption

As already discussed at length, voters were fed up with corruption in the Republican Party. As some CleanTechnica readers pointed out, if people were prospering financially and not being hit with severe inflation, many of them probably wouldn’t care about the corruption. However, when considering #1 and #2, people naturally get quite frustrated with blatant corruption and essentially high-volume robbery from Donald Trump, the Trump family, Trump staffers, and the Republican Party broadly.

4. The War on Iran

Naturally, this is heavily linked to #1, since it is largely this war that has led to gas prices rising so much. However, also more broadly, Americans are fed up with forever wars in the Middle East, there’s never been a good and strong case for why Trump started this war (as tends to be the case with these wars in the Middle East), and many people really don’t like seeing innocent schoolchildren being bombed to death. Trump was supposed to be an anti-war president (I know that many people believed that, even though Trump is a naturally aggressive, violent person who seemed to me like someone who would obviously get into wars). Voters who cared a lot about this topic might have felt betrayed by Trump and swung strongly away from him and the Republican Party (which has a tendency to get us into these oil wars in the Middle East).

5. Inhumane, Gestapo-like Immigration Army

Even for many people who thought we needed stronger actions to stop people from coming to the United States, the inhumane, deadly, Gestapo-like ICE army — often including violent people with their faces covered and without ID acting like the mafia — was a step or ten too far. There are countless stories of good, innocent people being jailed without cause, or even murdered, by this Nazi-like police force. There was clearly a huge blue shift in certain places as a result of this.

6. Democracy!

Many voters have gotten extremely concerned about Republicans under Trump’s leadership eroding the foundations of our democracy. While this became a major problem in Trump’s first term, he has gone much further in his second term. Apparently, more people have woken up to this problem and it has freaked them out.

7. AI Craze

A massive rollout of AI and data centers — often feeling completely forced on us — has upset a lot of Americans. This does come back to #1, too. Giant data centers have jacked up electricity prices a ton in several regions. Others are threatened with the same thing happening. The same thing has also happened from the crypto craze, which more and more people have also found to be a scam. Seeing billions upon billions trillions of dollars funneled toward AI companies while people are struggling, and then seeing electricity prices rising significantly — surprise, surprise — pisses people off and makes them vote for change.

8. Money.

9. Money.

10. Money.

No matter how you cut it, people vote based on money — in particular, their own money. Whether it’s food prices, gas prices, electricity prices, clothing prices, doll prices, computer prices, car prices, or other prices, people don’t like it when they have to pay a lot more money for stuff — especially when they aren’t making much more money, or more money at all. Simply put, this matter deserves extra weight, because the critical thing swing voters are often voting on is just that — money.

It’s the economy, stupid!

Of course, there are solar, wind, and EV aspects to all of this. Trump has made the US spend a fortune to stop wind and solar farms from providing the US with cheap electricity, and he has made the US spend a fortune keeping old, dirty coal power plants open. High gas prices have also pushed people to buy electric cars, but mostly in other countries where there’s more EV choice and more people have more sense on this topic. However, by and large, I don’t think American voters really shifted much based on Trump stopping renewable energy projects, promoting coal and gas, or limiting EV choice in the United States. People voting for Democrats on climate and cleantech matters were already voting for Democrats based on these issues. It’s unlikely many people at all shifted from red to blue because of these factors.

Images courtesy of MS NOW.