As the latest episode of NBC News’ “Meet the Press” began, host Kristen Welker welcomed Sen. Eric Schmitt onto the program. Ordinarily, guests respond with some brief pleasantries before the interview begins in earnest, but the Missouri Republican went in a different direction.
Before Welker even asked her first question, the GOP senator began by declaring that Donald Trump won “a mandate” in this year’s presidential election. As the segment unfolded, Schmitt repeated the line more than once, boasting that the president-elect received a “mandate … from the American people.”
Around the same time, on ABC News’ “This Week,” Republican Sen. Bill Hagerty of Tennessee pushed a similar line, telling Jonathan Karl that Trump received an “overwhelming” electoral mandate.
The senators have plenty of company. Immediately after his victory, Trump claimed that the American electorate had delivered an “unprecedented mandate,” and countless GOP voices have echoed the line ever since.
The problem, of course, is that reality keeps getting in the way. The New York Times published a compelling analysis, explaining that the Republican’s victory “was neither unprecedented nor a landslide.”
In fact, he prevailed with one of the smallest margins of victory in the popular vote since the 19th century and generated little of the coattails of a true landslide. The disconnect goes beyond predictable Trumpian braggadocio. The incoming president and his team are trying to cement the impression of a “resounding margin,” as one aide called it, to make Mr. Trump seem more popular than he is and strengthen his hand in forcing through his agenda in the months to come.
On the surface, the argument, such as it is, might seem unnecessary. Trump won, fair and square. He’ll have power and the ability to pursue his goals.
But the details matter. As things stand, according to the latest tally from the Cook Political Report, Trump won 49.86% of the popular vote — a margin of 1.6% over Vice President Kamala Harris. (The Democratic nominee, interestingly enough, came up short while winning a higher percentage of the popular vote than Trump received in 2016 or 2020.)
The bottom line is unambiguous: As a matter of arithmetic, the 2024 contest was a close race in which more Americans voted against him than for him. This is relevant, not for practical reasons, but for political ones. Trump’s many critics can declare, accurately and honestly, to the nation and the world, that the incoming president lacks an electoral mandate. The incoming president and his allies, meanwhile, can try to claim that he’s the one true voice of the nation, but the popular vote totals point in the opposite direction. When some news organizations reported on this last week, Karoline Leavitt, the incoming White House press secretary, responded via social media, “New Fake News Narrative Alert! … The fake news is trying to minimize President Trump’s massive and historic victory to try to delegitimize his mandate before he even takes the Oath of Office again.” But the pushback is baseless. There’s nothing “fake” about actual election results, whether Republicans approve of them or not. Using the word “mandate” over and over again will not change the outcome or make Trump’s coming overreach any less outrageous.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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