Vice President Kamala Harris congratulated Republican rival Donald Trump on his victory and called on Americans to unify one day after suffering a surprisingly lopsided loss in the 2024 presidential election.
The Democratic candidate spoke to the nation Wednesday afternoon from the porch steps of her alma mater, Howard University in Washington D.C., asking her supporters to keep up the fight while wishing Trump well in his second term in the White House.
"Earlier today I spoke with President-elect Trump and congratulated him on his victory," Harris said to a large but subdued crowd of followers. "(I told him) that we will help him and his team with their transition, and that we will engage in a peaceful transition of power."
The scene was in stark contrast to the 2020 election, when then-President Trump refused to accept his defeat to current President Joe Biden and organized the Jan. 6 riot to try to overturn the results. Harris restored the American tradition of a peaceful transfer of political power.
"A fundamental principle of American democracy is that when we lose an election we accept the results," she said. "That principle as much as any other, distinguishes democracy from monarchy or tyranny, and anyone who seeks the public trust must honor it. We owe loyalty not to a president or to a party but to the Constitution of the United States."
Harris also called on her supporters to keep up the fight despite the setback. While I concede this election, I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign," she said. "... Now is not the time to throw up our hands; it's time to roll up our sleeves."
Harris' comments marked the end of a bizarre presidential campaign that included two assassination attempts on Trump's life, saw the incumbent candidate Biden drop out of the race, and featured an amazing surge by Harris, who had hoped to be the first Black, Asian female to be elected to the highest office.
Despite polls showing a dead heat with the winner to be determined by a small group of swing states, Trump ran the table in those critical battlegrounds. He holds a 291-223 lead in the electoral college vote with a handful of states still to be decided.
At about 2 a.m. ET Thursday, the critical state of Pennsylvania was awarded to Trump and Harris' hopes were dashed.
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