ANDY PUZDER: Trump won in an ‘It’s the economy, stupid’ election. Democrats chose just to be stupid

In the end, it was simply "the economy, stupid," to quote James Carville, President Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign strategist.  

Yes, massive illegal immigration, out of control crime, woke cultural advocacy, an international order collapsing under geopolitical tension, and Vice President Harris’ apparent inability to handle a press conference – let alone the job of president – all contributed to her devastating loss.  

But nothing topped the economy. Nothing. According to an AP VoteCast survey, 96% of voters said "high prices for gas, groceries and other goods" factored into their decision on how to vote.    

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As I wrote on these pages in May, people wanted their lives back, they wanted financial security, opportunity, a brighter future, good paying jobs and a better life. They believed former President Donald Trump could give that to them and Harris could not. Bidenomics, which Harris supported and praised, had provided them with nothing and offered them nothing.  

Grocery and gas prices were a major influence on how people voted. (iStock)

Despite all the talk about growing the economy "from the Middle Out and Bottom Up—Not the Top Down" (whatever that meant) Bidenomics did just the opposite.  

It resulted in an America where wealthy asset-owning Americans enjoyed historic stock market highs, soaring real estate values and higher interest rates on fixed income investments (like bonds). But for working- and middle-class Americans dependent on their jobs to get by, real wages decreased as the price of virtually everything simultaneously increased by a dramatic 20+%, the steepest inflation since President Ronald Reagan’s first term which ended 40 years ago.  

Then it got worse. Following the Biden-Harris inflationary surge, interest rates rose to bring the rate of inflation down. Higher interest rates made it difficult to buy a home or a new car, or simply to keep up with credit card debt. Families that went from saving for that new home under Trump to worrying about paying their rent under Harris noticed the difference. Harris, the Democrats, and some Nobel Prize winning economists apparently did not.  

Perhaps they forgot that tangible economic results matter more to everyday Americans than obscure economic indicators. All that "you don’t know how good you’ve got it" talk coming from the left’s economic experts alienated and insulted them. It came from a bubble in which they did not live. They simply were not feeling what the left’s economist claimed they were seeing – rather, they felt ignored. 

This may well be a sea-change election, and that change is this – for good reason, working- and middle-class Americans now trust President-elect Trump’s Republican Party, not Democrats, to act in their best economic interests. This change likely came as a shock to both Biden and Harris. They followed the long-established, progressive tactic of using government largesse to buy voter support – literally spending trillions of dollars in the process. How could they have spent so much and be appreciated so little? 

Well, they ignored warnings from their own experts that additional government giveaways following the pandemic, but before supply chains had recovered, would put demand on steroids leading to inflation we had not "seen in a generation" to quote the Democrats’ economist emeritus Larry Summers. As a result, inflation predictably surged and was followed by an interest rate surge to fight it.  

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The Biden-Harris plan was always economic suicide. As things turned out, it was also political suicide.  

To address the economic pain that government largesse caused, the supposed "change candidate" proposed changing nothing. Harris had no economy wide plan for prosperity. All she had were more targeted government programs designed for political gain – such as price fixing for grocers or $25,000 giveaways to buy a house. As for a plan to get us back to prosperity, I repeat, Harris had nothing. 

But for working- and middle-class Americans dependent on their jobs to get by, real wages decreased as the price of virtually everything simultaneously increased by a dramatic 20+%, the steepest inflation since President Ronald Reagan’s first term which ended 40 years ago.  

Perhaps one of the great ironies of this campaign will be that Harris may have lost the election on a leftist screed-fest thinly veiled as a talk show called "The View." When asked how she would govern differently than President Joe Biden – clearly a softball question – she said, "There is not a thing that comes to mind."  

Seriously, the "change candidate" was unprepared to answer the "how would you change things" question? That response may well become the epithet for her "not a thing comes to mind" campaign. 

Facing the prospect of continued economic decline, Americans remembered how a short time ago, under a president who reduced everyone’s taxes, slashed government regulations and cut the costs of domestic energy production – encouraging greater production at lower prices – they experienced historically low unemployment, historically high family incomes, record low poverty rates, a reduction in income inequality – and all without inflation. He promised to do so again. Americans were ready for a president who understood their concerns and would address them.  

The promise of a return to prosperity decisively elected Donald J. Trump as our 47th president in a stunning political comeback. But the really stunning thing is that Democrats appear not to have seen it coming.   

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Andy Puzder was chief executive officer of CKE Restaurants for more than 16 years, following a career as an attorney. He is currently a senior fellow at both the America First Policy Institute and the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy. His next book, "A Tyranny for the Good of its Victims – The Ugly Truth About Stakeholder Capitalism" will come out  early next year.