Analysts: ‘Trump hit the right topics. He mobilized his voters, the economy decided’

The economy, immigration and security are the topics that mobilized voters to vote for Donald Trump in the US presidential elections, while the Democratic candidate Kamala Harris focused too much on her rival and failed to clearly define her policies, according to Croatian analysts. ares.

Vlatko Cvrtila reminded that in the months before the elections, all the surveys showed that Americans are most worried about the state of the economy, inflation, immigration and related security.

“Trump managed to mobilize his votes, but also hit on the right topic for undecided voters who are not affiliated with one party or another. That’s why the economy decided,” Cvrtila told Hina.

He also pointed out that Trump presented immigration as a serious security issue that threatens lives and gained the confidence of voters that he could solve it.

He pointed out that Harris was burdened by the fact that she entered the race late and could only continue with the policies that she already had. defined by Joe Biden, with slight modifications.

Another thing, Cvrtila adds, is that the Democrats were very busy with the abortion issue because they thought that the issue, which turned out to be important in the 2022 congressional elections, could be crucial to encourage women who to vote for the protection of their rights.

“The issue of democracy and the protection of institutions had the least impact on the voters’ decisions,” said Cvrtila and stated that Harris, who in the campaign accused Trump of being a fascist and a tyrant, turned too late to a more conciliatory tone and more important topics.

Democrats have been on the defensive from the start

Zcaronko Puhovski, who says that he did not expect that the Republicans could win the White House and both houses of Congress, believes that the Democrats removed Biden from the presidential race too late.

“And then as a substitute candidate they brought in a person from his administration who dragged all the sins of that administration behind her,” said Puhovski, adding that they were in a “defensive position” at the start.

“Trump managed to go beyond his worldview and foreign borders, and the Democratic Party didn’t even manage to secure its borders with Kamala Harris,” said Puhovski.

“He swept away their phraseology. The Democrats didn’t even manage to get their own voters, and Trump got both his and some of theirs,” he said.

“A paradox occurred that the Democrats took the campaign model of non-governmental organizations, which are usually a movement with one slogan, and that here was abortion. This is for such a broad intervention that is expected in the presidential and general elections. it’s simply not enough”, assesses Puhovski.

According to his words, what Trump always has an advantage over all his competitors is that he speaks the language of the street, adding that “in parentheses, he warns about our president”.

“Therefore, the illusion of ‘I speak like them, they speak like me’ is created, in contrast to the alienated political, intellectual elite who speak a different language,” the analyst said.

“Of course it’s nonsense that Trump has ties to the regiment, but at least he pretends to belong to the regiment”.

Harris is well below Hillary

Analyst Davor Gjenero believes that as a liberal it is important for him to emphasize pro-choice politics and equality in society, but that it must be “part of consistent public policies, but not, conditionally speaking, some special politics”.

“If you present it as a separate policy, it becomes empty,” said Gjenero.

“We had the weakest capacitated democratic candidate in recent times. Considerably below the level of Hillary Clinton, who knew how to create public policies,” adds Gjenero.

According to Gjenero, Joe Biden brought stability and opened space for dialogue during his tenure with a centrist position, but when Harris took over the role of candidate, that disappeared.

“The centrist momentum in American politics has been lost. This is very harmful for America, but it also spills over into other democratic orders in the West,” said Gjenero and warned that “the space for rational dialogue is disappearing, divisions are strengthening, and the whole policy begins to function in a war pattern”.

“When you don’t present rational public policies, but a priori interpersonal labeling, turning politics into entertainment, then you are on the verge of the fact that, even after the election, relations will remain as they were during the campaign,” Gjenero said, and asserted that Harris is overly turned to Hollywood and pop stars.

“This should not be done in serious politics,” said Gjenero, while reminding that “Democrats are increasingly tied to the cultural and social establishment, while Trump’s Republicans have become anti-elitist and populist,” Gjenero believes.

Trump wiser in the campaign

Domagoj Juričić alsođer believes that Trump played more wisely than Harris.

Harris, Juru said, is still a representative of the existing establishment, and people, regardless of the fact that macroeconomic data for America are stable, feel inflation and its impact on the everyday life of citizens.

“I would say that the economy and the feeling of security, that is, insecurity, and the migrant policy and the policy of border protection ruled,” said Juričić.

As far as foreign policy is concerned, especially the war in Ukraine and the Middle East, Cvrtila believes that Trump will engage, in part, in the war in Ukraine, but that it will not be his priority focus in his foreign policy and will focus more on the Middle East and China.

“China is his rival with whom he wants to compete and he will be more involved there, because China and the relationship towards China is related to internal economic issues,” said Cvrtila.

Cvrtila believes that some changes in policy towards Ukraine can be expected, but it cannot be said that Trump will act in a way to threaten Ukraine’s position in the war with Russia.

Cvrtila reminded that in 2022 the West adopted a strategy that Russia must not win in that war.

“His administration will be faced with a choice: whether to act within that strategy or decide to stop the conflict and seek a specific solution for the impossibility of further warfare,” said Cvrtila.

Speaking about the war in the Middle East between Israel and multiple terrorist groups on several fronts supported by Iran, Cvrtila stated that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to involve the US in the war in order to weaken the theocratic regime in Tehran.

“He succeeded, Hamas no longer exists, Hezbollah has been decapitated (…) Iran is very careful how to act towards Israel,” Cvrtila said.

He believes that further escalation is not impossible, and that US support for Israel will then be much stronger.

Gjenero is convinced that Trump’s support for Israel will be either equal or stronger than Biden’s.

“I think Trump would have less inhibitions about military interventions against Hamas and Hezbollah, terrorist organizations, than Biden did,” Gjenero said.

Frozen conflict

Speaking about Croatia, Gjenero believes that Croatia must raise its defense allocation to two percent of GDP and that it “must start behaving” like a member of the NATO alliance and be consistent and clear, especially regarding Ukraine.

His fear is that Trump’s America will leave the security of the European continent to Europe and that the need for Western Europe to invest in its security will have to grow.

Juričić he pointed out that Trump despises multilateralism and that he wanted to discuss all the pressing problems in the world only with the leading players.

“Trump does not stick to the EU, but to individual countries. As a small country, we could take advantage of the Three Seas Initiative, which he advocated in the previous mandate,” said Juričić.

As for Ukraine, he predicted that Trump could offer the Russian president a “permanent exit”.

Puhovski believes that Trump will cause great damage to the USA because he will damage institutions and threaten liberal democracy, but that he will bring something good to the world in the short term: “a pause in the bloodshed”.

“He will negotiate a ceasefire and then involve the EU” and we will have a frozen conflict, concludes Puhovski.