The World Reacts To Donald Trump Winning The 2024 Presidential Election
On November 6, 2024, Donald Trump made history as only the second president to win reelection after being voted out of office. The stunning result represents a rebirth for the real estate mogul and former reality TV star. After his supporters rioted in the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021 in an attempt to stop the transfer of power to the Democratic president-elect Joe Biden, some commentators believed his political career was over. When a presidential debate proved disastrous for Biden, he stepped aside and let Vice President Kamala Harris take over the 2024 Democratic ticket. Following an initial bump in numbers for Harris, the polls appeared to tighten before election day, with experts saying the race was too close to call.
As the smoke clears, it seems that polls failed to reveal what appears to be a sizable victory for Trump in both the popular vote and the electoral college. "This was a movement like nobody's ever seen before, and frankly, this was, I believe, the greatest political movement of all time," he told supporters, per The Guardian. "There's never been anything like this in this country, and maybe beyond."
The campaign was notably divisive, and reactions from media commentators have ranged from jubilant to bereft. But whether they support Trump's reelection or not, political leaders from across the globe have to face the reality of dealing with his new administration in 2025, and they've been lining up to show they accept the result in the spirit of international cooperation.
Many world leaders congratulated Trump on his win
Whether to the right or left politically, scores of world leaders took to social media to congratulate Donald Trump on his election victory. United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who has long been a political opponent of Trump's British equivalent, Boris Johnson, praised Trump's "historic" election victory and reiterated the U.S.-U.K.'s "special relationship." "We stand shoulder to shoulder in defence of our shared values of freedom, democracy and enterprise," he wrote in a statement posted to X. Similar messages were posted by French President Emmanuel Macron — who said he was "ready to work together as we did for four years" in an X post — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, and other leaders from across the globe.
In a lengthy X post, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has relied on military support of western allies since the Russian invasion of his country in 2022, congratulated Trump on his "impressive election victory." "I appreciate President Trump's commitment to the 'peace through strength' approach in global affairs," he added, saying he hoped that a Trump administration could help bring "just peace" to the war-torn country.
Meanwhile, Russian president Vladimir Putin apparently has no plans to congratulate the president-elect publicly. Trump has notably praised the dictator many times and has reportedly spoken to him on several occasions in the years since leaving the White House. Nevertheless, as Newsweek reported, Putin ally and Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev described the result as "useful for us."
US political figures on Donald Trump's victory
At home, the news of Donald Trump's historic victory has been met with jubilation from his supporters. "What I'm most impressed by is not just the size of the victory, I know the number is still growing, but the way Donald Trump won this election," Florida Senator Marco Rubio told CNN. "He won it by fundamentally remaking the Republican party, but I hope also revealing to people that for voters in the United States of America, their primary identity is not their ethnicity. It's not their race. It's what they do for a living. It's who they are in their daily lives."
One person who appeared to be decisive to Trump's 2024 campaign is billionaire backer Elon Musk. The controversial figure made several public appearances and countless social media posts on X, the platform he owns, in support of the nominee. "The future is gonna be fantastic," the SpaceX CEO claimed on X alongside a picture of a rocket. Musk, who is expected to play a part in Trump's administration, also posted a crudely photoshopped image of himself carrying a sink into the Oval Office. "Let that sink in," the caption read, referencing a similar post he made after buying Twitter.
Others were less buoyant. Former United States Representative Liz Cheney was one of the several senior Republican figures who had backed Kamala Harris in the 2024 campaign. In a post to X, she urged Americans to accept the result — but said they now had a responsibility to "defend our Constitution, preserve the rule of law, and ensure that our institutions hold over these coming four years."