2024 Election: Will the Loser Accept Defeat?

With just three weeks left until the U.S. presidential election, there’s still no clear sign as to who will end up winning on November 5. The only thing that is apparent at this point of the campaign is the fact that it’s going to be an extremely tight race to the White House and that whoever is going to win is probably going to do so by a razor thin margin.

In light of the events that unfolded in the aftermath of the 2020 election, culminating in the storming of the Capitol on January 6, the closeness of the race raises the question of whether the eventual loser of the 2024 election will admit defeat and publicly acknowledge that his or her opponent is the legitimate president of the United States.

According to a recent poll conducted by the Pew Research Center, there’s a sizeable gap in expectations regarding each candidate’s handling of a possible defeat. According to Pew’s findings, 72 percent of registered voters think that Kamala Harris will accept the results and acknowledge Trump’s victory in case he wins enough votes cast by eligible voters in enough states. With Trump on the other hand, people aren’t so sure. Just 24 percent of voters think that he’ll concede the race and accept Harris’ victory if she ends up winning the election.

Interestingly, Democrats and Republicans are also divided on how important it is for their candidate to accept the election result one way or another. While 61 percent of Harris supporters think it’s very important for her to accept defeat in case of a Trump victory, just 32 of Trump supporters think it’s very important for him to acknowledge a possible defeat.