Welcome to the last in our series of Policy Conversations between Counsel Public Affairs Senior VP John Delacourt and Counsel PA Account Director Will Shelling about the 2024 US presidential election. John is a veteran Liberal strategist, longtime Policy contributor and novelist, and Will is a Vegas-raised, Vancouver-based NDPer.

By John Delacourt and Will Shelling

November 13, 2024

John Delacourt: Will, greetings from Ottawa, where the nation’s capital is emerging from an epic, weeklong marathon of doomscrolling. If aliens had landed on Parliament Hill and set their forces on the city, they would have been seized with one burning question: who is this god who commands all of them from these little black devices, and what is he communicating to them that has made them oblivious to our invasion? There have been so many takes, so much improvisational analysis and, chiefly, so many bleary-eyed, passionate responses to Trump’s resounding victory over the last week that it’s quite a challenge to say anything about this result that doesn’t cite at least a few other pundits who have come to similar conclusions.

But I believe your perspective is unique, given your roots south of the border, your distance from the bubble and, inevitably, the high-resolution lens you have on some infuriating factors that determined this result.

There are a few wobbly circles in this Venn diagram of distraught voters and supporters of the Harris-Walz campaign. Which are most prominent to you? And what do you feel were most prominent for Team Trump? In other words, who among the electorate principally made the difference for Trump – not necessarily in numbers but in influence?

Will Shelling: Before I answer you, this result was a phantasm in the back of my mind for the last month. Hope has a nasty habit of allowing you to put wind in your sails then only to realize that you’re stuck in the doldrums, far from shore. There have been so many “hot takes” this past week that even using Twitter as a means of interacting with news has become mostly useless. One thing I will say is, that any position about the election that is singular, as in, blames only the Democrats for failing to connect with their base, blames only Latino voters for voting against their best interest, or citing only the War in Gaza and Harris’ position on it as the reason why we got where we are, is frankly, bullshit.

This election is probably the best (and worst) example of a wicked problem. There are so many differing factors within this election ranging from continued economic angst on Main Street despite record profits on Wall Street, the failure of celebrity endorsements to really hit home, and just voter literacy on how the US electoral system works, that makes a postmortem fantastically difficult to assess what really went wrong here. It’s a combination of every factor I’ve mentioned so far, to greater and lesser extents that has now crystallized into very real ways that American and Western life will shift drastically from where we are now.

While legacy media is going to pin this as a great divide within the United States, it really wasn’t that polarizing, especially when compared to other elections in recent memory. It was a slight majority from the GOP that threw them over, along with key wins in major states (like all the battlegrounds). You asked about the most prominent voting blocks, and I think it was every voter who lives paycheque to paycheque. It was a cross-cutting demographic. It captured women, Latinx voters, few Black voters, and many men across the board who simply do not see the impacts of policies in Washington in their day-to-day lives. People voted for Trump because they think that he will deliver more powerful paycheques or because he will bring home manufacturing jobs. I was particularly shocked by this demographic because these are the same people who perhaps do not know much about the democratic process or how economic policies (like tariffs) work, and I don’t blame them. Education is now the largest divide in politics, and this comes as we’re fully seeing the impacts of policies like the No Child Left Behind Act.

John, you’ll recall our first Policy Conversation focused on Tim Walz, and the effect that he had and that we both hoped he would have on American men. I’m also sure you’ve seen the misogynistic rhetoric that has hit social media from men who voted for Trump, especially regarding women. What do you think we can learn from Trump’s strategy to engage men this time around? It’s a very different brand than just the “strongman” moves we saw in 2016 and 2020.

Delacourt: It really is, Will. I remember, when we were initially talking about the potential Tim Walz had for connecting with young (and young-ish) men, the strength of his particular approach was authenticity. A veteran, schoolteacher, devoted father, here was a man who lived his values. The message itself was fairly straightforward; it was a kind of Civics 101 primer, designed to cut through the delusional, tech-bro bullshit that has, at its root, strong foundations in civic narcissism, cynicism, disaffection and distrust of government and government institutions. Walz was speaking from a place that used to be considered solid, midwestern values: there was a life of substance and meaning in giving back, in public service and in belief that we can be better.

Unfortunately, as more than a few pundits have pointed out, the pitch has been queered for that kind of discourse, given what Scott Galloway, who has written and podcasted extensively on how young men are falling behind, is the advent of a whole segment of the media ecosystem devoted to “aspirational masculinity.”

This is not the province of legacy media. The more “provocative” the personalities in this manosphere are, the more likely they clearly were to tap into that wellspring of rage at incumbents that virtually every government is facing, post-pandemic.

I see your point – and largely agree – with what you’re saying about this result owing to a lot of factors for the Democrats. However, I have to say, of all of these factors, I agree with Galloway that the revenge of the manosphere really was decisive, or most prominent. It also remains the most challenging front for progressives, going forward.

And that is probably progressives everywhere. Will, given your transplanted American status, and your perspective honed from working on numerous campaigns here in Canada, do you see similar strains of influence playing a prominent role in the next federal campaign? And in what ways do you think ours might be different

Shelling: Alright, I’m going to go on a tangent here, but it’ll make sense in a second! The Democratic Party attempted to create the largest coalition of people that would be pushed out the door to vote against Trump and to give another four years to democracy. In the final days, Harris was campaigning with Liz Cheney and seeking to turn over one of the most prescient voting blocks away from Trump; white women. In response, critics, pundits, and Senator Bernie Sanders are all lamenting the fact that the Democratic Party should’ve given a real, left-wing populist answer to the GOP because of the influence of right-wing populism. Critics and pundits wanted something different than continuing Biden-era politics. They wanted something that wasn’t even radical but was something slightly more left.

So, to bring back it all back, I think the Liberals will be facing this same question in the next election. Their partnership with the NDP did provide strong leftist policies, such as Pharmacare, Dentalcare, and stronger union protections, but how will they distinguish themselves from the NDP, who are focused on capturing the left anyways? The Liberals will face real questions from Canadians about how a new mandate can showcase more left-wing policies , or how a reinforced centrist party will allow them to weather the storm of a coming global recession Conversely, the NDP will be forced to communicate strong left-wing policies against a populist opponent, and show how given the chance to govern, they can create better conditions for all. I think Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew and BC Premier David Eby are both extremely skilled at this and showcasing how the NDP can govern. People across the world want change, and this is a largely agnostic one. Long-time conservative governments are falling, long-time liberal governments are moving on, and the Liberals and the NDP both face unique problems in 2025.

Another factor that I’m curious to hear your take on is the impact of non-legacy media on the US election (e.g. Joe Rogan, rightwing podcasters, influencers). Do you see a similar issue forming in advance of the federal election here?

Will, this is an interesting question, considering that we’re living through what will be considered, years from now, as the twilight of legacy – or if you will, “prestige” media. The manosphere sees no borders and has its own, um, lingua franca, but as with any media outlet’s bottom-line considerations, the fundamental question will always be: where are the ad revenues? The biggest pot will always be stateside.

A representative example of this phenomenon is what happened to Vice Media – and of course, one of its original founders, Gavin McInnes. Vice should have been a Canadian success story, and yet … they followed the money to the US. There is a new documentary on Gem focused on McInnes, which is really a missed opportunity (it’s directed by his mentee, Thomas Morton). Morton’s well-meaning but ultimately feckless attempt to take on some of the narrative tropes about the American manosphere (birthplace of McInnes’ Proud Boys venture, Trump’s ersatz shock troops) is testament to how befuddled – and muddled – the progressive response seems to be right now. It makes one nostalgic for the kind of straight talk the late, great David Carr provided to the Vice team in an earlier documentary, called Page One. Progressives need those strong counterarguments to the approach to political discourse the dudes of the manosphere are going to revel in, and profit richly from, over the next four years.

John Delacourt is a Senior VP at Counsel Public Affairs. He has served in a number of portfolios in three federal Liberal governments, as well as in communications and stakeholder relations in Opposition. He is the author of five novels and a regular contributor to Policy magazine. 

Will Shelling is an account director at Counsel PA and New Democrat who specializes in justice, equity, diversity and inclusion, Indigenous affairs, climate change, and Canadian culture. He is a director for White Ribbon Canada, a national non-profit dedicated to ending gender-based violence. He was raised in Las Vegas, and now lives in Vancouver, BC.