As the sun set over Howard University’s campus on November 6th, 2024, an electric energy pulsed through the gathering crowd. Tens of thousands had flocked to Kamala Harris’s alma mater, eager to witness history in the making. Adorned in campaign merch and signature pearls, they danced to the beat of optimism, their faith in the nation’s first female and first Black vice president unwavering. Yet as the night unfolded, that bright hope would gradually dim, giving way to an all-too-familiar sense of despair.
The Promise of Progress
In the 108 days since Harris’s unexpected rise to the Democratic nomination, her campaign had ignited a firestorm of enthusiasm. She shattered fundraising records, raking in over a billion dollars from grassroots supporters energized by her progressive platform and historic candidacy. On the trail, Harris drew massive, diverse crowds eager to embrace her vision of an America unshackled from the divisiveness of the Trump era.
For many, Harris represented more than a political choice—she embodied the promise of progress, the shattering of one of the highest glass ceilings. Women, in particular, rallied around her barrier-breaking run, determined to succeed where Hillary Clinton had fallen short just eight years prior. As Harris often said in her stump speech: “It doesn’t have to be this way.”
A Crowd Predisposed to Anxiety
But even as the Howard University crowd swayed to the music, a current of unease rippled beneath the revelry. After all, they had been here before—the heartbreak of 2016 still raw, the shock of that unfathomable defeat never far from mind. Few dared to voice more than a “nauseous optimism,” the race remaining a nerve-wracking toss-up until the bitter end.
“I can’t even imagine. I won’t even allow my mind to go there,” said Rhonda Greene, 55, recalling how she had woken up the morning after Election Day 2016 certain of a Clinton victory, only to face a gut-wrenching reality.
As the night wore on and key battleground states began to tilt Trump’s way, that familiar dread crept in. Harris claimed her home state of California, but it was cold comfort against the red tide rising across the electoral map. North Carolina fell first, then Florida, Ohio, Georgia—brick by brick, the fabled “blue wall” crumbled.
The Vibes Were Off
As the probability needle swung ominously toward a Trump upset, the mood on campus shifted. 2Pac’s “California Love” thumped from the speakers, but the celebratory vibes rang hollow. Many attendees, dismayed by the results trickling in, began to stream toward the exits, unwilling to stick around for what increasingly felt like a concession speech in the making.
“I am a bit let down by my nation that this is even this close,” lamented Janay Smith, 55, an alumna who had flown in from Atlanta to witness Harris’s expected triumph. For Smith and so many others, Harris’s framing of the election as an existential choice for America’s future made the deadlocked results all the more gutting. Faced with the prospect of shattering the ultimate glass ceiling or handing the nuclear codes back to a twice-impeached former president, the nation appeared poised to choose the latter.
Hope Extinguished
In the end, Harris never graced that Howard University stage, her historic quest cut tragically short. Instead, it fell to campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond to send the diehard supporters home for the night, even as he vowed to fight on until every last vote was counted. There would be no shattering of glass ceilings under the lights, no dancing in the streets, no poignant tears of joy and relief—only that painfully familiar ache of a dream deferred.
As the campus emptied out and the “jumbotrons” flickered off one by one, a heaviness hung in the air—the weight of an opportunity lost, of history left unwritten once again. In this crucial inflection point for American democracy, when faced with the choice between progress and backlash, between a woman poised to make history and a man hellbent on unraveling it, the voters had spoken. And for the scores of women who had pinned their hopes on Harris’s groundbreaking campaign, that verdict cut like shards of glass.
