How did Hillary lose?

Right up until the polls closed on Tuesday, Hillary Clinton’s campaign team were confident that she would become the first female president of the United States, said Karen Tumulty in The Washington Post. For the Democrats’ election night party, they chose a New York conference centre “notable for one architectural feature: a glass ceiling”. But in the event, one of the best-qualified candidates in recent history was defeated by one of the most disliked and divisive. Donald Trump successfully portrayed his opponent as the embodiment “of a rigged system that had failed the everyday American”. Her credentials – as a former first lady, a senator and secretary of state – “which in another electoral climate would have been an asset, pegged her in his supporters’ views as the ultimate establishment insider”. Clinton, meanwhile, ran a highly professional campaign, but struggled throughout “to articulate a simple, pithy reason for running”. Her strategists considered 85 possibilities for an election slogan, according to a leaked email, before settling on “Stronger Together” – not a patch on Trump’s pledge to “Make America Great Again”.

While Clinton always looked like the favourite, in many respects she faced an uphill struggle, said Dan Roberts in The Guardian. “Incumbent parties rarely hold on to power after eight years in office.” Thanks to the financial crash, less well-off Americans have faced “stagnant wage levels and soaring inequality”. Trump convinced many that this was caused by a “rigged” financial system and “bad” trade deals. Clinton, backed into a corner, refused to defend agreements that she’d previously supported – which looked “unconvincing at best; deeply cynical at worst”. She was also lulled into a false sense of security by the polls, said Matt Taylor on Vice: they simply did not reflect how effectively Trump had cut into the Democrats’ traditional blue-collar voter base. The FBI’S intervention didn’t help, either. Director James Comey’s statement last month that the bureau was once again investigating Clinton’s “careless” use of a private email server for State Department business came to nothing – but it created a window “in which all the attacks on her could be renewed”.

There is a simpler explanation for Clinton’s defeat, though, said The Economist: people hate her. They took against her during Bill’s first presidential campaign, in 1992, and over the years Hillaryhating has become a “national pastime”. Many voters have simply had enough of the “Clinton soap opera”, said Daniel Finkelstein in The Times. In addition, they dislike her because she is rich, well connected, defensive – and, “distressingly”, just because she is a woman. Donald Trump is an “oaf”, which has led many Europeans to ignore the fact that many Americans think Hillary Clinton is no less flawed than him. For most people on this side of the Atlantic, that judgement might seem “extraordinary” – but it is the key to understanding this week’s extraordinary result.