America prepares as two distinct visions collide on election day

America is choosing the path forward and the stakes could not be higher.

Both candidates have offered clear visions for the future if they lose this election. Donald Trump said the country would “go to hell” and become “immediately communist” if he lost, while Kamala Harris described her opponent as a “fascist” who wanted “unchecked power” “.

Voters in key battleground states have been bombarded with campaign ads, much of it designed to instill fear. Given this climate, it’s no surprise that Americans surveyed reported high levels of anxiety.

“I truly believe they are making us live in fear just to get our votes,” Heather Soucek told me in Wisconsin as election day approached. She lives in a swing district in a swing state and plans to support Trump because, in her words, Harris’s economic plans are “scary.”

But just along the street, I also met Tracy Andropolis, a registered independent who said she would vote for Harris. “This is one of the most important elections of my lifetime. There’s a lot on the line,” she said, adding that she fears Trump will refuse to relinquish power if he wins.

Both expressed genuine fear about the future if their candidate lost, reflecting the prevailing mood of many voters before the election.

Ms. Andropolis also told me that she does not believe in stock polls. Not because she has any real evidence, but because she can’t imagine millions of people would vote for Trump. And she is by no means alone in her struggle to accept the closeness of this race.

One of the things I’ve learned from traveling around this country and talking to voters is that America doesn’t seem significantly divided but feels as if two separate countries are coexisting awkwardly. on the same land.

Democrats primarily live in cities and suburbs, while Republicans primarily live in rural areas. Americans increasingly move to places where neighboring countries share their political views. And it’s not difficult to identify these areas at the moment, based on the signs and yard signs that often mark Trump and Harris’ territory.

But it is impossible to live forever in these separate political worlds. These two sides are about to collide with the harsh realities of an election.

Even if there is a dispute, even if there is an argument, there must still be a winner.

And when some people here learn the final results and realize that tens of millions of fellow Americans feel very differently from them, it will be a shock.

Both Trump and Harris have charted their own historic and tumultuous paths to voting day.

I was among the press gathered outside the Manhattan courthouse to witness the arraignment of Trump in his criminal hush money trial in April. He was convicted a few weeks later, becoming the first former or sitting president to be convicted. Many people asked the question at the time: could a convicted felon really reclaim the White House?

But his legal troubles and claims that he is being deliberately targeted by the Biden administration have only fueled his campaign and galvanized his supporters. “They’re not after me, they’re after you,” he often said.

“They are weaponizing the criminal justice system against their political enemies and that is not right,” one of his supporters told me outside court. “I will fight for this man until the day I die,” another said.

A familiar pattern emerged: with each indictment, his poll ratings increased and financial contributions poured in.

Think back to last year when his mugshot was taken as part of the election meddling case in Georgia. It quickly became an iconic image that now adorns many of the T-shirts I see at Trump rallies.

And it’s impossible to recount the former president’s wild ride to voting day without including the moment that created another iconic image and almost ended the campaign altogether.

When Trump was shot by an assassin in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July, it shook this race and this country profoundly. As Secret Service agents helped him to his feet, blood pouring from his ears, he raised his fist in the air and called on his supporters to fight.

When he appeared just 48 hours later at his party’s convention in Milwaukee with gauze covering his ears, some in the crowd cried. I could see tears rolling down the face of a delegate standing near me. That’s Tina Ioane, who came from American Samoa.

“He is the anointed one,” she told me. “He is called to lead our country.”

At that stage of the summer, electorally, Trump appeared unassailable.

On the other hand, Democrats are increasingly discouraged about their own prospects. Extremely worried that their candidate, Joe Biden, was too old to win reelection.

I was in the press room watching his fiery debate with Trump at the end of June. There was a stunned silence as we watched Biden’s 50-year political career essentially end before our eyes.

But even then, many who publicly suggested he should resign were rejected. Biden’s campaign even attacked the “bed-wetting brigade” calling for him to go.

Of course, it will be a matter of time.

Just days after the jubilant Republican convention in July, when it seemed impossible for Trump to lose, Biden announced he was giving up his re-election bid. The mood of Democratic Party supporters quickly changed from pessimistic worry to eager anticipation.

Any reservations they had about whether Kamala Harris was their best candidate were erased at a cheerful conference in Chicago a few weeks later. Those who had been resigned to failure were now swept away by a wave of enthusiasm.

She said to resounding cheers that this election was an opportunity to “overcome the bitterness, cynicism and divisive battles of the past”.

But this burst of excitement did not last. After an initial bump in the polls, Harris struggled to maintain momentum. She appears to have quickly won back traditional Democrats who did not support Biden but found it difficult to win over key undecided voters.

However, Harris has repeatedly offered a more optimistic message. She also sees reproductive rights as a cornerstone of her campaign and hopes the issue will motivate women to protest in large numbers.

But the challenge, as in all presidential elections, is convincing the undecided.

I met Zoie Cheneau at a hair salon she owns in Atlanta, Georgia, less than two weeks before the election. She said she has never been so unmotivated to vote.

“For me right now, it’s the lesser of two evils,” she said, explaining that she would ultimately vote for Harris but feels Trump may prove better for small businesses .

“I would be delighted that a black woman would become president of the United States,” she said. “And she will win, I know she will win.”

While some voters are nervous and believe this race is close, Ms. Cheneau’s certainty about the final result is something that supporters of both sides continually express.

Many Harris supporters simply cannot understand why she did not go further against a convicted criminal who was publicly attacked and ridiculed by those who served in his previous administration.

Trump’s supporters were equally astounded that anyone could vote for a candidate who had changed policies and was in the White House at a time when illegal border crossings reached record levels.

These two tribes exist in what appear to be parallel political ecosystems, across deep partisan divides, where opposing views are rejected and candidates inspire unity. devoted loyalty that goes beyond conventional party affiliation.

Voters received apocalyptic warnings about what might happen if the other side won. They have been told that this election is about more than just who will sit in the Oval Office for the next four years. Many believe it is an existential event that could have disastrous consequences.

There is no doubt that the tone of this campaign has increased anxiety and tension, meaning the consequences of this election could be explosive. We hope the legal challenges and street protests will come as no surprise to anyone.

This is a country divided between conflicting views of what is at stake. But it is at the polls that Red and Blue America will meet and be counted.

Whatever the outcome, about half the country is about to discover that the other half has an entirely different sense of what America requires.

For the losers, this will be a stinging realization.