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Watch: Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell baffled by Trump’s victory

Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart have their eyes on the prize (Youtube)

Donald Trump is on course to win the US election – and it’s safe to say that Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell aren’t thrilled about the news.

On a livestream of their Rest is Politics podcast, Stewart – who earlier this week said he hadn’t ‘changed my mind on Kamala Harris winning comfortably’ – struggled to process the news that the US election was far closer than he may have hoped.

Stewart suggested that Trump’s success in winning the two key swing states of North Carolina and Georgia was difficult to comprehend given how good the Democrats’ ground game was during the campaign:

‘When a result happens, you rewrite history. If she (Kamala Harris) was currently winning, you’d have a very good answer for why she was winning. Abortion would be number one. Number two would be that she had much more money than he did. Number three: she had a real ground game. People were really clear: all my friends down in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, were clear: Trump was nowhere to be seen. They were swamped with Democrats, leafleting every door…There were almost so many Democrats out there they couldn’t even find doors for them to knock. 

‘Add to that a whole series of narratives about a campaign where she (Harris) didn’t really do anything wrong. She barely put a food wrong during the campaign. And where Trump has been convicted of over thirty felonies. He’s been responsible for the January 6 insurrection. You could provide a pretty good story for why she won.’ 

Stewart didn’t stop there. If Trump defies the pollsters and does secure victory, the ex-Tory MP said he feared Trump’s second presidency would be worse than the first:

‘I’m worried that this is terribly bad for his ego and his narcissism. If everyone has told you that you can’t do something repeatedly and you do it, I think you get a slightly more arrogant version of Trump this time around and that’s bad.’

‘It’s impunity’, said his fellow host Campbell. Oh dear…

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Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

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