President Trump and Grover Cleveland: How presidential candidates triumphantly returned to the White House

President-elect Donald Trump succeeded early in the morning on Wednesday, and defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential race for the White House.

Trump will take office for a second time in January.

The only other presidential candidate in history to win the presidency non-consecutively was Grover Cleveland, who was elected as the 22nd and 24th U.S. president.

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Cleveland, born into a large family as one of nine children in New Jersey, according to WhiteHouse.gov., was raised in New York.

The former president studied law and became a lawyer before taking public office as mayor of Buffalo in 1881, according to WhiteHouse.gov.

Cleveland became the Democrat U.S. presidential candidate in 1884, while he was serving as the governor of New York. He was the first Democrat elected president after the Civil War, defeating his Republican opponent, Sen. James G. Blaine of Maine.

During his first term in office, he faced criticism for his veto of private pension bills for Civil War veterans, according to NPR.

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Also during his first term, a proposed bill to provide Texas farmers with $10,000 in federal funds to be used for seed grain was brought to the floor, which he vetoed, according to the New York Post.

Cleveland called for Congress to reduce high protective tariffs from the Civil War, according to the Associated Press, and signed the Interstate Commerce Act in 1887, which established federal regulation of an industry for the first time through its regulation of railroads, according to NPR. 

During his first term in office, Frances Folsom, who was 21 at the time, became the first lady with her marriage to Cleveland. To this day, Cleveland is the only president to be married inside the White House. 

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Four years after becoming president, Cleveland was up for re-election. He campaigned against Republican Benjamin Harrison but was unsuccessful in his bid to return to the White House.

Cleveland won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College to his Republican opponent.

“He began the race without a campaign manager; delegated most of the electioneering responsibilities to his running mate, Allen Thurman, who, at the age of 74, was not healthy enough to withstand the rigors of campaigning; and based the entire race around his proposal to reduce tariffs, which divided his own Democratic Party and unified the Republicans in opposition,” presidential historian Troy Senik told History.com. 

In 1892, there was a rematch between Cleveland and Harrison, and Cleveland came out victorious, making him the first to return to the White House for a non-consecutive term.

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Cleveland was the only president to hold this distinction until Trump accomplished a similar feat.

Trump was first elected as president in 2016, when he beat his Democrat opponent, Hillary Clinton. Trump lost the popular vote but won the electoral vote to win the presidential race.

Trump’s success stems from a background in business as a real estate developer, rather than politics.

In July 2016, Trump accepted the Republican nomination for president, was elected on Nov. 8, 2016, and was inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2017. 

His first term in office included policies like tax cuts, energy independence, military expansion, improved health care for veterans and security of the southern border.

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Also during his first term, Trump appointed federal judges, including three U.S. Supreme Court judges, and signed legislation to create the Space Force, the first new armed service since 1947, according to the U.S. Department of Defense’s website.

In 2020, Trump faced Democrat challenger Joe Biden for the White House and lost the election.

After years removed from the presidency, Trump began a campaign for re-election. He announced his third run for office in the days after the 2022 midterm elections and began two more years of campaigning.

Initially, Trump and Biden were campaigning against one another again. However, in July 2024, now-President Biden announced an end to his re-election bid and endorsed his vice president, Harris, as the Democrat nominee.

Trump defeated Harris in the 2024 presidential election, becoming president-elect. Trump is now the 45th and 47th U.S. president.

“I want to thank you all very much,” Trump said in an address to the American people during the early morning hours Wednesday, after the results of Election Day. “This is great. These are our friends. We have thousands of friends in this incredible movement. This is a movement like nobody’s ever seen before; I believe the greatest political movement of all time.”

“I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honor of being elected the 47th president,” Trump continued. “And every citizen, I will fight for you, for your family and your future. Every single day, I will be fighting for you. And with every breath in my body, I will not rest until we have delivered the strong, safe and prosperous America that our children deserve and that you deserve.”

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