Election Parties Were a Nightmare in 2016 and 2020. This Year Is Different.

The $30 ticket to Maria Bruggere’s election party in Los Angeles guarantees attendees an unlimited number of both “Pina Kamalas” and “Kamalaritas.” An open taco bar will be on-site, alongside photo booths, a dessert menu, and a merchandise shop brimming with California-toned campaign swag. (Bruggere is particularly proud of one graphic tee, where the stately, seriffed lettering of the Los Angeles Dodgers insignia is interpolated into the last two letters of Kamala’s name.) Bruggere, who is a comedian by day and activist by night, has been canvassing for months now, and she has taken the bold step of preparing a Tuesday soiree while mired in the margin of error. What will the vibe inside be like? That, of course, depends on the returns from Bucks County, a few thousand miles away.

“Hopefully we’ll all get to pop Champagne and go to bed early. But we may be there until one or two in the morning, depending on how fired up people are about what they think is going to happen,” said Bruggere. “When you’re campaigning there is always a light at the end of the tunnel, and now there isn’t really much more to do than to prepare a fun party. Regardless of what happens on election night, everyone can have a good time and feel like they were together.”

Every American on the planet has become fully accustomed with the ways in which our political norms have been disfigured by the Trump era. The fact that the man could very well win his second presidential term tomorrow is an indisputable fact of life and has been for quite some time. But it’s also true that 2024 is the first year the MAGA colossus is operating in a postpandemic presidential cycle, which means there is a decent chance you’ve been invited to a fizzy election party—like the one being thrown by Bruggere—for a race that a majority of Americans believe represents an existential hinge point for the future of the country. This is certainly different from 2016, where Democrats treated Hillary Clinton’s coronation like a giddy fait accompli until all of that hubris was brutally humbled. The 2020 ballot, meanwhile, was encased in the darkest days of the pandemic, a social reality with no precedent in modern history. (Perhaps you remember watching eldritch amounts of CNN, in total isolation, for days on end while the votes were tabulated.)

But this November isn’t subject to either of those contingencies, which means many of us are facing the same question. Are you prepared to stare into the void, once again, among friends and family? Your mileage may vary.

“In 2016, right after midnight, I was watching how close the votes were in Michigan, and my friend Brian turned to me and said, ‘Hillary is still going to win, right?’ I stared back at him blankly and didn’t say anything,” said Derek Robertson, a journalist at Politico—and a friend—who has hosted a get-together for every cycle he’s voted in.

“All the color drained out of his face,” he continued. “That’s my primary memory from that night.”

It has been eight years since that fateful day, and despite the lingering trauma of Hillary’s rejection, Robertson has decided to renew his election-night tradition. Like many Americans at his precise age and disposition, Robertson can remember a time when presidential cycles weren’t nearly as puckered with anxiety as they are today. In those days, the Tuesday night parties he attended functioned more like an excuse to drink, rather than a fundamental referendum on the human soul. (It’s 2012. Barack Obama has just been declared the winner of Ohio. Season 1 of Girls had recently premiered on HBO. You have no idea how bad it’s going to get.) Robertson doesn’t expect to reclaim that effervescence tomorrow—American politics will likely remain rife with ominous feelings for the foreseeable future—but regardless of what happens, he does think that the sentiment won’t become truly putrid in his living room. His attendees are no longer capable of becoming flat-out heartbroken over a bad result, not after what they’ve already lived through. We’re in the endgame now baby, and we have been for quite some time.

“I think most people, whether you support Harris or Trump, are pretty immune to shock. There isn’t going to be a year-zero moment. A lot of people will be extremely unhappy, but I don’t think there will be the same anguish,” said Robertson. “Donald Trump has already been president. You’re not sailing off into the unknown.”

That said, Robertson has said that he’s seen a number of bars around his neighborhood advertising their own election watch parties, which he regards as a much more deranged way to spend Tuesday. “It seems like you’re courting some crazy potential interactions,” he said. (As an aside, in 2012 I was viciously lit at a conservative-leaning frat bar in central Texas when Obama was certified the winner, and came pretty close to getting my ass kicked.) The political climate has only grown more febrile since then, so I’m not surprised—like in every other avenue of life in 2024—the folks who’ve decided to be around other souls while the precincts report are doing so along strict partisan lines.

I think that’s the best way to process a stressful evening. Be around loved ones. Have a few drinks. And be ready to rev into galactic amounts of victorious shit talk or grimdark gallows humor, depending on what Oakland County, Michigan, has in store for us. Or maybe we’ll just end up in one of those interminable stalemates, where no winner reveals themselves, forcing us to bide our time for when more mail ballots are unsealed later in the week. (For what it’s worth, Bruggere expects her party to be filled with positive energy, even if the Champagne stays on ice till Thursday.) Election night has a way of reminding us of our powerlessness, and if there’s one lesson I hope we’ve learned from 2016, it’s that we must not grow too sanctimonious in our displays of grief. You are, indeed, always allowed to experience joy, no matter the circumstances. Greg Iwinski, another comedian who is hosting a variety of performers at an election party in New York, told me that the difference between a Trump victory in 2016, versus the prospects of one occurring now, is that his rise appears much more endemic to the culture—something that can’t be blunted by art, music, satire, or any other liberalized cultural force. The Republican nominee is going to get 47 percent of the vote, no matter what. There is beauty in the terror.

“That’s what will make this party better. There’s no obligation on us to fix it, because we’ve proven that we can’t,” said Iwinski. “So instead we can just do the dumbest stuff we can think of, and have fun on a bad night.”

I can’t blame anyone who plans on spending Tuesday completely alone, eyes darting across a panorama of screens, all brimming with portentous exit polls. But please, do consider leaving the house and interfacing with another human being. You can talk about how Kamala’s numbers are looking in the Philadelphia collar counties. Then you can talk about how the sun will rise tomorrow.