Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign moved quickly in the last 48 hours to build a digital presence among 18 to 28-year-olds — or chronically online voters.
Harris inherited much of President Joe Biden’s campaign after he dropped out of the presidential race and endorsed her on Sunday afternoon. Since then, her team has leaned into the “coconut” and “brat summer” movements to try to capture the younger demographic.
Josh Klemons, a digital campaign strategist for progressive candidates and founder of Reverbal Communications, in an email to the Deseret News, said changing the 2024 presidential ticket has led to a “digital momentum we’re witnessing,” which, he argued, “is just the tip of the iceberg of what’s to come as we head into November (and beyond)!”
“The Biden campaign understands the internet as well as any campaign ever has,” he said. “And now, with Kamala at the helm, they have a whole new swell of energy and excitement to tap into.”
Lucille Wenegieme, the executive director of HeadCount, a leading youth voter registration group, is also observing “a change in energy” among young voters, she told the Deseret News.
“We know that young people have been wanting a different set of choices at the top of the ticket, other than the two older candidates whose records they’ve seen before,” said Wenegieme.
What is the Kamala Harris coconut meme about?
More than a year ago, the Republican National Committee clipped a video of the vice president telling a story about “providing context” that involved coconut trees.
“My mother used to give us a hard time sometimes and she would say to us, ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with you young people. You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?’” she says in the video before laughing.
“You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you,” Harris continued.
The RNC edited another four-minute-long video of Harris saying her go-to phrase: “What can be, unburdened by what has been.”
But Harris’ campaign is trying to turn some of her verbal miscues into a positive for the new presidential candidate. The Biden-Harris HQ profile on X, formerly known as Twitter, was rebranded to Kamala HQ, with the bio saying, “Providing context.”
After Biden’s poor performance at the presidential debates against former President Donald Trump last month, Gen Z-targeted edits and visuals of Harris’ supposedly awkward moments went viral.
“These conversations are happening really, really fast,” Wenegieme said.
The memes and cosplays lead to young people “volunteering to register other young people to vote, and of course, registering and voting,” Wenegieme said.
HeadCount’s executive director said the organization saw 5,000 new voter registrations on Sunday alone.
Some of Harris’ allies have also jumped on the trend. Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz posted a photo of himself climbing a coconut tree with the caption, “Madam Vice President, we are ready to help.”
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, in response to speculation about him “running for something,” said, “You think I just fell out of a coconut tree?”
Pritzker had earlier endorsed Harris for president. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis stuck to only emojis: a coconut, a palm tree and the American flag.
Kamala Harris and the ‘brat’ phenomenon
Harris isn’t online, like Trump, who often types his own posts on Truth Social, his propriety social media platform, nor has she acknowledged the jokes circulating online.
But at nearly 60 years of age, she brings youth to the ticket previously led by the oldest president in U.S. history.
“Whereas the Biden campaign’s Dark Brandon memes felt forced, Harris’s efforts are likely to appear more authentic, maybe even fun,” Charlie Warzel wrote for The Atlantic.
Amid a tidal wave of endorsements, pop star Charli XCX posted, “kamala IS brat,” referencing her latest summer album, brat, and insinuating her support. The post had roughly 50 million views on X.
According to Charli XCX, Brat is “very honest; it’s very blunt — a little bit volatile, does dumb things, but, like, it’s brat. You’re brat. That’s brat.”
The bright green color from the album art has been edited into posts in support of Harris.
“Kamala has branded her Kamala HQ Twitter page with the same aesthetic of the album. That’s another Gen Z word, aesthetic,” CNN’s Jake Tapper said on Monday, citing his teenage daughter.
Social media: The new campaign battleground?
National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman Sen. Steve Daines of Montana issued a memo indicating how they planned to target Harris’ campaign.
It included a list of “weird” facts about Harris, like how she “has a habit of laughing at inappropriate moments,” wants to ban plastic straws and consumption of red meat, loves Venn diagrams and school buses, and “recently discovered electricity doesn’t smell.”
“There’s just something about those three circles and the analysis of where there’s the intersection, right?” she said of Venn diagrams in 2022, in a clip resurfaced by the RNC.
This memo made rounds on the internet among the “KHive,” too, while the Harris operation continues to try to reclaim these moments. Whether that will work with older voters as well remains to be seen.
The big thing to remember about the internet is that it’s not unidirectional, “and it’s not even bidirectional,” said Wenegieme. She said she perceives it as an ecosystem that takes a sound bite from a rally or a YouTube clip and modifies it for further consumption and discourse.
Wenegieme made one thing clear: social media is where the conversation starts and ends for young people this election cycle.