Harris walks perilous line between viral and ‘cringe’

Just hours after President Biden dropped out of the race, a spoof of the Charli XCX’s album cover, “brat,” graced the banner on the Harris campaign’s X account.

The next day, Charli XCX declared that the vice president is “brat,” validating the hard tone shift in the Democratic ticket’s digital strategy. 

In the weeks since, KamalaHQ — the 2024 Democratic presidential campaign’s rapid digital response team — have jumped on various viral soundbites on TikTok to drum up excitement, whether it’s teasing the VP pick or making an on-trend jab at Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio). 

And each video posted on the KamalaHQ TikTok has racked up hundreds and thousands of likes, if not millions. 

“It’s working,” Christian Divyne (@xiandivyne), a TikTok creator with 600,000 followers, told The Hill  “It’s just making people like Kamala Harris.”

But, as fast as the waves of support came in for Harris, it could quickly come crashing down. Three weeks into the campaign, it remains an open question whether excitement for Harris — both online and at massive rallies — will continue through November.

The internet can be unforgiving, and one memorable misstep make a politician “cringe-worthy” overnight. 

In Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign, her online momentum tanked after one moment: “Pokémon Go to The Polls.”

“That’s an iconic moment that will live on forever as a campaign staffer,” said a spokesperson for Priorities USA, a Democratic SuperPAC focused on digital communication.

In an appearance on the Ellen Show, Clinton called the American people to join her at the polls in November, and made a flailing reference to Pokémon Go, the then-trending phone app.

The segment was clipped and strewn all over the internet. While some were laughing along with Clinton, many more were laughing at her. 

“Hillary Clinton in that time was taking something that she had heard about, or her team had heard about that she had no reference with,” Divyne noted. “It also isn’t a great joke, like, fundamentally.”

So, how does Harris avoid her own cringe-worthy moments? The answer lies in cultural fluency.

“A good social media campaign is one that understands the ideal target audience and is able to speak credibly to that audience based on the message, the messenger, the tone, the delivery, etc,” explained Danielle Butterfield, Priorities USA’s Executive Director.

Harris’s supporters online are warning her against taking the “brat” comparisons too far, such as one TikTok video that has amassed 1 million views and over 190,000 likes.

“[P]raying someone on Kamala’s team has enough sense to ensure she NEVER does the apple dance. At the moment the memes are fun but if that were to ever happen I fear we’d be jumping the shark into pokémon levels of cringe,” the user wrote on the screen with Charli XCX’s aforementioned song, “Apple,” playing in the background.

The apple dance is a trending spin-off from the “brat” album. 

Hundreds of commenters commented on the post with their own suggestions to the Kamala HQ account on thwarting a devastating gaffe for the campaign. 

“I think if she engages with it too much, it might become more cringy,” Divyne said. “It has to remain in this way where it seems like the sort of goofy, fun part of it is the part that her people are doing.”

The digital-side of the Harris campaign is comprised of 175 staffers from the Democratic National Committee and the campaign staff, according to the campaign. The mobilization team, responsible for their social media strategy, all belong to Gen-Z. 

It’s obvious to those online that Harris is not the mastermind behind their social media strategy — and that’s a good thing.

The other component of cultural fluidity is appearing genuine to the audience. Part of the reason that no one wants to see Harris in control, or filming videos for the KamalaHQ account, is because they know the 59-year-old leader of the Democratic party has likely never heard of the trends being referenced, and pretending she was in the know could be tragic.

“I think being cringe-worthy generally comes from being out of touch,” said Allie O’Brien (@allie_202_), a 23-year-old influencer on TikTok with over 550,000 followers.

Harris’s running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D), quickly pushed the envelope during his first speech as the VP candidate. He made a reference to a debunked meme insinuating that Vance once had sex with a couch.

“I gotta tell ya, I can’t wait to debate the guy,” he said, to thunderous applause. “That is if he’s willing to get off the couch and show up!”

The quip made rounds online, with even KamalaHQ reposting the bit. In a viral TikTok video, Walz’s daughter, Hope, coyly shrugged when asked if she shared the meme with her father.

“Kamala Harris is engaging with the culture in the ways that she knows and other people are making Kamala Harris ‘brat,’ right? Kamala Harris didn’t get up and go, ‘I am brat,’” Divyne also noted.

Online politics can also get tricky when politicians turn against the platforms that helped make them popular. 

Rep. Jeff Jackson (D-N.C.) — who went viral during the 2022 midterms for his easily-digestible explainers on policy and politics — faced intense backlash after he supported a TikTok ban.

“He kind of built up all of this goodwill through his use of TikTok,” Divyne explained, “it’s sort of a hypocritical moment where you voted for something that people didn’t think you were going to support.”

In less than 24 hours, Jackson lost 100,000 followers. It spiraled so far that the congressman eventually filmed an apology video explaining his vote — which was met with even more political scorn.

The Harris campaign says she doesn’t want a TikTok ban, but does want it to change owners. Biden signed a bill in April to force its Chinese parent company to either divest or face a U.S. ban. 

But a more immediate concern is how the campaign connects to users before November, and social media professionals say the biggest threat to the Harris campaign’s soaring virality is a lack of substance.

“Our theory is that the conversation needs to shift to substance and issues and contrast,” Butterfield noted. “Ultimately, voters are making their decision at the ballot box based on what candidates they think is going to improve their lives for the better.”

“I think we’re sort of nearing the end of the curve of, you know, enthusiasm just around a new candidate,” O’Brien said, “and there’s starting to be some curiosity of, okay, we haven’t heard specifically exactly what you stand for.”

The campaign’s digital team has limited material to work with. Three weeks into her campaign, Harris has yet to release a comprehensive policy plan, or add an issues tab to her campaign website.

Instead, her campaign has publicly backtracked on some of her more progressive policy opinions from past campaigns, such as a fracking ban, gun buybacks defunding the police and universal Medicare.

For an online generation that’s widely progressive, this lack of substantive issues could prove to be troubling down the line.

O’Brien highlighted the war on Gaza as one area the campaign could aim to engage on the issues online.

“Palestine has been sustainably viral for, you know, months now — since October — and they simply have not tapped into the energy,” they said.

The Harris campaign knocked down suggestions that she was open to an arms embargo after a brief encounter with Uncommitted movement leaders at a rally in Detroit on Wednesday. 

For now, KamalaHQ is largely focused on bashing the Trump-Vance ticket, and sculpting Harris’s cult of personality. Given their success so far, her social media team is already looking like the Democratic vanguard. 

“I can only imagine that people are now going to try to pick up on it and hire specific social media managers for their campaign to try to replicate this,” Divyne expressed.

“I unfortunately think it will be the future, and it will be very cringey.”