Transcription
Well, President Biden's exit from the race for the White House has really turned everything upside down, with, as we mentioned, just 100 days now until the election. Vice President Harris is emerging as former President Donald Trump's opponent. It didn't take long for the Harris campaign to take the fight to Trump on social media.
Joining me now to talk more about this is NPR political correspondent Elena Moore. Elena, thanks for joining us.
Thanks for having me.
So, the Harris frenzy really took hold with pop star Charlie XCX proclaiming, quote, "Kamala Kamala is brat," referring to the singer's new album. What do you make of this kind of surge of enthusiasm for Harris on social media, and what does this even mean?
Well, there are lots of meanings of brat, and I don't think we have enough time to get into all of them. But it's been a really monumental week for young voters, who really over the last year have been telling me, as I've been out talking with them, that they're not excited about this race. They wanted a new voice, someone to be hopeful about, and what I've been hearing from people, especially left-leaning folks, is that now they feel that.
These memes, though funny, also potentially show a kind of shift in that enthusiasm to get out and potentially support this campaign. I've talked to young organizers who say that over this past week they've had friends who are less political reach out and ask how they can get involved. These young groups have seen an increase in support. So yes, the internet is one thing, but this kind of organic enthusiasm may be kind of sparking a next phase in some of this political momentum for young voters, which has been kind of a question mark until now.
I apologize, Elena. I can't actually hear exactly what you said. We're having a little bit of audio issues, but let me just ask you this: hopefully the audience can hear you. On the Republican side, you have JD Vance's 2021 comments surfacing on the Democratic Party being run by quote, "childless cat ladies," and claiming people without kids should pay more in taxes.
The Wall Street Journal went as far as to call this his "basket of deplorables" moment. We all remember that moment that was from Hillary Clinton, that dig at Trump supporters back in 2016. It was a really big moment during the campaign. What do you make of these past comments? They really have offended some people, even some celebrities like Jennifer Aniston.
He's actually doubled down on this. What do you think? Is this a good strategy?
I mean, it's hard. I apologize for the tech issues. I think that kind of having an opposite effect—we're seeing another viral moment, but it's more negative. Some of these same communities that have been rallied by the brat memes and the coconut tree memes are kind of using that to back up their candidate in that same way.
I think that the Trump campaign has a lot of questions moving forward about how they can harness their momentum and push past some of these viral moments. As you said, the campaign is standing by Vance in his comments, but you know, this issue that he brings up about choosing when to have a family and someone's decision to have a child, that kind of hits on this bigger issue that we've seen really motivate voters in the past, which is reproductive rights.
Choosing when to become a parent—I'm really curious to see how the campaign continues to maneuver this issue because we've seen it benefit Democrats in the past, especially with young voters. Young voters have turned out in high numbers in the past over the issue of reproductive rights and having that choice.
So this is kind of part of a bigger thing and gets back into brat—celebrating women and young voters—and it's kind of all mashed up in this week of internet phenomenon.
All right, NPR political correspondent Elena Moore, thank you so much.