Harris allies lean on influencers to post about campaign

Ahead of the Democratic National Convention, Vice President Kamala Harris’s allies are leaning on social media influencers to push her campaign’s message, according to a pitch deck obtained by The Spectator.

The League of Conservation Voters’s Harris DNC Organic Creator Campaign is anything but organic, it turns out. “Creators need to promote and uplift Kamala Harris’s record,” they are told. Suggested visuals lean heavily into the “brat summer” meme.

“This can appear as at least one of the following:

• Mention Kamala Harris by name — either audio or text overlay
• Use Presidential imagery — e.g., an image of Kamala Harris
• Use a news headline with ‘Harris’ in it on greenscreen

“We are excited to partner with creators who specialize in observational humor, social-native journalism, eco-awareness and cultural coverage to spread awareness of VP Harris’s specific achievements as a climate champion,” the packet reads. “Take your audience on a learning journey into Harris’s environmental stewardship — from history-changing achievements in her early career, to enormous investments she’s leading our government to make toward a sustainable future.”

The specifics that LCV is directing influencers to highlight could cause Harris political problems, however. Its point that “Vice President Harris cast the deciding vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, the most ambitious climate law ever, which makes investments in clean energy projected to drive down energy costs by $1,000 a year” could complicate her campaign’s cribbing of some of the more popular economic policies of Donald Trump’s campaign — such as abolishing taxes on tips.

Creators are urged to use trends and memes, like “Operation Coconut Tree, Kamala is Brat” and nicknames, endearments and hashtags, like “Big Sister General, #projectcoconut, #yeswekam.” The campaign appears heavily geared towards both TikTok and Instagram, with no mention of either Facebook or X platforms. 

Time is also of the essence. According to the posting schedule, influencers should have video drafts in for client approval and have the videos ready to launch by the end of this week, just in time for the DNC. Participants are encouraged, but not required, to tag LCV, but “nothing in this Agreement is intended to prevent Creator from, at their own discretion, including a clear and conspicuous disclosure that the post is paid content that is in partnership with LCV Victory Fund.”

The metrics for success are fairly straightforward. “Creators should self-report forty-eight hours after posting and seven calendar days after posting,” they are told. Screenshots are an acceptable form of reporting everything from views and impressions to “second-level metrics” like total watch time and repeat views.

It is not immediately clear how the work of these influencers will complement that of the director of celebrity outreach that the Biden-Harris campaign was hiring for earlier this year.