From Taylor Swift to Charli XCX, Kamala Harris had her pick of celebrity endorsements. In fact, leading up to the election, there was quite a bit of speculation as to which side Swift would throw her weight behind and the potential impact it would have on election results. This conjecture was not entirely unfounded, given the massive year that Swift has had and the fact that, following her Harris endorsement, over 400,000 people clicked on a voter registration link Swift posted. Yet, as Reuters highlights, “social media posts have misinterpreted that number as a tally of new voter registrations” when, in reality, it is simply the number of people who visited the site. In other words, the actual registrations garnered from Swift’s post is more than likely a fraction of that figure.
Nonetheless, irrespective of any organic, ringing endorsements, the Harris campaign decided to splash out on flashy rallies, celebrity guests and TV ads, in the hopes to engage young voters and win popular support. However, it appears that the younger voters could not be pandered to. In fact, despite both sides making appearances on various podcasts and engaging with popular culture, ultimately less young people turned out to vote than in the 2020 election.
That being said, it is still noteworthy that Trump managed to create a “16-point gender gap between young men and women” who voted. This may have been a result of the president elect’s “appearances on popular podcasts consumed by largely young male audiences.” Although Harris did eventually take the same steps as Trump by appearing on the Call Her Daddy podcast, incredibly popular amongst young women, it did not end up having the same impact. Instead, this appearance simply appeared to be part of an ongoing “media blitz” leading up to the election, which was perhaps too little too late.
In the end, Harris’s main strategy of focusing on traditional celebrity endorsements and hosting concerts, did not have the intended impact, and might have even ended up harming her campaign, more than helping, which begs the question – do celebrity endorsements even matter anymore?
This conversation has been exacerbated by the recent controversy over Chappell Roan’s endorsement. Whilst having worked in the industry for over a decade now, Chappell Roan experienced overnight fame during early 2024 when her Spotify listeners went “from 941,000 streams between February 17 to 18 to 1.24 million streams between February 24 and 25.” Given her newfound status as a highly influential figure, as well as being an American citizen, people wanted to know how she’d be voting in the upcoming election. Rather than endorse a single candidate, when asked, Chappell gave a non-committal answer and stated that “I have so many issues with our government in every way. There are so many things that I would want to change. So I don’t feel pressured to endorse someone. There’s problems on both sides.”
Her response rubbed people the wrong way and even made them wonder whether Chappell was a secret Republican, despite the fact that, in the same interview, she made her support of the LGBTQ+ community incredibly clear. Rather than allow these theories to float around the internet unchecked, Chappell decided to make an impromptu TikTok elaborating on her position and clarifying her left-leaning stance. However, this only served to infuriate people who believed she should have fully endorsed Harris, being the lesser of the two evils. While I can see why people might think this way, especially with the election having been so contested, there was never any guarantee that her endorsement would have made a difference to the outcome. With this in mind, the whole debacle ends up looking more like an excuse for people to go after a queer woman who has refused to play by the rules than a genuine critique of her political opinions.
Ultimately, celebrity endorsements are nothing new. They have been around since the early 20th century and will likely be a facet of political campaigns for years to come. However, this does not mean that they hold the same weight that they once did. In an increasingly digital age, where the power of celebrity is dwindling and the majority of people have direct access to a plethora of information regarding the candidates as well as numerous interviews with the candidates themselves, young people are much less likely to vote a certain direction simply because a prominent public figure has told them to do so. Instead, they’re likely to look towards people they feel they can relate to, such as their close circle, as well as do their own research to come to their final decision. So perhaps it’s not so much the death of the celebrity endorsement as the fall of the celebrity endorsement.
Image: Wikimedia Commons/Voice of America (20, A. Shaker)
Licence: Public Domain.
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