A mob of white men in the thousands amassed in a show of solidarity for their presidential candidate of choice, and no violence ensued. Not one broken window, makeshift noose or whiff of bear spray.
But this rally wasn’t for him. It was for her.
White Dudes for Harris hosted a Zoom fundraiser Monday in support of the vice president and her bid to win the White House. The online event raised over $4 million, drew 200,000 attendees and inspired a slew of jokes.
“What a variety of whiteness we have here,” actor Bradley Whitford (“Handmaid’s Tale,” “West Wing”) said in his opening remarks. “It’s like a rainbow of beige.”
Leveraging identity politics for campaign cash is nothing new, but bringing together a bunch of white men to counter MAGA’s dire warnings — “White guys will be replaced if the Dems win!” — is genius.
Democratic organizer Ross Morales Rocketto was behind the effort, and according to the New York Times, acknowledged the discomfort some might feel about the group’s name.
“I don’t blame them,” he said. “Throughout American history, there’s a lot of evidence to suggest that when white men organize, it’s often with pointy hats on, and it doesn’t end well.”
If only the Ku Klux Klan were a thing of the past.
But who better to counter such hate than these other white dudes and their de facto leader: Jeff Bridges? The actor who played the Dude in “The Big Lebowski” kicked off the video call by referring to a White Dudes for Harris hat he saw online.
“I qualify. I am white. I am a dude. And I love Harris,” he said. Bridges also worked in his “Lebowski” character’s catchphrase: “As the Dude might say, ‘That’s just my opinion, man.’ ”
Co-opting the other side’s identity politics and then wringing the absurdity of their messaging for all it’s worth marks a new day for Democrats. The former fear and angst over President Biden’s low polling numbers has given way to a fresh enthusiasm since he announced he was leaving the race, and Harris stepped in.
Racist and sexist attacks from the right on Harris — including those by Congressman Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) and others who called her a “DEI hire” — are being repurposed and weaponized by the left. A “Cat Ladies for Harris” Zoom call is in the works, taking its name from the insult hurled at Harris from Trump’s running mate, J.D. Vance, who called the vice president a “childless cat lady.”
The white dudes took their cues from previous Zoom fundraisers for Harris that were organized around racial identities. “Win With Black Women,” a group of high-profile Black women, raised $1.5 million for Harris in the hours after Biden announced he was stepping out of the race. Other groups who’ve gathered to support and donate to Harris include Black men, South Asian Americans and white women.
Monday’s dude attendees and speakers included Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina and Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois.
Actor Mark Hamill delivered his classic “Star Wars” line: “I’m Luke Skywalker. I’m here to rescue you.” Other celebrities included actors Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Mark Ruffalo, Josh Gad, Sean Astin and Paul Scheer, director J.J. Abrams and singer Josh Groban.
But it was Democratic organizer Rocketto who best summed up the reason for the gathering. “The left has been ceding white men to the MAGA right for way, way too long,” he said. “That’s going to stop tonight because we know that the silent majority of white men aren’t actually MAGA supporters. They’re folks like you who just want a better life for their families.”
And they made their point without storming the Capitol or shooting up a Black Lives Matter demonstration. Righteous, dudes.