In a failed bid to clinch victory in the election, Kamala Harris secured the endorsement of Beyoncé – the self-proclaimed “black Bill Gates in the making” – who joined her on the final campaign stops in her home state of Texas.
This follows the Democratic Party’s familiar strategy of ‘winning over’ young women in red states by repeatedly bringing up the abortion debate every election cycle, attempting to resonate – or admonish – by highlighting reproductive rights.
‘Cowboy Carter’ and ‘Crooked Kamala’ have much in common – they are both successful, bourgeois women eager to display their feminist credentials, having risen to the top in their respective fields.
Beyonce endorses Kamala Harris at Houston rally. pic.twitter.com/bUBBbeQvrV
— Storyful (@Storyful) October 28, 2024
Just as Kamala and the Democrats are known for opportunistically hopping onto trends, Beyoncé’s latest album, Cowboy Carter, feels lifted from the Democratic playbook: paying lip service to historic injustices, promoting ‘empowerment’, and projecting disruption of the status quo.
But in fact, the whole album’s production and marketing was a transparent attempt to capitalise on the commercially lucrative and popular crossover country music in the charts.
In the run-up to the election, Harris’ campaign assembled a ‘celebrity avengers’ squad, including Taylor Swift, Lizzo, Eminem, and Bad Bunny, all trotted out in the campaign’s final push. Jennifer Lopez has joined Harris in key swing states like Nevada and Arizona.
Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr, Scarlett Johansson, Danai Gurira, Don Cheadle, Paul Bettany and Mark Ruffalo endorse Kamala Harris in new video.
— Pop Base (@PopBase) October 31, 2024
This felt like the worst kind of ‘Déjà Vu’. In 2016, both Beyoncé and JLo campaigned with Hillary Clinton just before the election, creating an illusion of popular momentum behind the Democratic candidate.
And just like before, these out-of-touch tactics hit a bum note. To paraphrase Karl Marx: once is a tragedy; twice is a farce.
For those outside of the blue bubble, these tactics reeked of desperation. It’s precisely this kind of vibes-based politics that many people find off-putting.
As one YouGov poll found, celebrity endorsements actually turned a majority of people away from a given candidate.
Clearly, millionaire and billionaire support only reinforces the perception that the Democrats are part-and-parcel of an arrogant, moralising establishment, which thinks it knows better than ordinary people.
As one BBC reporter observed:
“This Democrat despair brings to mind a conversation I had with a Republican at one Trump rally who said their candidate had completely ‘reimagined’ the Republican party from its country club voter stereotype to appealing to working class families, while the Democrats had become the ‘party of Hollywood’.”
Beyoncé assured voters that she’s “not here as a celebrity… [but] as a mother” who deeply cares about “the world our children live in, where we have the freedom to control our bodies and aren’t divided.”
Yet the mothers in the US, Gaza, and Beirut won’t forget the role the Democratic administration has played in recent conflicts.
At home, ‘Single Ladies’ know that their bodies and lives are being gambled with. In the Middle East, bombs, weapons, and intelligence continue to flow to Netanyahu, despite Biden and Harris’s tepid objections.
“It’s time to sing a new song,” Beyoncé urges. We couldn’t agree more. But Kamala’s campaign was no Renaissance; it’s just more of the same.
Time to do away with these ‘Beautiful Liar[s]’ and ‘move to the left’.
‘Always stay gracious; best revenge is our (news) paper’.
