My “take” may be a little glib, and it’s meant to complement your perceptive essay rather than argue with it. But I suspect part of what’s going on here is that following online influencers and voting for representative governance candidates are two very different activities. I suspect stats would show that to a significant extent it’s two different kinds of people engaging in the two activities.
No doubt there are other factors explaining the gap, but my guess is that this explains a lot of it. It would be interesting to know how many fans of an influencer vote against them, or vote at all. I also assume that my point would be more relevant in primaries where only the most politically active citizens turn out.
I definitely think there’s something to this. I think the way I would think about is if the US population is one big bubble, the number of people who vote in primaries are a smaller bubble, and the number of people who follow political influencers are a smaller bubble inside that -- which is to say, I do think many of the people engaged enough to follow politics online also fit the profile of the voters who are engaged enough to vote in primaries. However, that inside bubble is still relatively small -- and so the odds, for a national-focused influencer, that a meaningful # of their followers are from their own district are slim, meaning those followers might be engaged enough to vote in a primary but just aren’t all concentrated in one place (and the non-following primary voters aren’t particularly impressed by work “experience” on social media)
Gabe, since you love statistics and graphs, how about one overlaying two curves: number of social media followers by age and voter turnout by age. The reason social media isn't a great campaign strategy may be very simple.
The usual advice people who want to enter politics receive is to start small. Run for your school board or county commission or city council and then work you way up to mayor or your state’s congress then national office. Seems to me that if at the same time you were active online as an influencer you would definitely have a leg up. In other words, being a popular influencer is neither necessary nor sufficient to a career in politics but it seems like it ought to provide a boost. I guess we’ll see in the coming Democratic primary whether Gavin Newsom, who has pretty much followed this traditional path (SF Traffic Commissioner, SF Supervisor, SF Mayor, CA Governor), gets any positive cred for his online presence. The jury’s still out.
Very thoughtful and substantive post. I would just suggest not lumping in Abughazaleh among the “lazy” because she has an incurable and debilitating chronic illness. Give her the dignity of believing her. Most of us with the condition have dealt with the “lazy” label all our lives when often that couldn’t be further from the truth.
i ran for congress in 2024 and this blew my mind. it was the first real time that influencers were running i can remember. i think it was Cheyenne Hunt? anyway was shocked how little traction or fundraising she got
While some of your thesis makes sense, putting Kat Abughazaleh as an influencer who couldn’t make hay in the political arena really makes me doubt the whole thing.
As you don’t draw attention to, Abughazaleh was not polling in single digits. She in fact almost overtook Daniel Biss, the machine candidate. It was in fact due to a last minute smear campaign by AIPAC that she ended up not clinching it.
So I would say her case detracts from your argument as opposed to contributing to it
I agree Abughazaleh came closer than any of the other influencers mentioned -- not something I was trying to hide, which is why I included the margins for each race and noted hers was much closer than the others. But, at the end of the day, she did lose, and I do think she fits in well with the broader trends of the piece, especially details like the influx of donations she got from outside the state and the fact that her residency in her district was questioned. Obviously there are many factors that influence an election loss, but the fact that her opponents used her residency and work experience as an attack against her suggests that was one of the factors in hers.
My “take” may be a little glib, and it’s meant to complement your perceptive essay rather than argue with it. But I suspect part of what’s going on here is that following online influencers and voting for representative governance candidates are two very different activities. I suspect stats would show that to a significant extent it’s two different kinds of people engaging in the two activities.
No doubt there are other factors explaining the gap, but my guess is that this explains a lot of it. It would be interesting to know how many fans of an influencer vote against them, or vote at all. I also assume that my point would be more relevant in primaries where only the most politically active citizens turn out.
I definitely think there’s something to this. I think the way I would think about is if the US population is one big bubble, the number of people who vote in primaries are a smaller bubble, and the number of people who follow political influencers are a smaller bubble inside that -- which is to say, I do think many of the people engaged enough to follow politics online also fit the profile of the voters who are engaged enough to vote in primaries. However, that inside bubble is still relatively small -- and so the odds, for a national-focused influencer, that a meaningful # of their followers are from their own district are slim, meaning those followers might be engaged enough to vote in a primary but just aren’t all concentrated in one place (and the non-following primary voters aren’t particularly impressed by work “experience” on social media)
Thanks for this helpful response— you dug deeper than I did!
Gabe, since you love statistics and graphs, how about one overlaying two curves: number of social media followers by age and voter turnout by age. The reason social media isn't a great campaign strategy may be very simple.
Definitely agree that’s a factor here!
This column is kind of a "whew" for those of us who can't keep up with the influencers.
The usual advice people who want to enter politics receive is to start small. Run for your school board or county commission or city council and then work you way up to mayor or your state’s congress then national office. Seems to me that if at the same time you were active online as an influencer you would definitely have a leg up. In other words, being a popular influencer is neither necessary nor sufficient to a career in politics but it seems like it ought to provide a boost. I guess we’ll see in the coming Democratic primary whether Gavin Newsom, who has pretty much followed this traditional path (SF Traffic Commissioner, SF Supervisor, SF Mayor, CA Governor), gets any positive cred for his online presence. The jury’s still out.
What Americans really want after so many years of Trump is to Make Politics Boring Again.
I am curious about if Spencer Pratt also fell victim to this in his run for mayor of LA?
Good to know. I guess we can breath easy since Conflict Entrepreneur and Attention Grabber extraordinaire was an anomaly :-)
There is no way that middle aged man is 33
Very thoughtful and substantive post. I would just suggest not lumping in Abughazaleh among the “lazy” because she has an incurable and debilitating chronic illness. Give her the dignity of believing her. Most of us with the condition have dealt with the “lazy” label all our lives when often that couldn’t be further from the truth.
i ran for congress in 2024 and this blew my mind. it was the first real time that influencers were running i can remember. i think it was Cheyenne Hunt? anyway was shocked how little traction or fundraising she got
While some of your thesis makes sense, putting Kat Abughazaleh as an influencer who couldn’t make hay in the political arena really makes me doubt the whole thing.
As you don’t draw attention to, Abughazaleh was not polling in single digits. She in fact almost overtook Daniel Biss, the machine candidate. It was in fact due to a last minute smear campaign by AIPAC that she ended up not clinching it.
So I would say her case detracts from your argument as opposed to contributing to it
I agree Abughazaleh came closer than any of the other influencers mentioned -- not something I was trying to hide, which is why I included the margins for each race and noted hers was much closer than the others. But, at the end of the day, she did lose, and I do think she fits in well with the broader trends of the piece, especially details like the influx of donations she got from outside the state and the fact that her residency in her district was questioned. Obviously there are many factors that influence an election loss, but the fact that her opponents used her residency and work experience as an attack against her suggests that was one of the factors in hers.