Can the meme magic last? DNC aims to charge youth vote with red carpet for creators.

Vice President Kamala Harris has ridden a tsunami of online excitement since claiming the top of the Democratic presidential ticket. Now, the party hopes to supercharge that energy with white-glove treatment of influencers at its convention.

Quentin Jiles, a Houston-based creator with nearly half a million TikTok followers, said he signed up for credentials to the Democratic convention while President Joe Biden headed the ticket but had considered not going. That changed when Harris rose. “The momentum invigorated me, just seeing the energy online, seeing the energy at the rallies,” Jiles said. “This is a moment in time, and I have the opportunity to be in the moment.”

He will be one of more than 200 creators issued credentials in Chicago. They will not only get badges, but access parallel to legacy media, including interviews with VIPs and studio space. The inaugural program comes as the party pitches itself to young voters who increasingly get their news on social media.

“Bringing creators to our convention will multiply our reach and ensure that everyone can witness democracy in action,” Cayana Mackey-Nance, director of digital strategy for the Democratic National Convention Committee, said in a statement. “We’re confident that when the world turns to Chicago in August on their phones, tablets, or TVs, they’ll see exactly who Democrats are and the future that we’re fighting for.”

Republicans, too, offered credentials to some 100 creators at their convention and gave them a creator suite to work from, according to Brilyn Hollyhand, who chairs the Republican National Committee's Youth Advisory Council.

However, he cautioned that enthusiasm on social media may not translate to a win in November — for either party.

“Social media was something that we had to develop over a few years and convince some of the older wing of the party that this is the way,” Hollyhand, 18, said. “The Harris team just started off with it on day one, so props to them for that. But still, what they’re experiencing right now isn’t a surge — it’s a honeymoon.”

After Biden dropped out of the race, social media gushed over Harris. “We absolutely MUST meme this woman into the presidency,” one X user posted almost immediately. The internet saw thousands of TikTok edits of Kamala Harris’ unapologetic laugh , posts on X challenging former President Donald Trump to a debate and Instagram reels of her “feminonemon” status as potentially the first woman president.

Campaign headquarters has connected with that audience. The Harris campaign TikTok (formerly Biden’s) has more than 3.5 million followers, while her personal account racked up 4.5 million since it opened in late July. Trump maintains the upper hand on followers — some 10 million on TikTok for his sole account — but Harris appears to have more momentum.

Recent polling of voters younger than 30 bears that out. In an Economist /YouGov poll conducted in early August , Harris led Trump by 31 points among the cohort. A poll of three battleground states from The New York Times/Siena College gave Harris a 15-point lead.

Harris, 59, appears to have galvanized young people who had felt alienated from the 81-year-old Biden. Gen Z for Change, a group formed as “TikTok for Biden” in 2020, had refused to endorse his bid for reelection. On the day Biden announced he would not run, the group posted , “We look forward to working alongside Vice President Harris to advance an agenda that young people deserve.”

Antonio Arellano, spokesperson for the progressive youth voting organization NextGen America, said this level of excitement has not been seen since Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign.

“When Obama first ran, he was innovative, and his digital team tapped into YouTube and into MySpace in a way that had never been leveraged or utilized for civic, civic engagement and voter mobilization, voter persuasion campaigns,” Arellano said. “And what we're seeing here with Vice President Harris is a modern and innovative new approach to leverage platforms like TikTok, Instagram and X to her advantage.”

In a further appeal to online audiences, the DNC told POLITICO that for the first time, it will present conference footage vertically across TikTok, Instagram and YouTube — suited for mobile phones. The RNC did not present its footage vertically, but livestreamed it on the conservative-leaning video service Rumble, Hollyhand said.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has also grabbed the attention of creators. Fred Wellman, 58, a Democratic political consultant and retired Army officer, said he was inspired to show his support for the Democratic ticket to his 353,000 followers on Twitter, as well as viewers of the left-leaning MeidasTouch news network where he contributes. “Tim Walz is a veteran like me,” Wellman said. “So you've really kind of changed it up pretty dramatically for me as a veteran content creator.”

One Democrat who has not captured the buzz: Biden. On Wednesday he addressed some 100 attendees at the first-ever White House Creator Economy Conference .

“You break through in ways that I think are going to change the entire dynamic of the way in which we communicate,” Biden said.

Dallas-based “taxtok” creator Duke Alexander Moore, 29, posted a video to his 3.5 million followers on TikTok while teaching Biden a dance called “The Dougie”. He soon followed up with a confessional video. "I have lost thousands of followers in the past 24 hours due to the 'Dougie incident' video," Moore said. "Regardless of what side you’re on, being invited to the White House with the opportunity of meeting the president of the United States and voicing your opinion on policies that you strongly believe need change immediately is one hell of an experience.”

Republicans, meanwhile, appear to be eyeing their rivals with envy. Mary Morgan, 23, runs a conservative YouTube channel called Pop Culture Crisis, which has 130,000 subscribers. She said Trump had “ meme magic ” on his side in 2016, when young conservatives rallied behind him in places like 4chan. This year, she said Republicans had failed to understand TikTok.

“The right wing's version of engaging with the culture is having Kid Rock perform at the RNC ,” said Morgan. “It's so far removed from anything that is relevant to young people. And I can't believe it has taken this long for us to realize that it’s important.”

Hollyhand at the RNC acknowledged, “we famously have a messaging problem,” but said the party had come a long way since he took his position in 2023.

“When I came to the RNC, our social media accounts were just posting quotes and clip arts of Reagan. We would say ‘Happy Wednesday’ with a bald eagle, that type of stuff. It wasn't anything to engage young people.”

Democrats appear to be pouring more resources into social media, with a recent job posting for a digital advertising strategist. Meanwhile, content creators who will amplify the campaign’s message for free are preparing for showtime.

Los Angeles-based creator Leigh McGowan, 49, whose Politics Girl handle has 681,000 followers on TikTok, said that she had not yet heard whether her requests to speak with “top brass people” at the DNC would be granted, but intended to speak with delegate wranglers as well.

"They are including us because we come with a built-in audience that only continues to grow because people like the authenticity,” she said.

The condensed time frame of Harris’ unexpected election campaign may be uniquely suited to an online audience with a short attention span, said Javier Morillo, who directs state strategy for the progressive grassroots group Movement Voter Project. “[In] a yearslong campaign, we might have had a harder time keeping up that momentum,” he said.

Creators say it would be a mistake to think that online messaging is only for the young.

“I don't think it is like a zero-sum game just to get Gen Z back on board,” Jiles said. “The old people on TikTok, they're there. I see them there in the analytics as well.”