Published By: Soham Halder

Zoom Boom: Virtual Cheers for Harris; How Historical Digital Meetups are Redefining Election Campaigns

Who would have imagined that in an era of Instagram or TikTok, virtual meeting platform Zoom to become the biggest crowdpuller for election campaigns?

From surprising events to clash among business owners, assassination attempt on Presidential candidate to sudden rise in unemployment, for many reasons, US election 2024 will always remain unforgettable. With only over 80 days left for election, analysts are expecting an overheated political spectacle which can possibly change the fate of America in coming years. Even a small kid can tell the importance successful campaigns before election. What's so special this year? It's the rise of virtual meetups. Let's understand how.

Zoom Boom:

You just cannot ignore the role of technology in election. John F. Kennedy, for the first time appeared in TV presidential debate to beat Richard Nixon in 1960. Let's take example of a recent scenario; when social media was on the rise, Barack Obama leveraged it to the fullest and received millions of dollars donations. In an era of Facebook, Instagram, X (previously Twitter), TikTok, one defining moment is zoom rally. What's this? Let's understand.

Zoom Rallies for Harris: Thousands of attendees are coming to one platform in support of Democrat’s presidential candidate Kamala Harris. Well, this is not a new trend. It started since Joe Biden stepped down from the race and slowly picked up to become a record-breaking number of attendees in a virtual meet.

 

(Credit - @Reuters X handle)

A Unique Fundraising Event: Ever attended a zoom meet with over thousands of people? Possibly couple of times. But, the supporters of Kamala Harris broke all the records. It started with a group called ‘Win With Black Women’ promoting one of its daily scheduled Sunday evening Zoom calls on MSNBC. Within three hours, the organizers raised over $1.6 million. This was followed by ‘White Women Answer the Call’ with 164,000 attendees over several hours, raising over $11 million.

Later, ‘White Dudes for Harris’ saw an attendance of 60,000 people who helped raising over $4 million.

Some other zoom meetups that gathered huge in numbers are ‘Disabled Voters for Harris’, ‘Cat Ladies for Harris’.

Unique Authenticity: Some unique features of these meets are casual dressing and unscripted speeches, increasing the sense of authenticity. Some are attending from the garrage, some are facing terrible light issue or even interruption by pets. The vibe and mood of those virtual meetups are optimistic and joyful.

 

(Credit - @Arkypatriot X handle)

A change in configuration: The videoconferencing apps became an instant hit during the pandemic which helped remote workers to connect and share thoughts globally. Zoom was not previously developed for grass-roots political organizing. However, it has now become a crucial campaign tech for politicians. Zoom usually allows 1,000 participants at a time for a meet. However, Zoom had to increase its capacity to support the campaign. These rallies would have been be hard to arrange physically as attendees are from different parts of US.

The Most Important Thing - Identity:

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has many times been criticized for attacking on the ‘intent of identity politics’. The sudden rise of people coming together in support of an Asian-American lady indicates one crucial aspect, which is observing glimpses of own identity in Harris.

 

 

(Credit - @KamalaHarris X handle)

Why it's a Revolutionary Approach?

One of the organizers recently said: “Now that the pandemic is over. This is really the first presidential election with Zoom as a more developed and popular tool. People are thrilled to connect with each other across the country.”

“The feeling a lot of people have about politics today, I haven’t seen anything like it since 2008,” said Ross Morales Rocketto, the organizer of a ‘White Dudes for Harris’.

The supporters of Kamala Harris have already announced that they will host more such Zoom rallies before November’s vote.