Is Calling Republicans "Weird" our Best Message?

MAGA Republicans are super weird, but the voters already know that

There are many reasons why Kamala Harris picked Tim Walz as her Vice President. He is eminently qualified; he is ready on day one; and he is a great guy with an amazing record of accomplishments. According to reports, Harris and her team were also very impressed with how Walz made the case against Donald Trump and Vance on cable and podcasts in recent weeks. The central feature of Walz’s viral messaging was “Republicans are weird.”

This gambit began as a response to JD Vance’s comments calling people without children “catladies” and “sociopaths.”

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Senator Brian Schatz, and the Harris campaign have all echoed the message in recent days. Here’s how Walz made the argument during a recent episode of Pod Save America (which is definitely the interview that secured him the nomination):

There are a few reasons that the “Republicans are weird” message is so effective. First, MAGA Republican policies are weird and creepy. These old men are obsessed with people’s personal lives, health care decisions, and sex lives. Second, it’s a call back to something Harris said a few years ago. According to ABC News:

The dig appeared to be a callback to what Harris once said she would do, according to CNN, if Trump followed her around the debate stage like he did to Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Harris reportedly said she would turn around and ask him, "Why are you being so weird?"

Finally, it generates engagement online. It’s one of the reasons that Walz, a heretofore largely low-profile politician, has become an internet star and the favored VP choice of many online Democrats.

A scroll through TikTok will result in dozens of videos of politicians and online influencers calling Trump, Vance, and other MAGA Republicans “weird.”

Many Democratic operatives and elected officials love this message, myself included. Walz and Schatz began pushing it on cable and Twitter. More people will use it now that Walz is on the ticket. He was a hit at his first rally with Harris in Philly. It’s fun, but is it effective? Have Democrats finally unlocked our contrast message for the election?

The Message Breaks Through

There are two components to a successful political message: what you say and getting people to hear what you say. The first part is hard, and the second is nearly impossible in this fractured media environment. In a world where traditional media sources are losing their audience and people exist within their own personal algorithm-dictated media bubbles, reaching broad swaths of the public with a singular message is improbable.

The weird messaging broke through in ways other critiques of Trump and MAGA Republicans have not. CNN’s Harry Enten reported:

It's clear from the numbers that the attack on Vance/Trump as "weird" has penetrated the zeitgeist. Searches for weird are way up on Google, and the topics that are driving that are all political.

It’s everywhere. So many Democratic politicians, pundits, TikTok influencers, and cable hosts enthusiastically embraced it.

Voters Think Republicans Are Weird

The folks at Data for Progress are out with a brand new poll that shows branding Republicans as weirdos pushes on an open door. The pollsters read a series of recent Republican comments and antics. These include the intentional mispronunciation of Kamala Harris’s name, Trump questioning her racial identity, and Vance’s attacks on adults without children.

Lo and behold, voters think this is all really weird stuff. In many cases, more than 70% of voters describe it as weird. The poll also found that 47% of voters describe Republicans as “weird,” while only 37% describe Democrats that way.

But Does It Work?

Does calling MAGA Republicans weird actually move voters?

Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, we haven’t (yet) found the secret sauce. According to private research done by a top Democratic outfit, calling MAGA Republicans “weird” has minimal impact. The study showed voters various clips of Democrats using the message and then measured how the messages impacted their vote choice. The study found not significant impact one way or the other.

The lack of a backlash is notable because using a term like “weird” would seem condescending to some voters — something akin to Hillary Clinton’s deplorables comment in 2016. There is no downside to the message, but it doesn’t move the race in our direction. In other words, calling Donald Trump and JD Vance “weird” may be more cathartic than constructive.

Why is this the case? Consider how different persuadable voters are to political junkies like us. They pay little attention to politics, rarely consume political news and are generally much more cynical and skeptical about politics and the media. Bread and butter issues like housing, gas and grocery prices are central to their lives. This is why there is often an inverse relationship between online virality and efficacy. Remember those Lincoln Project ads that caused Democrats to swoon in 2020? A post-election study found them ineffective with our target voters.

However, we must now educate voters about Harris’s record and biography. Harris has high name identification, but people know very little about her. According to a recent poll from Blueprint, a Democratic polling outfit:

In fact, 71% of voters say their minds are made up about Trump and that there is absolutely nothing that could change their opinion about him. Just 57% say the same about Vice President Harris, with 20% saying either that they’re open to changing their minds about her or that they don’t really have any views on her and need to learn more They want to like her, but Democrats have to fill in the blanks before Trump and the Republicans do it first. This ad from the Harris campaign is a good example of the information voters need to hear:

There is no greater priority than informing voters about who Kamala Harris is, what she stands for, and what she will do as President. That’s how this campaign will be won or lost.