Photo: White Dudes for Harris
Waiting for the White Dudes for Harris stream to begin, I had a question: How long would it take to see a top knot? I did not have to wait long, for the first white dude — Ross Morales Rocketto, the founder of White Dudes for Harris — had the signature late-millennial white dude cut. “We know the silent majority of white men aren’t MAGA supporters,” Rocketto said, urging white guys around the nation to heed their call and donate to Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic candidate for president as of just last week.
Rocketto, a progressive organizer and Deloitte alum, was quick to address the uncomfortable name of the group he co-founded to raise money for the vice-president’s campaign. After an estimated 40,000 Black women gathered on Zoom to fundraise for Harris last week — followed by a White Women for Kamala event that broke Zoom —Rocketto stated that a white guy fundraiser was necessary: “We created this place to listen.” Then the white guys began talking.
The three-plus-hour stream was a mix of white male politicians, white male celebrities, white male labor leaders, and one Black man — Working Families Party national director Maurice Mitchell, who called in from the New York Mets game. Mitchell kicked off the event, telling the white guys on the stream that “silence equates to agreement” and that they must “get in formation” in the coalition to defeat Donald Trump. He was followed up by not just a white dude, but the white dude.
“I gotta laugh because I accepted the invitation not for being white, but because I’m a dude you know?” said actor Jeff Bridges, who pushed back on a philosophical point on the messaging from the campaign that Democrats must “fight” for democracy. “It’s not so much a fight, but a surrender to higher thoughts of how we want the future to turn out,” Bridges said. “That’s just my opinion, man.”
It’s hard to follow up on the energy of the dude from The Big Lebowski. Rather than try, they went with Pete Buttigieg next. “I’m a policy guy,” he said. Unlike Bridges, the Transportation secretary said that he has never put much stock in “vibes” — but added that the “vibes are incredible” since President Joe Biden dropped out of the race.
Throughout the night, the stream swapped back and forth between political figures and celebs. Singer Josh Groban discussed the “constant education” of listening to women, followed by North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, who discussed the “disrespect of women” embedded in the Republican Party. The West Wing actor Bradley Whitford joked about the “rainbow of beige” on the call on Monday night, followed by the co-chair of Harris’s campaign Mitch Landrieu, who called on white guys to “just show up.” Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker played the role of both politician and comedian, making at least three jokes involving J.D. Vance and a couch.
It was a strange night — an affinity group of liberal white guys talking about their identity and their relationships to women. Actor Josh Gadd and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz cited their status as fathers of daughters. Business professor Scott Galloway identified as a “man who protects and provides that is what we do.” (Galloway also pledged $50,000 in exchange for Star Wars actor Mark Hamill, who was also on the call, to say: “I’m Luke Skywalker, I’m here to rescue you.”) Actor Sean Astin described his “absolute reverence for women” and Michigan Senator Gary Peters advised white men to “worship our loved ones.” But overall, the messaging was focused. To quote from the crowd, Harris offers a new vision of “hope” and economic investment, compared to a Republican Party led by an “adjudicated rapist” and his “weird” VP candidate, J.D. Vance.
The tone was like a star-studded public radio fund drive that was really easy to make fun of — and was a definite throwback to the 2016 Democratic effort to get as many celebrities as possible to rally the base. But if money was the whole point, it looks like it all worked out. With 60,000 individual contributions, the stream raised more than $3.9 million before it was over. Hey, it’s an ad buy, right?
