Endless Thread - Introducing WIRED Politics: Kamala Harris' Brat Summer Is Almost Over. What's Next?

Episode Date: September 30, 2024

We're in your feed today to share an episode from a podcast we think you might like called the WIRED Politics Lab. As Election 2024 quickly approaches, our news feeds and timelines are filled with conspiracy theories, disinformation campaigns, and technological shenanigans. Join host Leah Feiger on WIRED Politics Lab as she cuts through the noise and helps you make sense of it all with the help of various experts and journalists. In this episode, Leah is joined by writer and critic Hunter Harris. They discuss how Kamala Harris is harnessing social media to propel her campaign and what comes next in the run-up to November. We hope you enjoy. Listen to and follow WIRED Politics Lab here: https://listen.wired.com/politicslab_feeddrop

Support for endless thread comes from Mathworks, creator of MATLAB and Simulink Software, to design and develop engineered systems, accelerating the pace of discovery in engineering and science. Learn more at Mathworks.com. Support for WBUR comes from Is Business Broken, a podcast from the Mayrotra Institute at Boston University that explores questions like, why is innovation in healthcare so hard? Is ESG just greenwashing? And, of course, is business broken? Listen, wherever you get your podcasts. What up, E.T. homies. It's Ben Brock Johnson, and I'm hopping into the feed today on a Monday to share an episode from a podcast we think you might like called Wired Politics Lab. As Election 2024 quickly approaches our news feeds and timelines are just chock full of conspiracy theories, disinformation campaigns.

and technological shenanigans. Join host Leah Figer on Wired Politics Lab as she cuts through the noise and helps you make sense of it all with the help of various experts and journalists. In this episode, Leah is joined by writer and critic Hunter Harris. They discuss how Kamala Harris, no relation, I don't think, is harnessing social media to propel her campaign

in what comes next in the run-up to November. We hope you enjoy. Take a listen. This is Wired Politics Lab, a show about how tech is changing politics. I'm Leah Fiker, the senior politics editor at Wired. Today on the show, I'm talking to Hunter Harris about the internet culture surrounding election season this year. Hunter is a writer and critic who writes a lot about pop culture and occasionally about politics. She's also worked for Vulture at New York Magazine and as a screenwriter on HBO's Gossip Girl reboot.

Now she hosts the Wondery Podcast Let Me Say This, and she has her own substack called Hung Up. Hunter, welcome to Wired Politics Lab. Thank you for having me. Well, let's dive right in because I know that you have so much to say about how the internet has responded to Kamala Harris and Tim Walz's campaign over the last few weeks. What are you thinking? What are you seeing? It's kind of funny, like the absolute rancid vibes of Joe Biden's campaign and like the tone and tenor of the internet felt extremely dystopian. It was sad. Yeah, no, it was sad, but it was also like elder abuse. Like we can't keep trotting out this man and pretending that he is going to be president. And now I think there's a big sort of wave of goodwill and also like we can have fun again in a campaign season, which hasn't felt that way since Obama. Yeah. And there's something funny to me about the way that Kamala Harris is maybe the most memeable political.

politician ever, or at least in my memory, she's so naturally funny, even like unintentionally, and it kind of thrills me. And I think it's also this very specific, like, cultural moment of conversation. The way that she is talking and the things that she's saying are funny, I don't know if I would have found them funny 10 years ago, but I find them absolutely hilarious right now. I don't know if I would have found them funny even 10 months ago. Like, there was a really, there was a really dire point in the presidency where it seemed like, There wasn't a lot of clarity on how she was being positioned, right? Like, she was the knock against her was that she was like too kind of like laughy, giggly,

which obviously I think that has lots to do with misogyny and misogyny war. Oh, yeah, very gendered. But she did also laugh a lot, like, to be fair. And she was like wearing converse, it seemed relatable. Like that was a whole moment in her public life. And then they, it seemed like she was just not doing any appearances or any press at all. And now everything that was like seen as a detriment to her then has just come around full circle into being like some of her greatest strengths. I mean, what you're saying, though, about how the White House was positioning her and even how Biden's campaign positioned her in 2020, that was horrible.

That was shockingly bad, actually. Like, I don't know if we've actually seen a vice president in the last couple of cycles where it's like been, I mean, maybe Pence, but like on the Democratic side where. someone has just seemed so shoved to the side. Like I think of like the Joe Biden Barack Obama memes. They were everywhere. That was like, oh, they're best friends. They're this. They're thought partners.

They're everything. And the whole thing with like Biden being like, I'm going to be the last person in the room. I'm going to be the last person you make a decision with. And it was so clear to me that that was not how Harris was getting positioned. So when it seemed like after the debate, Biden was faltering. Senators and Congress people were calling for him to drop out. Nancy Pelosi had her whole like behind the scenes campaign.

to end this all. And I'm looking at polling that shows that Harris is actually pretty neck and neck with Biden compared to Trump in a lot of states. You know, the comparison that everyone makes online is that this is like literally the HBO series VIP playing up in real life. In VIP, for those who haven't seen the HBO show, the president actually drops out in like a finale twist at the end of season three. And Selena Meyer, who is like the vice president played by Julie Louis Dreyfus, assumes a presidency. Potus is not going to be running for a second term. Oh, my God.

I'm going to run. Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, ma'am. Giving the straight poop here, is just for real? It's totally crazy. Oh, thank you. People who know Veep by heart, it's our season. Let me tell you that. It's so good.

But, I mean, truly, it was ridiculous. The degree that Kamla Harris was being publicly and it seemed privately undermined. Yeah, absolutely. And then I think it's worked in her favor, the degree to which the Biden campaign had basically hidden her way because all the reasons why the internet and young people had sort of soured on Kamala, her record as a prosecutor, her stance on Gaza, people kind of like forgot that she was less progressive than, you know, she'd seemed. Sure, totally, totally. Yeah, she just popped out. It feels like this is, it's an underdark story, is like kind of how it

feels, which is hilarious because she's on the incumbent side. It is shocking that someone who has been so close to the presidency for the last four years is like the underdog in this narrative because she but she wears it very well. I think that it is, you know, I wonder when this will all kind of turn when politics will become politics again and not pop culture and then it will feel like, okay, we're back to like none of this being very fun. Well, I guess that brings me to is Brat Summer over already? Let's talk about it. You know, Biden drops out. Charlie X-X-Rodon X that Kamala is brat, the Harris campaign seized on it, they changed a ton of their social stuff. They've been doing things that the Biden campaign just couldn't have even

dreamt of with social media. What are you seeing in terms of like trends changing, like things perhaps shifting in even the discussion about it? Like you can't have a brat summer in October. Sure. I think the bratt summer sort of phenomenon will eventually die down, although Obama did just put a brat song in his annual summer playlist. Like, bless the intern who is like super on top. That entire playlist. I'm like, this is amazing. You know, there's something so petty to me about him not putting Chapel Rhone, like the

music story of the summer being absent from his playlist. I was looking for Hot to go. That was what I wanted to see pop up on the Obama playlist. It just feels very shady to me that Obama's listening to Suede and not Chapel Rhone, but it is what it is. But no, so I think that, you know, like the brat moment for the Kamala campaign at least has already kind of passed. It doesn't feel so funny. I mean, the thing is it felt sort of plugged in and online.

But I do think that their social team does seem pretty nimble in terms of how they will pivot and position her in the future. But again, you know, the internet is such a crazy place and all of this stuff is so. nebulous. And one thing that I am very intrigued by is how all of those like R&C supercuts of her giving that old stump speech, you know, what can be unburdened by what has been. What can be unburdened by what has been? What can be unburdened by what has been. What can be unburdened by what has been. What can be. That playing on a loop only worked in her favor.

Everyone loved it. Exactly. Exactly. And that this comes from the Republican side and that they're trying to find a way to make her seem ditsy or stupid or kind of uninformed. It's not doing that at all. It makes her seem like the most online ready candidate in a long time. I 100% agree. I mean, she's Teflon right now.

Like that supercut is such a great example because I'm like, that's what your OPA research team came up with. They looked around and said the internet's going to hate that. this. And I'm like, have you spent a single second on the internet? Which I guess gets into like also how fragmented these spaces are. Maybe that would play super well on true social or like a couple of spaces on telegram and people would be like, yes, this is it. This is this is it. But on Instagram, on TikTok, even on Elon Musk's ex, everyone had a very different reaction. Totally. And it does sort of remind me in a weird way of the way Trump's memeability existed during his presidency. Like, I mean, gosh, these are like the most annoying tweets I ever saw. But like whenever anything would happen in culture and someone would, you know, immediately run and say there's always a tweet and you would, they would retweet like a classic Donald Trump tweet of him talking, you know, more eloquently about Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson than about like anything happening in global politics.

Totally. And both of these candidates do have that kind of teflon, as you said, like funny bone quality of like it doesn't really. matter the substance of what they're saying, but they just do have a certain way of talking that is pretty funny and does traffic very well in being a meme. There was some good reporting earlier this week about how the Trump campaign is really upset that Kamala's getting all of this like free press, basically, that like everyone is so excited to write about her, everyone's so excited to post about her online. And in like part of the dismay from the Trump campaign absolutely has to be that like that was their game. That was that was how Trump did it. It was free press. It was free publicity. It was like you said, it was the memeability. He was made for the internet.

So it is fascinating to watch a Democrat like for the first time flip the script a bit. So I want to talk also about the fandoms getting in on this that are propelling so much of this content. You wrote in your newsletter about how Club Salomei endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris. And that was just so specific. You got to tell us. I know. I know. you're a huge fan. You are Club Chalemay Pilled. Who is that? Who's behind it? And why should we care? Okay. Let me just let me say get ready. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. So Club Chalemay is really just one woman named Simone. I think she lives in California, but she is a Gen X super fan of the actor, Timothy Chalame. She started posting, I want to say, like four or five years ago. It's unclear. So she's in her like 50s. I think she's like 50s, six or 57. It's unclear what she was doing for like the previous decades of her life before

Kempel Lameh was born. For at least some of that time, I believe she was a Michael Fosbender Stan, the actor Michael Fosbender. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Sure. But basically, she has that dog in her. She really is like the main character of every day. I mean, I have like multiple group chats on like just dedicated to text each other club chalemay stuff because it harkens back to like golden age of Twitter where she just really has the most unhinged take on everything both Timi Shalami related and not Timi Shalami related which is like you know hilarious some of her club classics if you will yeah please include this is like when I first started to like take note of her she had, I would say, a deliriously unhinged post about 9-11.

Just bear with me because this is like legitimately kooky. So she posted 9-11 like on the anniversary last year and basically she said that like sometime in 2000 she had applied and interviewed for a job at the World Trade Center and she like got a weird feeling and didn't take the job. And then she's like, and it would have offered me more money and like better better. benefits and all this stuff, but I just, like, didn't, I felt bad. Like, something was, like, unsettled in my spirit, so I didn't take the job. And then she's like, and then look what happened. Oh, my God. It's a perfect shitpost. Like, incredible. It really operates on so many levels of, like, how was 9-11 about you so you knew what was going to happen? Like, I don't, I'm not sure that she understood the implication. World Wars were started by this. But me personally, I don't, I

just I need you guys to know my relationship with all of this. It also brought a lot of attention to her age that she really is like Gen X, but extremely online on corners of Stan Twitter where she's defending Timela-May, where she's posting every update to his life. She has an ongoing, one-sided, I would say, beef with Kylie Jenner. Oh my God, incredible. Tremay's girlfriend, who she calls slurpy. How did this get into Kamala Harris again? So based on her, what I'm imagining is her demographic, like I said, she's Gen X. She lives in California. She seems to be a pretty like establishment Democrat. Was posting a lot in support of Joe Biden. Yeah. And all of a sudden, once Joe Biden drops out of the race, I mean, I ran to Club Shaolin's account because I had to know what she was going to say. Because I mean, listen. You're like Anderson Cooper means nothing to me. I am all Club Shop. No. I know the news. I need the commentary. And of course.

You know, she posted, it's very similar to the tone of the 9-11 post in that this all comes back to what this means to her and how I think her point was like for the first time someone around my age is going to be in the White House. And she endorsed related to that. She's like, this is, this is why I'm a fan. Yeah, yeah. There wasn't really a lot of like political discourse. It really did seem to be like their ages are the same. And that was a endorsement. I mean, you know, to each their own, Everyone has a reason. For some, it's reproductive rights. And for others, it's similarities in demographic. And let me say this. They also, listen, as a black woman, black woman with bobs, they stick together. With a silk press, we're built different. Like, love it. I think there are a lot of commonalities, dare I say? I don't know. But it is funny that Club Chalame, like, you have to be so online to care about this stuff, but that she is, I don't know.

that Kamala does have this very online appeal. And obviously we're seeing like other fandoms, other kind of random influencers come out in support of Harris as well, which just continues to your point, this incredibly online candidate. Who else are you seeing get involved that you have been slightly enthralled by? A lot of this stuff does kind of feel like how it felt during the Obama years when Obama is like a cultural tastemaker in some ways. And Kamala Harris getting Kuevo, at the rapper from Migos or Megan the Stallion involved in her campaign. Like that does feel a little bit more organic than it felt during Joe Biden's presidency.

Totally. He had the support of rich and famous people like George Clooney, for example. We see how that ended. But, you know, at the end of the day, it does help, I think, the campaign feel more active and engaged and, like, youthful than it felt even two months ago when Joe Biden was the candidate. Absolutely. I mean, one of our senior. writers wrote an article in the last few weeks about how now Swifties are organizing in support of Harris. Obviously, Taylor Swift has not come out and said anything yet, but it wasn't just, like, the article wasn't just about like, oh yeah, we're, we're in support. Like, Swifties are organizing in very serious ways. Like, we're, the fundraising campaigns, the social outreach, like,

chatting with the campaign, have like their game plan for the next few months. Like, it's honestly really refreshing to also watch these campaigns in turn take these fandom seriously. I have to ask, before we take a quick break, who are some influencers or celebrities that you just like dream of getting involved, giving some endorsements? Maybe not on the club Chalemay level, of course, but who's on your list right now? Even just like for the love of it all, the humor of it all. I can give you mine right off the top. Yeah, please, please. Caroline Calloway, I need to know what she thinks about this entire election cycle. For those of you that don't know, and you absolutely should, Caroline Calloway is an Instagram influencer and author and alleged scam artist. Basically go look her up.

But from her apartment in Florida, I need her to tell us what Floridians are thinking about this campaign right now. Wow. Who do you have? Listen, at the end of the day, I love Julia Roberts. And my favorite thing about Julie Roberts is that she will post a grainy photo of her and anyone. like if it's like her friend's birthday, if it's like her anniversary. She does not have a Getty login. She just goes straight to Google and looks up Julie Roberts, George Clooney.

And like that's the photo she posts. And I mean, she was at the Joe Biden fundraising event where George Clooney like lost all faith in him. And so I'm imagining that she has some photos of herself and Kamla and the archive to post. And she does also activate that type of white woman who is totally calm. Lepild and like will be so enthusiastic to vote for her. Major endorsement. Major endorsement. Yes.

We actually have a pretty big project coming out today, also from senior writer McKenna Kelly, comparing the influencers and content creators from the right and left. I'm very excited for everyone to see it. I'll send it on over to you as well. A large scale analysis here is on the right, influencers and content creators are bigger. Their audiences are larger and they are more general. And on the left, they're smaller. And they are more specific, either in corners of the country or on topics.

And it's really interesting to watch how that is like playing out in online discourse right now. Anyway, a little plug for that project, but very, very excited that it's now out. We're going to take a quick break. And coming up is what happens next for these very online presidential campaigns. At Radio Lab, we love nothing more than nerding out about science. neuroscience, chemistry. But we do also like to get into other kinds of stories. Stories about policing or politics.

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Discover how the magic is made at WBUR.org slash creative studio. Welcome back to Wired Politics Lab. So Hunter, until recently, it really felt like Trump was kind of winning the internet. He has Elon Musk's ex behind him. He has all of these manosphere dude bro influencers posting about him. They have millions and millions of followers. And now it seems like Democrats are alive again because Biden's out. But as we also chatted about, Harris can't keep talking about Brat summer in October. What happens after this energy fades a little bit? Do you have any thoughts or predictions on how the Harris campaign kind of continues to mobilize online through the fall?

My prediction is that I think Republicans will continue to hit at her sort of tendency to give like word salad answers. Even, you know, the way in some interviews, she gets a little, really bark back in an interview. Like, she will get a little testy. And I think that maybe Republicans will use that against her. But I honestly think, again, that can be used in her favor online. That's a reaction meme. That's like a gif in the making. People are into it right now. I mean, there's so many reasons that she is different from Hillary Clinton as a candidate in 2016. Like, we don't even have to get it into the large, massive list. Whereas I think like Hillary snapping back maybe wouldn't have worked in her favor for Harris, it actually really could. Like in the debate, for example.

Totally. I think that her history is a prosecutor. And as I said, she just is very funny. Like, I remember this was years ago. But like, when she was running for president in 2020, there was like a really funny video of her, like, taking a deep sigh and waving. And I used it when I turned 25 and it was like me saying goodbye to like my youth basically. Like that just kind of is a part of her appeal. And I think that capitalizing on those moments and drawing attention away from her more, I don't know, moderate political opinions will probably keep younger voters, younger people on her side. But at some point, like you said, the election, quote unquote, like has to really start. How are they going to integrate her policy positions and platforms

into this youthful outreach online? I think that's the real challenge for her campaign is that eventually this kind of goodwill will die down. And at the end of the day, she probably is more conservative than a lot of Gen Z voters who are liberal would want her to be. She has to appeal to moderates and to older people. And, you know, I think a lot of this energy that she's harnessed the last couple weeks is mostly people who probably would have voted for a Democratic ticket anyway. And so how they couch her more unpopular positions and continue, you know, they can't meme their way out of her stance on Gaza. They can't meme. I was going to say. They can't meme her way out of her more tough on crime positions, but they can certainly turn the attention back onto Donald Trump

and how that is the reality that people don't want again who are very online. And maybe that will work for them. Yeah, I mean, thinking about, you know, the fandoms we're talking about that are coming out in support for her right now, that are organizing for her. And just recently, protesters in support of Gaza interrupted Harris at an event while she was speaking. And she absolutely shut it down. You know what? If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise, I'm speaking. Some people loved her reaction, but a lot of people didn't, specifically Gen Z posting online about it. I'm really interested to watch that tide turn. We're not there yet. And frankly, I think the Democrats have a bit of a layup for the next couple of weeks. This week is the buildup to the DNC.

And then we have the DNC. And then the week after that, they should be basking in the glow. And then what happens. I mean, that's what I was saying earlier. I think that it really, in some crazy way, worked to her benefit that she just has not been as front and center over the last, you know, few months of Biden's campaign because there's more distance from the way that she really can come off as just kind of unpleasant. Like when I watched her responding to the protesters, it was like, oh, this is the Kamala that is kind of unpopular, especially online. Especially online, right. Yeah, no, we're going to have to see what happens there. And meanwhile, obviously, she's writing a different sort of wave, our favorite Midwest princess wave named Tim Wals. I'm so curious what you think about all of that. I mean, it felt like last week was just an explosion of love for that man online. Truly, I was not that familiar with him before, but then all of a sudden it is like, oh, this is like a character from Parks and Recreation. Yeah. Like, this is truly, he would have gone crazy on an NBC sitcom in 2012.

Like, this would have been, like the t-shirts, the merch alone would have been outrageous. No, he, you know, does get the impression of, like, dad posting online. Like, dad who loves dad movies, dad who, like, wears the new balances. And I think there is some kind of an interesting kind of parallel to, like, the return to the so, like, dad core, mom core fashion. and the way that he exists on the internet, that those trends are sort of coming together. There is an appreciation for stuff that does feel kind of homey and nostalgic

that he taps into. I mean, he was made for the internet. I think it was an article about how him and his wife don't actually have any investments. They don't actually own any homes. They sold their house below original asking price when they moved into the governor's mansion in Minnesota. And everyone's like, this is so relatable.

I too have $20 in my pocket. And I was like, you are made. for this moment. Exactly. Who does that appeal to other than like people who are in their 20s and like, I have to transfer money from my savings to my checking for every single purchase. Like that's what it is to be 25. Yeah. Yeah, 100%. And obviously he started the trend of calling Republicans weird and he jokingly perpetuated this rumor about J.D. Vance and couches. What do you think about this new era of Democrats using the rights tactics against them? It's kind of ironic to me that the day that Joe Biden dropped out of the race.

Erin Sorkin had written that op-ed for The New York Times. Oh, my God. Suggesting that Democrats as sort of a last-ditch effort to save democracy nominate Mitt Romney. Incredible. It's like we're seeing the, I would say, you know, older and newer way of Democratic establishment operations kind of together in some really crazy way where it's like, you know, Aaron Sorkin who made the newsroom, who made the West Wing, who really is like, it feels like now, it's sort of crazily outdated liberal, you know, way of thinking.

Fantasy. Uh-huh. Fantasy entirely versus a Democratic Party that is a little bit more agile, that is not afraid of leaning into a certain level of humor and culture and onlineness, for lack of a better word, to get their point across and to find new audiences. Yeah, totally. And for everyone accusing them of being hypocritical, I think my question is a little bit like, do voters care?

Like I don't actually know if there's a Democratic voter out there who's like, you know what? I actually, Republicans were going low. And I really did want us to go high in that moment. Now it seems like everyone's loving this. Exactly. And I think, you know, in a lot of ways, that was kind of the, I just remember watching the newsroom when I was in high school. And it's like, the point of that show was that Democrats always like do the right thing and that it never works out. And, you know, now it's time to shake the table a little bit.

We're going to take one more break. Hunter Harris, thank you so much for joining us. We'll be right back with Conspiracy of the Week. Welcome back to Wired Politics Lab. It is time for Conspiracy of the Week, our very favorite segment of the show where guests bring favorite conspiracies that they've come across over the last couple of weeks

or that are old school favorites, and I pick my winner. Since it's just the two of us today, Hunter, I'm already going to declare you the winner, but let's see. I think I have one that you're going to really like as well. you're the guest, please go ahead. What do you have for us? It's not breaking news, but I think I maybe kind of believe that Chloe Kardashian was O.J. Simpson's daughter. Oh, my God. Okay, wait, say more. What? I've never even heard of this. Oh, my gosh. This is like old news at this point. I'm behind. There just is a rumor that Chris Jenner and O.J. Simpson, maybe during or after the trial, we're lovers and Chloe Kardashian is the love child between them.

Has anyone ever commented on this? Like have they come up and like, no, no, no, couldn't be me. So on an episode of Keeping Up, Chloe kind of addressed the rumor and said that her parents were Robert Kardashian, Caitlin Jenner, Chris Jenner, you know, and that she doesn't, has never subscribed to this theory. But then randomly O.J. Simpson himself said that he thought Chris Jenner was like a cute girl. Oh my God. But quote, she was really nice, but I was dating supermodels. Oh my God. Also rude. Yeah, no, kind of the craziest way to respond to like a romance rumor.

But I don't know. I mean, I did read that OJ Simpson asked people to sign NDAs like on his deathbed, which I. listen, not something I would say an innocent man does. Was this part of that? I don't know. But it's just something that I think about a lot. Like, hmm. That's a good one. I'm going to go into an absolute rabbit hole on this, the minute that our recording ends.

Okay, here's mine. I am so confident that you've heard this, and I'm so confident that you probably know more about it than I do. But in the last couple of weeks, I've gotten really into the body switching conspiracies that are like pushed by the right wing about, you know, Kamala. Harris and Hillary Clinton, they're like, they're wearing masks and this is this whole thing. It's like a very Q&on, far, far right conspiracy. I found a different body switching conspiracy that I spent hours a full day, like really throwing myself into, which is the conspiracy theory that Canadian singer Avril Levine actually died in the early 2000s shortly after Let Go. And then she ended up getting replaced by a person named Melissa Vandela who is just out there posing as

Avril Levine. It like all apparently started on this Brazilian blog. There's been like a lot of Twitter threads about it. And it's become like not definitely not like accepted. This is not a widely accepted conspiracy. But like every once in a while if you're searching on Twitter or TikTok, you have like people that are like, okay, now let me tell you why I'm super confident today. And sometimes people just reference it. They're like, oh, and you know, like Avril Levine, that's not actually Avril Levine. It is wild. Have you heard about this before? Yes, I have. And I feel like you're either an Avril Levine is not alive, truther, or you're a Katie Perry is John Bonnet Ramsey truther. Like, those are the two paths before you on the internet. Hunter Harris hosts the Wondery Podcast. Let me say

this. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. You can also subscribe to her substack, which is called Hung Up. Hunter, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much. This was so fun. Thanks for listening to Wired Politics Lab. If you like what you heard today, make sure to follow the show and rate it on your podcast app of choice. We also have a newsletter which McKenna Kelly writes each week. The link to the newsletter and the Wired reporting we mentioned today are in the show notes. If you'd like to get in touch with us with any questions, comments, or show suggestions,

please, please write to us at PoliticsLab at Wired.com. That's PoliticsLab at Wired.com. We're so excited to hear from you. Wired Politics Lab is produced by Jake Harper. Pran Bandy is our studio engineer. Amar Loll mixed this episode. Stephanie Kariuki is our executive producer. Chris Bannon is Global Head of Audio at Conday Nass.

And I'm your host, Leah Figer. We'll be back in your feeds with a new episode next week. Thanks for listening, y'all. New episodes of Wired Politics Lab are available every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.