‘Like a rainbow of beige’: Liberal ‘white dudes’ rally for Harris

First came the Black women, who had been meeting every week for four years and were ready to spring into action for Kamala Harris. Then came the Black men and South Asian Americans. There were also the white women, in a Zoom-busting paroxysm of solidarity and angst.

On Monday night, the string of identity groups backing Harris reached its bizarre, and perhaps inevitable, apotheosis with the inaugural meeting of the aptly named “White Dudes for Harris.”

Joseph Gordon-Levitt on the White Dudes for Harris call.

“What a variety of whiteness we have here,” marvelled Bradley Whitford, a West Wing actor, his tongue firmly in cheek as he opened his remarks to the 60,000 or so attendees who had gathered on a live video call to show their support and raise money for Harris’ nascent presidential campaign. “It’s like a rainbow of beige.”

The call, put together by a few Democratic organisers (and not affiliated with the Harris campaign), was billed as a moment of solidarity, a chance to prove that former president Donald Trump doesn’t own the votes of white men or speak for them.

The speakers included two white dudes on the shortlist to be Harris’s running mate — Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg — as well as singers Josh Groban and Lance Bass and actors Mark Hamill and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper was there, in a suit and tie, and Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker was too, cracking jokes about J.D. Vance.

Since President Joe Biden dropped out of the race and backed Harris, just over a week ago, there has been a rush of Democratic enthusiasm behind her — momentum that some have likened to Barack Obama’s first presidential run.

But the country has changed since 2008, and so has the Democratic Party.

Since Trump entered the political scene, Democrats have watched in frustration as Republicans have pushed white identity politics to the cultural foreground. At the same time, Republicans have accused Democrats of amplifying racial divisions through “anti-racism” training and mantras such as “Check your privilege.”

But in a little more than a week, united behind a likely nominee who is Black, South Asian and a woman, the long-suffering Democratic Party and its supporters seem to be hitting upon a robust response, tapping into distinct cultural and ethnic identities — and also learning to poke gentle fun at themselves.

The mood in the “White Dudes for Harris” group chat, initiated late last week in the WhatsApp messenger, was positively giddy for days, with organisers sharing John Cena memes, jokes about beer and words of support.

Before Monday’s call, Ross Morales Rocketto, a Democratic organiser who helped start the group, acknowledged the discomfort some might feel about the group’s name.

“I don’t blame them,” he said in an interview. “Throughout American history, there’s a lot of evidence to suggest that when white men organise, it’s often with pointy hats on, and it doesn’t end well.”

“What we are really trying to do is engage a group of people that the left has largely ignored for the last few years,” Morales Rocketto said. “There’s a silent majority of white men who aren’t MAGA Republicans, and we haven’t done anything to try to capture those votes.”

The group, he said, was inspired by the success of “Win With Black Women,” a weekly call of prominent Black women who had, in the hours after Biden’s July 21 announcement, raised $US1.5 million for Harris.

Roy Cooper was among those on the White Dudes for Harris call.Credit: AP

Since then, “Win With Black Men,” “Latino Men for Kamala,” “South Asian Men for Harris” and other identity groups have popped up to host their own calls aimed at raising money to support Harris’ campaign.

On Thursday night came “White Women: Answer the Call 2024,” which drew more than 150,000 people to a Zoom meeting that crashed the platform and, according to its planners, raised more than $US8 million. (The “White Dudes for Harris” call, at the end of its three-hour, 20-minute run, had brought in more than $US4 million.)

Actress Connie Britton jokingly called the women’s group “Karens for Kamala.” Several speakers observed, with shame, that white women had dropped the ball in 2016, and emphasised the importance of using their privilege to fight for freedom and justice alongside Black women. Author Glennon Doyle urged women to get engaged in political organisations, and tearfully described conversations with her therapist and her sister about her fear of getting cancelled if she says the wrong thing.

“Spoiler alert,” Doyle said, paraphrasing her sister. “If we stay quiet and don’t fight, we are all getting mass-cancelled on January 20, 2025, anyway.”

In an interview Monday, the group’s organiser, Shannon Watts, a founder of Moms Demand Action, called the meeting “a reckoning, more than a rally.” She added: “This was meant to be a conversation about the regrets we have about what happened in 2016, and also the need for white women to pull their weight, and they haven’t been.”

Before Monday’s “White Dudes for Harris” call, there was some predictable backlash from the Trump camp. “They should give it a more fitting name like: Cucks for Kamala,” Donald Trump Jr. posted on the social platform X, using a term popular in some far-right circles for a weak or submissive man.

(Morales Rocketto sighed: “For whatever reason, the Republican Party has really leaned into being creeps.“)

Kicking off the “White Dudes for Harris” call was, of course, the Dude, actor Jeff Bridges, abiding in a comfortable-looking chair. He had seen a link for the “White Dudes for Harris” trucker hat and wanted one. “I qualify!” he said. “I am white. I am a dude. And I love Harris!”

He added, “A woman president, how exciting!”

Then came Buttigieg, in a shirt and tie, expressing excitement about following the Dude. “The vibes right now are incredible.”

He somehow got whiter: “What’s really filling my sails right now,” he said, was Harris’ focus on “positive things,” particularly “freedom.”

Later on the call, Reprentative Adam Schiff, who is running for Senate this year, held up a Big Lebowski bobblehead and, after encouraging viewers to “smash” the donation button, signed off with “Thanks, Dudes!”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.