The announcement of Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential run following Joe Biden’s exit from the race has ignited a whirlwind of reactions across the internet, particularly within the LGBTQ community. Within hours, queer people flooded social media with cheeky videos and memes celebrating Harris’s candidacy.
A particularly popular video supercut of Harris laughing, set to Charli XCX’s song from the album “Brat,” quickly gained over 1.3 million views. Photos and videos surfaced of men at Fire Island Pines, a queer-friendly beach on New York’s Long Island, donning cropped T-shirts in lime green — the color of Charli XCX’s album — with “Kamala” emblazoned in the album’s typeface. “BRAT Kamala shirts already on Fire Island. The gays move SO FAST,” one user noted.
Support for Harris blossomed in various creative forms. LGBTQ individuals shared their enthusiasm through memes and videos, with many referring to Harris as “mother” in campy, queer-coded posts. One user on X proclaimed, “BIDEN IS OUT! MOTHER KAMALA… IT’S YOUR TIME,” while another quipped, “knee deep in the passenger’s seat and biden dropped out is it kamala now?” referencing lyrics from queer pop icon Chappell Roan.
On TikTok, a user resurrected comparisons between Harris and Bette Porter, the power lesbian character from “The L Word,” suggesting, “Bette Porter walked so Madam President Kamala Harris could runnnn.” Meanwhile, another speech Harris gave, which referenced coconuts, became linked to trans pop artist Kim Petras’ song “Coconuts,” with the coconut emoji becoming a symbol of support for Harris. “All aboard the coconut express!!!” a person wrote on X, accompanying a video of Harris set to RuPaul’s “Call Me Mother.”
Offline, Harris’s candidacy garnered support from LGBTQ rights groups, including the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy organization. The group highlighted her efforts as California’s attorney general to abolish the gay/trans panic defense, which had previously allowed those accused of homicide to receive lesser sentences by claiming panic upon discovering a victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity.
Harris’s campaign also received endorsements from 10 of the 12 openly LGBTQ members of Congress, such as Senators Tammy Baldwin and Laphonza Butler, and Representatives Angie Craig, Ritchie Torres, Becca Balint, and Mark Takano.
However, Harris’s bid has not been without criticism within the LGBTQ community. Some individuals criticized her for supporting the Biden administration’s policies on the Israel-Hamas conflict. “Kamala, you will have our votes when you end U.S. support of genocide in Gaza. Simple as that,” drag performer and activist Pattie Gonia posted on Instagram.
Moreover, Harris faced scrutiny for her past actions as California’s attorney general, notably her 2015 decision to block a trans woman from receiving gender-affirming surgery while in prison. At an LGBTQ presidential forum in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in 2019, Harris addressed this issue, stating that she had worked behind the scenes to change the California Department of Corrections’ policy on denying trans inmates such care. “I commit to you that always in these systems there are going to be these things that these agencies do. And I will commit myself, as I always have, to dealing with it,” Harris reassured.