USA Today, July 2024
The word of the political moment seems to be “weird.” It may have been unprecedented that President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race about 100 days from the election, but that isn’t what has Democrats and Republicans sparring over the word “weird.” Rather, since Vice President Kamala Harris, a younger, more meme-friendly candidate has stepped in as the Democratic candidate, a host of her surrogates have started labeling her opponents Donald Trump and Sen. JD Vance as weirdos. It appears that Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, also reportedly under consideration for Harris’ running mate, may have started this wave of attacks. Here is what we know about how things got weird:
“These are weird people on the other side,” Walz says in the interview. “They wanna take books away, they wanna be in your exam room, that’s what it comes down to and don’t, you know, get sugar-coating this, these are weird ideas. Listen to them speak, listen to how they talk about things.” The following day, the Harris campaign posted an edited video of Vance’s viral remarks about Diet Mountain Dew and racism, with the caption “It’s getting weird…”. Since then, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and others in the Democratic Party have mirrored the message in news interviews.
