by WorldTribune Staff, November 8, 2024 Contract With Our Readers

Voters gonna vote.

For the great majority, who they vote for and why is not influenced by a celebrity endorsement.

That didn’t stop the Kamala Harris campaign from amplifying every endorsement from a bevy of actors, singers, and athletes.

Oprah’s endorsement did not tip the scales for Kamala Harris. / Video Iamge

Oprah, Katy Perry, Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Madonna, Ariana Grande, Harrison Ford, Bruce Springsteen, and LeBron James were just a few.

Oh, and Taylor Swift.

How’d that work out for Harris?

A poll from YouGov shortly after Swift’s endorsement found that only 8% of voters would be “somewhat” or “much more” likely to vote for Harris – but 20% said the endorsement actually made them less likely to vote for the Democrat.

Why did all those big names have so little impact, if any?

Writing for The Guardian on Nov. 6, Tim Jonze noted: “The view that celebrities are so divorced from real life that they’re not worth listening to is encapsulated by a brief Ricky Gervais video posted in June, which resurfaced as a viral meme just before the election.”

In the video, Gervais says: “As a celebrity, I know all about stuff like science and politics so trust me when I tell you who you should vote for. If you don’t vote the right way, it’s like a hate crime and that makes me sad and angry and I’ll leave the country and you don’t want that.”

The cool factor attached to a celebrity endorsement is used to attract younger voters. But Harris underperformed with “almost every kind of young person,” wrote Peter Hamby in Puck.

“Despite the Brat Summer hype, all the clever and demure posts from KamalaHQ, and the promise of generational change, in the end it turned out that Gen Z wasn’t very interested in Kamala Harris,” Hamby wrote.

Harris actually underperformed on old white guy Joe Biden’s 2020 numbers with young voters.

It’s not likely Barbra Streisand or Beyonce are affected by the price of gas or the inability to buy a first home, as New York University arts professor Laurence F. Maslon told the The Guardian.

“I think endorsements have probably always done more for the celebrity than the person being endorsed. I think sometimes it’s a way to hitch your star to somebody who seems to be good for you, and maybe there’s a certain kind of reflected glory in that,” Maslon said. “Even if you look at, say, Sinatra’s endorsement of John F Kennedy, that was probably more of a big deal for Sinatra, because it allowed him to get a seat at the table and he probably thought it would help him achieve that next level of stardom.”

In 2024, in fact, the biggest celebrity impact on the 2024 presidential campaign may have been George Clooney’s op-ed in The New York Times in which he called on Biden to drop out.

Clooney wrote: “We are not going to win in November with this president. This isn’t only my opinion; this is the opinion of every senator and Congress member and governor who I’ve spoken with in private.”

Soon after Clooney’s op-ed, the Democrat Party forced Biden out and installed Harris as the candidate. Clooney eagerly endorsed her.

Following Donald Trump’s resounding victory over Harris, one user posted to X: “I would like to take a moment to thank George Clooney for shoving the most incompetent candidate down America’s throat to ensure a Trump victory.”

Another wrote: “Trump should not forget to thank the Hollywood celebrities. Especially George Clooney.”

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ESPN sports pundit Stephen A. Smith said Harris’s celebrity supporters contributed to her defeat.

“In the end, celebrities, who are worth hundreds of millions, if not billions, who most American citizens feel are incredibly detached from their way of life and their quality of life, were not going to get away and guilt them into doing something different than what their experience says is going on and what they should do about it,” Smith said on the Wednesday edition of the Stephen A. Smith Show.

Smith then played a clip of Oprah telling voters that if they don’t vote for Harris they will never have the opportunity to vote again.

“This is the kind of stuff that alienates an electorate, alienates a voter,” Smith said. “Because the freedom that you tell them you have, you try to confiscate morally by letting them know, you ain’t worth a damn unless you vote the way we say you should vote. Who’s going to go for that in a general election? With an economy rife with inflation, with over 12 million people crossing the border … the value of their dollars dissipating before our very eyes.”

So, in the end, what exactly did trotting out all those celebrities do for the Harris campaign?

Apparently, put it $20 million in debt.

That’s right, the campaign that raised over $1 billion in a short period of time would up in debt, Politico reported.

Jen O’Malley Dillon, the Harris campaign chair reportedly “blew through a billion dollars in a few months,” a campaign staffer told Breitbart news.

O’Malley Dillon reportedly prioritized the concerts with celebrities “at the expense of” other campaign priorities such as “spending money on social media,” the Harris campaign staffer said.

Robby Soave and Emily Jashinsky had a good take on the celebrity endorsement angle in a YouTube video:

Bonus:

Sponsor a butthurt Hollywood celebrity for just $8 per month.pic.twitter.com/Kbi5TZyYK4

— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) November 8, 2024

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  2024 election, The celebrity endorsement: How are Democrats gonna shake this one off?, WorldTribune.com

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