“I don’t know what’s wrong with you young people. You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?”
So began the viral meme that would become a trending TikTok sound and a cornerstone of then-presidential hopeful Kamala Harris’s digital campaign to win over youth voters: her memory of a quote from her mother.
Official account KamalaHQ posted viral memes proclaiming “Kamala is Brat” in the iconic Charli-XCX-Brat-summer-green-and-black and reposting musical remixes of the coconut tree line. Harris’s running mate Tim Walz leaned into the camo and neon aesthetics of another pop star, the Midwest Princess herself, Chappell Roan. It was all part of a calculated effort to reach Gen-Z in their native habitat: the digital world…