Kamala Harris' Call Her Daddy Cameo
Vice President Kamala Harris went on Alex Cooper's podcast, which has massive clout with young women. Here's why it matters...
For those of you who don’t know, Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy podcast (and the brand she’s built around it) has massive clout with a huge swath of young women. The podcast ranked second on Spotify’s most listened to list last year, just after Joe Rogan’s, and according to Spotify, is the “most-listened to” for young women.
After critiques that she hasn’t been doing enough interviews (including with legacy media), Harris taped an interview with Cooper last week that went live today. Some Republicans are criticizing Harris for taping the podcast amid the Hurricane Helene devastation in North Carolina — and some who feel Harris should be doing more legacy media interviews are still upset that Harris chose to sit down with Cooper over a traditional journalist.
In addition to her podcast, Cooper has 3.2 million followers on Instagram and 2.1 million on TikTok. The Call Her Daddy Instagram has another 2.4 million on Instagram and 3.9 million on TikTok. Her reach is massive, and she’s built a next-generation media brand that’s emblematic of what younger consumers (and voters) crave. It’s personality driven, but wildly substantive.
While Harris is already polling well amongst young women especially (the Harvard IOP poll has her up 47 points over Trump amongst young women under 30), a campaign spokesperson said last week that the goal of going on Call Her Daddy was to reach these voters in battleground states. They emphasized that the conversation would focus on reproductive healthcare access (though at the start of the episode Cooper said no topic was off limits for the interview).
In listening sessions and conversations with young women in recent months, they’ve told me they want to see Harris open up more; to be more authentic. Cooper’s known for raw interviews, often about relationships, sex, and mental health. So it seemed to me like a natural fit.
It’s also a contrast to former President Donald Trump going on the podcasts of Logan Paul and Theo Von, who are known to attract male audiences. This could all further bolster the “gender election,” which is already playing out.
In the intro to her episode with Harris, Cooper said she reached out to Trump, and that "if he also wants to have a meaningful in-depth conversation about women's rights in this country, then he is welcome on Call Her Daddy anytime."
I’ll share specifics of the Call Her Daddy episode below, but my high level takeaway is this…
There are a number of young women for whom Call Her Daddy is their go-to source for entertainment. The fact that Harris is talking directly to them, through an interview with their trusted messenger, Cooper, matters. By going on the podcast, Harris could reach viewers who she isn’t elsewhere. Some have wondered why Harris would go on a show that isn’t political — that’s exactly the point.
‘My goal today is not to change your political affiliation’
At the start of the episode, Cooper sat face to camera and laid out in plain terms why she decided to do the interview with the vice president.
“As you guys know I do not usually discuss politics or have politicians on this show,” she said. “I want Call Her Daddy to be a place that everyone feels comfortable tuning in. Every single week I talk about topics like mental health, relationships, sex, sexuality, trauma. Overall my focus is women and the day to day issues that we face.”
“I had been going back and forth with this decision for a while. To get involved, or to not get involved. But at the end of the day, I couldn’t see a world in which one of the main conversations in this election is women, and I’m not a part of it,” Cooper told her listeners.
“I have a very mixed audience when it comes to politics. So please hear me when I say my goal today is not to change your political affiliation. What I’m hoping is that you’re able to listen to a conversation that isn’t too different than the one’s that we’re having here every week,” she said.
For those of us who have been following this race obsessively, the content in the interview wasn’t particularly new or surprising. But that’s not Call Her Daddy’s audience, and that was the point.
At the start of the interview, Harris shared why she wanted to join Cooper for the sit-down.
“You and your listeners have really got this thing right. Which is, one of the best ways to communicate with people is to be real, you know, and to talk about the things that people really care about. I mean, what I love about what you do is that your voice and your show is really about your listeners. And I think especially now, this is a moment in the country and in life where people really want to know they’re seen and heard. And that they’re part of a community,” Harris said, showing that she has at least somewhat of an understanding of Cooper’s audience - her “Daddy Gang,” as she refers to it (Harris in the episode referred to the “Daddy Gang” too, which made some online laugh).
The format of the episode mirrored that of any other Call Her Daddy episode, which is important, too. Cooper even wore a trademark sweatshirt, which she does in most of her interviews (especially recently).
On to the substance…
The brunt of the interview focused on women’s rights, Harris’ work on domestic violence, and sexism in the 2024 race — the area Cooper said she was leaning into at the start of the episode because that’s her niche. It’s her lane.
Harris spoke about her experience as a prosecutor specializing in sexual assault cases and her work with domestic violence cases since the start of her career. She also spoke about the state of women’s rights in America today and the reproductive healthcare landscape in a post-Roe America.
Asked how to make the country safer for women, Harris rooted her answer in the need for “economic freedom” for women.
“When a woman and particularly if she has children, if she is economically reliant on her abuser, she is less likely to leave, because most women will endure whatever personal, physical pain they must in order to make sure their kids have a roof over their head or food,” she said. “So one of the ways we know that women are able to walk away from abuse, and there are many layers to her being able to do that, but one of them is does she have the economic freedom to be able to do that.”
At the end of the interview, Cooper asked Harris a critical question for her demographic: “How will you help young people not feel left behind?”
“It’s a very real issue and we need to take it seriously and I do take it very seriously. So there are a number of issues that contribute to that feeling,” Harris said, before sharing her proposals to boost first-time home buyers with $25,000 for a down-payment as well as tax credits for new parents ($6,000) and small business owners.
Cooper also asked about the push for student debt relief, which the vice president said she will “continue to fight for.”
All in all, after hearing young people say for weeks that they are craving more talk about plans and policies from Harris, this seems like a good start. Harris needs young people, including young women, in her coalition to win, and it’s clear her campaign is prioritizing outreach to them in the final stretch of the campaign. The question moving forward is will she do more face-to-camera conversations like this, or post face-to-camera explainer style videos on TikTok to make sure young voters are hearing her plans for the issues that matter to them most (including, mainly, how she plans to set them up for their futures)?
There is real merit to both of the presidential candidates (and down ballot candidates too, for that matter) expanding their reach with younger voters by sitting down for interviews like these.
For his part, CJ Pearson, co-chair of the Republican National Committee’s youth advisory council and a content creator himself, suggested Trump take Cooper up on her offer for an interview.
“This might be an unpopular opinion to some but he absolutely should. We won’t win in November by only talking to those who agree with us,” Pearson said in a post on X (twitter).