WASHINGTON — On a “White Dudes for Harris” virtual call, it was probably fitting that “The Dude” dropped in.
Actor Jeff Bridges addressed a fundraising event geared toward white men supporting Vice President Kamala Harris and sang her praises on Monday night, before channeling his iconic role as “The Dude” in 1998’s “The Big Lebowski,” declaring, “As the Dude might say, ‘That’s just my opinion, man.’” (The original line was “That’s just, like, your opinion, man.”)
The call lasted more than three hours and organizers said it attracted 180,000-plus people who donated more than $3.7 million. It was the latest in a series of Zoom gatherings to raise money and rally support among tens of thousands of supporters for Harris, after President Joe Biden announced he was leaving the presidential race and endorsing her.
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Zooms have previously been organized by supporters’ backgrounds — including Black women, Hispanic women, Black men, Asian Americans, Native Americans and the LGBTQ+ community.
It reflected how Democrats, including Biden, have frequently relied on voters from broad and disparate backgrounds to piece together a diverse coalition of support. The president’s 2020 victory, for example, relied on segments of the population ranging from organized labor to conservative, suburban women disillusioned with Republican Donald Trump.
The “white dudes” Zoom event also featured appearances from actors Mark Ruffalo, Mark Hamill and Bradley Whitford, who deadpanned about so many white male speakers being “a rainbow of beige.”
Also participating were Democratic officials including Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, all of whom have been mentioned as potential Harris running mates.
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Pritzker joked that he wouldn’t normally attend “an event with a name like, White Dudes for” something, while Buttigieg talked about what an honor it was to share a call with Bridges as “The Dude” before striking a more serious tone: “Men are also more free in a country where we have a president who stands up for things like access to abortion rights.”
Walz said Trump supporters aren’t inherently bad people but urged participants: “Don’t ever shy away from our progressive values. One person’s socialism is another person neighborliness.”
Ross Morales Rocketto, a progressive operative who founded the “dudes” group, said, “We know that the silent majority of white men aren’t MAGA supporters,” referring to Trump’s ”Make America Great Again” movement.
The Zoom calls haven’t been organized by Harris’ team, but her campaign welcomes the assist — and the millions of dollars in fundraising. “Winning campaigns are powered by real, organic support,” said Harris campaign communications director Michael Tyler.
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Amit Ahuja, a political science professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara whose research focus includes the processes of inclusion and exclusion in multiethnic societies, said that “no campaign’s going to say no” to groups from different backgrounds organizing themselves and bolstering enthusiasm and fundraising.
But he said that it is up to the candidate to accept support from individual groups while offering a larger personal story that can resonate with the larger country as a whole. An example, he said, is then-candidate Barack Obama, who rose above early campaign questions about racial identities to build a narrative around his personal story and hope.
“This is a challenge for both sides. This is a tight race. They both have to compile the largest possible coalition. And, by leaning into one identity or the other, they could actually really hurt themselves,” Ahuja said. He said the best response is to urge voters to “look at the candidate, don’t look at the groups.”
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The calls for Harris often feature celebrities who have supported Biden’s campaign in the past. And their sheer number demonstrates how the vice president will need to appeal to different facets of the increasingly pluralistic population.
The political networking group “Win With Black Women” held a Zoom meeting the same night that Biden dopped out, and saw its number of participants swell to more than 44,000. It featured celebratory speeches from activists, business leaders, members of Congress and staff from the vice president’s office.
After that, a “Win With Black Men” virtual fundraising event attracted more than 53,000 attendees. They heard several presentations, including by 27-year-old Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost of Florida, who had been a leading advocate for Biden’s campaign among younger voters, and Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock.
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A Zoom of “White Women for Harris” attracted more than 164,000 participants — so many that the platform struggled to meet the demand. It was headlined by the likes of singer Pink, soccer star Megan Rapinoe and actor Connie Britton.
Trump’s campaign has also organized different groups of supporters by their distinct backgrounds, including events in battleground states like Pennsylvania and Georgia for Black voters and “Latino Americans for Trump.”
Some Republicans have criticized Harris for her “diversity, equality and inclusion politics,” arguing that the vice president’s political career was helped by Democratic efforts to promote diversity. That’s despite House Speaker Mike Johnson and other GOP leaders on Capitol Hill discouraging lines of criticism that they considered racist and sexist — instead urging members of the party to focus their criticisms on Harris’ political record.
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North Carolina Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, who announced he didn’t want to be considered as Harris’ running mate just before Monday’s night call began, asked those assembled about GOP attacks, “A DEI candidate?”
“Here’s what they’re saying, that women and people of color don’t deserve to lead,” Cooper said. “We know better than that, guys.”
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Associated Press writers Matt Brown in Washington and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.
