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The X account for “White Dudes for Harris” was briefly suspended on Monday as the group held an online fundraising rally for Kamala Harris – sparking outrage and prompting the organizer to accuse Elon Musk of getting “scared.”
A group of almost 200,000 Democrats, including Hollywood stars and potential running mates, met on a Zoom call on Monday evening to voice their support for Harris’ White House run.
The star-studded online rally raked in more than $3.5m in donations, adding to the $200m haul that Harris’ campaign raised in the first week of her run for the Oval Office.
But, the organizers soon learned that the X account, titled @dudes4harris, had been suspended.
Ross Morales Rocketto, an entrepreneur who runs a “progressive” political recruitment company and one of the organizers of the rally, posted from his personal account that Elon Musk must have got “scared”.
“Got @elonmusk scared,” Rocketto wrote on his personal X account along with a screenshot showing the account’s suspension.
A backup account called @dudesforharris was quickly formed as a replacement while social media users voiced outrage at the group being silenced.
Musk, who has previously described himself as a “free speech absolutist”, publicly endorsed Donald Trump this month and has since posted a doctored video of Harris on X – an apparent violation of his own platform’s rules.
The replacement White Dudes for Harris account quickly racked up 20,000 followers before the original account appeared to be unsuspended.
Got @elonmusk scared. https://t.co/HBwT5KqLmZ
— Ross Morales Rocketto (@RossMoRock) July 30, 2024
The reason for the account being blocked is currently unclear and Musk is yet to publicly comment.
The Independent has reached out to both X and White Dudes for Harris for comment.
In the 2020 election, Musk supported President Joe Biden’s campaign before switching allegiance to Trump this year, announcing he did “fully endorse” him after the shooting earlier this month.
The increasingly conservative tech mogul continues to be a staunch critic of both Harris and the Democrats more broadly.
White Dudes for Harris was created in the wake of the vice president kicking off her run for the White House earlier this month, noting that caucasian men play a prominent role in shaping the political landscape.
In 2020, Trump garnered a 17-point margin among white male voters over Biden, securing 57 per cent of the vote to the Democrats’ 40 per cent, according to data from Pew Research Center.
The White Dudes for Harris website reads that it vows to cut “through the MAGA crap” of Trump’s conservative support base.
“White men have a role to play to elect VP Harris, and we can’t sit on the sidelines anymore,” Rocketto said on LinkedIn over the weekend.
The Zoom call featured elected officials including North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper – who has bowed out of the running as Harris’ potential running mate – former House majority leader Steny Hoyer and potential vice president pick Pete Buttigieg was also on the call.
Cooper, along with others on the call, pushed back against conservatives’ accusations that Harris was a “DEI [diversity ethnicity and inclusion] hire”, saying: “We know better than that, guys.”
Hollywood stars Mark Ruffalo, Josh Gad, Sean Astin, Mark Hamill, and Jeff Bridges – who played ‘The Dude’ in Coen brothers’ 1998 hit, The Big Lebowski – also joined the call.
“I’m white, I’m a dude and I’m for Harris,” Bridges said on the call.
Star Trek Director JJ Abrams reportedly personally chipped in $50,000 to the campaign.
